Old Legs Tour Angola 2024 – Day 33

Our mission is to Have Fun and Do Epic, but most importantly, it is to Do Good.  For this, we need to raise a significant amount of money each year, which goes towards life-saving surgeries, emergency operations, chronic medications and ongoing support for elderly people who, through no fault of their own, have been left destitute after years of working hard and contributing to pension funds that were literally obliterated in two brutal hyper-inflations. These wonderful, dignified old folk who have never had to ask for a cent before, are in dire straits, and they need our help!  Every dollar counts – and if every person who read a blog and enjoyed it would donate just $1 to OLT, we can reach our final goal for the Angola 2024 Tour.

Please donate – you will be helping to change lives on an epic scale with your donation, no matter how small.  Help us to make this journey last longer than a month, be more significant than a mountain and more enduring than the memory.  Do it now and be a tangible part of the power behind the pedals.

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If you can’t donate, please share the link with someone who can – the more people we reach, the more lives we can touch.  Help us Do Good.

If you donate, we can promise that every cent will be spent on the pensioners.  The Old Legs is manned by volunteers.  And for those living abroad, we can facilitate tax-deductible certificates.

And if you have already donated – thank you, thank you, thank you.

And now…back to the bonus day blog!

The beautiful but tough ride up the Serra Da Leba , with its tortuous route from the base along the steep contours, climaxing in seven sharp switchbacks and a steep final ramp to the Da Leba restaurant and campsite was meant to be the final challenge of the tour.  Haha.  As is only fitting and right for a final day’s effort, the 40km ride uphill from the Serra Da Leba to the Cristo Rei was an even bigger challenge and needed every ounce of reserve to complete what has been an Epic, Fun Tour that has and will do so much Good.

After a round of hugs and congratulations we felt compelled to express gratitude for the privilege of completing this ride. We offered prayers to Cristo Rei, thanking Him for our safe arrival. We also prayed for Laurie Watermeyer’s full recovery, missing him still, especially so his brother Ali. And we asked that those of us who had suffered injury or illness would be quickly restored to full health.

Then, in true Old Legs style,  we celebrated under the watchful, and we hope, approving eyes of the giant Cristo Rei statue, with a feast of Hungry Lion chicken and chips and Cuca beers bought for us by the ever-thoughtful Linda and Laurie.

From the summit of Cristo Rei, Lubango, Angola’s second-largest city, sprawls out, 500 metres below, a vast expanse of tiny buildings on a plateau.  The city, like a miniature model, is visible in its entirety from up here – buildings, homes, streets, vehicles, trees, and even the airport.

Earlier, back at the Serra da Leba, Keegan had terrified us all with his idea of a celebration. He decided a handstand on a rock was a good idea.  And normally that would be perfectly fine.  But this particular rock was precariously balanced on another small rock, which was balancing delicately on another.  And they were all balancing on the edge of a sheer cliff, hundreds of meters above a rocky, turbulent river.

The wind howled, Troy yelled at him to stop (but kept filming anyway), and Adam, frantically searching for a deterrent, threatened to call Keegan’s mom (Yes, the Titan has a human mum.  No, it didn’t work.) A pair of terrified tourists clung to each other, while Jaime fled the scene. Keegan, defying gravity and common sense, arched his back and lifted his legs straight up in a death-defying salute to the Serra da Leba switchbacks across the canyon. Miraculously, he didn’t plunge to his doom and is still with us!

Our afternoon was shared with a bunch of climbers harking from all corners of the world. The restaurant’s owner, Luis, a passionate climber himself, was hosting Angola’s first-ever climbing festival. With the help of Dave and Nathan from the UK and USA, he was training locals and beginners in the adrenalin sport. Their spirit of adventure resonated with our own and Luis invited us to join them.  He quickly prepared not only 30 meals for the climbers but also 16 generous portions of chicken and chips for us, all without breaking a sweat.It was delicious, and we can highly recommend this stop for any travellers.  We left Luis with a set of coasters and a ride jersey in gratitude. The cost for meal, accommodation and facilities for 16 hungry Old Leggers? $100 all in! How?

Most of us were too exhausted from the day to party after dinner. Except for the media crew, we all headed straight to our sleeping bags. The media crew, however, never rests. As always, they spent the evening reviewing thousands of photos and videos they had taken, as well as those submitted by riders and other crew members. They also continued shooting and producing even more stunning (and potentially award-winning) photos, some of which have already been posted.

The next morning, we reluctantly rose late from our sleeping bags (dawn is late for us), packed up camp, and by mid-morning were ready to set off for Namibe and the sea. Before reaching the coast, however, we had a score to settle with the monster mountain. We decided to ride it downhill.  The rule was: ‘no pedalling after the first switchback. We uplift from where the bike stops.’

It took us 50 minutes to freewheel down, at times reaching speeds of over 50kph, brakes on. We all came to a wobbly stop within 5 meters of each other, about 22 kilometres from the first switchback. The spot where we stopped was just 50 meters from our starting point the day before, confirming that it had indeed been a relentless uphill climb.

Happy to have conquered the red-eyed beast, we uplifted, and the journey was filled with stories about the previous day and the adventures we had shared. Despite the hours it took to reach our beach stop at The Oasis, Namibe, time flew by.

The Oasis is another Angolan gem. This beachfront oasis features laid-back armchairs crafted from old fishing boats, a sandy beach, and a bar playing Bob Marley tunes. The perfect place to relax with a cerveja and watch the waves roll in.

As if to mark the arrival of The Old Legs, the spring tide had wreaked havoc on the Oasis. It turns out the massive waves we’d seen at Soba a few days before were not standard fare- the blood moon had brought up the highest tide for a decade and the previous night it had demolished one of the beach bars- a double-storey wooden affair with bar, toilets, kitchen…the lot…Today, whilst we were playing beach volleyball, we heard a loud CRACK and saw the complete wooden ship, held aloft on a wooden platform as a showpiece prop, fall on its side and slip into the rising tide. It has stood proudly there for 10 years – a signature symbol of this gorgeous place – what are the odds it collapsed today of all days?

Tomorrow is a rest day, meaning we can’t rest as we have to do “The big clean up” which entails cleaning everything we can ahead of the return journey and the day after that, half our number will leave by plane to return to Harare whilst the rest will set out to drive Christopher and his two Isuzu buddies the thousands of kilometres back home.

We are so happy to know that many thousands of people have been following the Old Legs Angola Tour, hopefully, all inspired by what a bunch of slightly stubborn, definitely crazy, mostly Old Legs can accomplish. Imagine how much more we can accomplish with your help.  Please donate.  It will mean the world to some very special people in Zimbabwe!

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Until the next update from the road,

Have Fun.  Do Good.  Do Epic.