My life totally changed in my mid-20s when a casual invitation to a wedding in India unexpectedly became six months of travel through South Asia. Upon my return to the USA, I realized I was addicted and decided to travel the world full-time. The next target of my travels became Africa, where I planned to cross the continent from Cape Town, South Africa, to Cairo, Egypt. I was a year into that journey, having just ridden a single-speed bicycle across Botswana and the Kalahari Desert, poring over maps of the continent and planning my route north, when I came across what would become my next challenge: Lake Tanganyika.Sandwiched between the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the west and Tanzania to the east, the lake is 418 miles long and up to 4,820 feet deep. It is not only the longest and largest of the African Rift Valley lakes, it is the longest, second largest by volume, and second deepest body of fresh water on the planet. As I learned more about this natural wonder, I couldn’t get it out of my head and began dreaming up ideas of how to explore it for myself. The plan I came up with was to paddle the length of the lake, south to north, solo, in a locally built wooden boat. .
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I am absolutely exhausted just from reading this story! I will never again complain about those very infrequent occasions when I have to bail insignificant (compared to what Scott suffered) amounts of water from my Adirondack guide boat.
Wonderful story. Stories of inexperienced and underprepared adventures done on the smell of an oily rag are always much more interesting and remind me of my own foolish adventuress leading to shipwreck on a remote island in New Guinea. How interesting it was to read the still-primitive nature of boatbuilding in Africa. I spent many years in New Guinea and the Solomon Islands and their canoes were of much better quality that those described in the article
Terrific adventure! When was this trip undertaken? What would the conditions there be like now?
I agree with Steve as I too am exhausted from reading the story. Sometimes we lose sight at what we really have and take it for granted.
A well done trip. Thumbs up!
Not to be a Debbie Downer, but what happens when he turns 66. He needs to put all those skills into a bag and move to Maine and run a boatyard.
Great to read your story. I was doing some research for a friend who is with a bicycle from Windhoek to Nairobi. I found him while I was traveling with a Toyota Hillux. You were with a boat. Whatever you do, the important thing is to do something with your life : to live and to learn. You didn’t reach your destination as planned but this wasn’t in no way a failure. All experiences help us forward in a way that we sometimes only understand much later. I also like your writing style by the way.