Peter Gostelow
Adventure cycling, Photography, Writing
The Big Africa Cycle goes live
It’s been a while in the waiting, but earlier this week my new website finally went live. There is still some work to be done, but it’s obviously a work in progress as The Big Africa Cycle gets...
Read MoreTake a seat
Documenting a bicycle tour with a video camera seems to be increasingly popular. Dominic gill did just that whilst riding the length of the Americas. What separates this tour however is that he chose to ride solo...
Read MoreFree Wheels East
It seemed like we’d been biking for ages. We had been biking for ages. The port of Dunkirk was nowhere near Dunkirk itself. Somewhere within the bowels of our minds we did remember it being a bit of a way...
Read MoreTake On Africa
I’m not the only Englishman who’s making a trans-African bicycle expedition this year, but I’m fairly sure Helen Lloyd is the only English woman. She set off from home several days ago and is...
Read MoreThe Cross Canada Project.
I recently came across this interesting film. To independently make something like this requires real effort. The Cross Canada Project: Documenting a Bicycle Tour Across Canada from mike beauchamp on...
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Filling up. Borehole pumps, like this one pictured, are a bit of a life saver when it comes to cycling through Africa. Most of the time you will find women and children filling up buckets and jerry cans, which may then be carried on foot for long distances. Collecting water is rarely ever done by men, although many borehole pumps, particularly in populated communities, are managed. This means that the pump may be locked at times to prevent constant usage throughout the day and night. Those with the key and padlock are often men, at least that was my experience. Typically a pump in such a place may be open for access for 2 hours in the morning, and 2 hours in the late afternoon.
🕑💧
Whenever I passed a busy borehole pump I almost always stopped, unless my bottles were completely full. The coastal regions of Mozambique are low lying and very hot, so I usually carried 4-5 litres of water in the day, and more if it was late and I planned to camp with no knowledge of whether I would find water. As I mentioned a few posts back, water in these pumps is almost always safe to drink, and because it has often come from deep in the ground, it's refreshingly cool.
🚿🚿
A queuing system was usually in place at most busy pumps, even if it wasn't very apparent for a Brit like me 😂, but as I was usually only filling no more than 10 litres, people didn't mind me jumping the queue, and there was usually an energetic helper to pump while I held my bottle beneath the tap, or visa versa.
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Many borehole pumps in Africa have been funded by outside NGOs, so there may be a sign next to a pump saying who paid for it. In more populated and urban communities people pay for water, but in small villages, which is often where I filled up, there was no fee, at least to my knowledge.
_🇲🇿😂💪🚲😰☀🔥
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