The Jubilee Bike Ride 2013 finally kicked-off at the Junction Mall on a chilly, rainy morning of December 12 2013. The riders, after a colourful flag-off by Pastor Faith of Nairobi Chapel, began an epic journey that would now see them head south through 11 African border crossings to Cape town, South Africa.

The political unrest in Egypt had necessitated a change of plan due to security concerns. Now instead of the earlier planned 10,000 KM Cairo ride, the journey had suddenly grown longer by 3,000 KM.

But this did not dampen the spirits of the 15 riders an inch. In fact that spirit was further uplifted when hundreds of bikers atop all manner of bike designs and sizes turned up on that wet morning at the flag-off to escort the Jubilee Ride 2013 team to Kajiado – it was the largest gathering of bikers ever seen in Kenya.

After riding throughout the day, the bikers arrived at the border town of Namanga at 6:00 PM and the usual customs delays here saw them enter Arusha, in Tanzania, well past 7:00 PM for a much deserved rest in readiness for next day’s ride to Dodoma through Babati and Singida.

The new route will see the team ride through the cities of Nairobi to Dar es Salaam (Tanzania), Lilongwe (Malawi); Maputo (Mozambique), Manzini (Swaziland) and finally Cape town (South Africa).

The route back from Cape town will take the riders through Gaborone (Botswana), Windhoek (Namibia), Harare (Zimbabwe), Lusaka (Zambia), Bujumbura (Burundi), Kigali (Rwanda), Kampala (Uganda) before it finally brings them back home to Kenya’s capital, Nairobi. The expected arrival date will be on 30th January 2014.

Here is a comparative analysis of the 2 trips highlighting their key differences.