The Masked Rider: Cycling In West Africa - Softcover

Peart, Neil

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1550226657 ISBN 13: 9781550226652

Verlag: ECW Press,Canada, 2004

Inhaltsangabe

Dysentery, drunken soldiers, and corrupt officials provide the background for Neil Peart's physical and spiritual cycling journey through West Africa. The prolific drummer for the rock band Rush travels through African villages, both large and small, and relates his story through photographs, journal entries, and tales of adventure, while simultaneously addressing issues such as differences in culture, psychology, and labels. Literary and artistic sidekicks such as Aristotle, Dante, and Van Gogh join Peart and his cycling companions, reminding the reader that this is not just another travel book?it is a story of both external and introspective discovery and adventure.

Über diesen Titel

Über die Autorinnen und Autoren

Neil Peart is the drummer and lyricist for the rock band Rush and the author of "Ghost Rider." He lives in Santa Monica, California.

Neil Peart is the drummer and lyricist for the rock band Rush and the author of "Ghost Rider." He lives in Santa Monica, California.

Neil Peart was the drummer and lyricist of the legendary rock band Rush and the author of Ghost Rider, Traveling Music, Roadshow, Far and Away, Far and Near, Far and Wide, and, with Kevin J. Anderson, Clockwork Angels and Clockwork Lives.

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The Masked Rider

Cycling in West Africa

By Neil Peart

ECW PRESS

Copyright © 2004 Neil Peart
All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-55022-665-2

CHAPTER 1

Inferno

The first traveler's tale of Cameroon reaches us from the fifth century B.C., when the Phoenician explorer Hanno led an expedition around the west coast of Africa. His fleet of sixty ships reached present-day Senegal, and Hanno attempted to land there, but was soon driven back by the local warriors. He sailed on past forested mountains and wide rivers, afraid to go ashore because of the hippopotamuses and crocodiles (it would appear Hanno wasn't the most stalwart of explorers). He came upon an island which looked safe at first, but when he tried to land he was frightened off again, this time by "fires and strange music." And once more he ran away, stating,

Sailing quickly away thence, we passed by a country burning with fires and perfumes and streams of fire supplied then fell into the sea. The country was impassable on account of the great heat. We sailed quickly thence being much terrified and passing on for four days we discovered at night a country full of fire. In the middle was a lofty fire which seemed to touch the stars.

Next morning, just before Hanno "sailed quickly away" again, this time for home, he saw a mountain of fire which he named Theon Ochema: the Chariot of the Gods. Being "much terrified," Hanno was no doubt given to exaggeration, but Mount Cameroon, the only live volcano in West Africa, is said to be that great mountain of fire which kept the tourists out of Cameroon for another two thousand years.

Then, in the sixteenth century, the Portuguese navigator Vasco da Gama cruised by and dropped anchor in the Wouri River. He stood at the rail and admired the small crustaceans in the water, and decided to name the river after them: Rio-des-Cameroes, "River of Prawns." Thus the Portuguese called their "discovery" Cameroes, until 1887 when the Germans claimed the land and called it Kamerun. After World War I it was taken from Germany and divided between the French, who called it Cameroun, and the English, who called it The Cameroons. What the people who lived there called it is not recorded, but no doubt it had nothing to do with small crustaceans.

* * *

By the time I got to Cameroon, in November 1988, the country was once again in the hands of the people who lived there. I saw no mountain of fire, and I saw no prawns, but my first impression of Cameroon was not unlike Hanno's: heat and darkness and fires, a strange inferno which did seem to suggest "sailing quickly away thence." The air was heavy, even at sunset, and the exertion of assembling my bicycle outside the airport left me dripping. Among a confusion of upended frames, wheels, bike-bags, and tools, a crowd of boys gathered around to watch me and a few other North Americans struggle with our handlebar stems and seat posts. I kept an uneasy watch on my possessions, and thought about cycling around Cameroon for a month in that kind of heat. A month can be a long time.

We pedaled away from the airport into the sudden equatorial night, following the broken shoulder of the highway into the city. A few dim streetlamps lit the skeletons of abandoned cars and uneven rows of gray plank and cinder-block houses. Corrugated-metal roofs gleamed among the looming, ivy-hung trees. Scattered oil-drum fires flickered on dark faces, flashing eyes, and teeth bared in demonic laughter that was drowned by the music which raged out from everywhere. Indecipherable wailing chants and pulsing rhythms chugged out of straining loudspeakers as I tried to find a path through the crowds. People turned to stare, evidently surprised to see a white man in a funny hat riding a bicycle.

One of the oil-drum fires lighted a member of our group at the roadside, where he had stopped to ask directions. The light flickered on his curly dark hair and beard, framing close-set eyes and vaguely Middle-Eastern features. That was David, our guide from Bicycle Africa — also, we learned, its founder, director, and secretary. "My office looks suspiciously like my bedroom," he confessed with a laugh.

Only later did David tell us that "Cameroon: Country of Contrasts" was "the most difficult bicycle tour on the market." He had been advertising it for two years and could only attract four customers. Us. He had led a tour of Cameroon just once before, two years earlier, with only three clients, one of whom, like Hanno, had turned around and gone home in less than a week. Had I known these things as I followed David's white helmet through the shadowy crowds, my excitement might have been tempered. But that's the good part about the future: it doesn't have to contain any flaws until it becomes the present.

I had enough to worry about in the dark here-and-now of crowded streets, sudden taxis, motorcycles, and crater-sized potholes. Everything seemed to blare like car horns: the music, the smells, the faces, the headlights, all in dizzy confusion. I tried to concentrate on my riding and keep an eye on David up ahead. I didn't want to miss a turn and get lost in the gauntlet of madness which seemed to comprise Douala, the largest city in Cameroon.

We made our way to the Hôtel Kontchupé, a chain of low buildings on a narrow street above the waterfront, where I could see the lights in the rigging of a small freighter. We parked our bicycles on a terrace fenced with black wrought iron. A mural decorated one mustard-colored wall, a montage of musical instruments, masks, and a pre-Cubist angular figure raising what looked like a martini glass.

Three of us moved along the terrace to the Café des Sports while David spoke with the manager in "survival French," the same kind I possessed. Still too early in the evening for nightlife, the bar was empty and smelled of stale beer and cigarette smoke. The young bartender was just putting on a record, and West African rhythms pumped out of the speakers. The walls were decorated with lurid black-light posters of skeletal bikers and voluptuous leather-clad females. After a long look around, the three of us took a seat at the bar.

Usually when I begin a trip like that, the hardest thing is learning everybody's name. You meet ten or twenty people at one time, and their names float right through your head, or, as often happens, your brain assigns them names which suit them, but aren't necessarily theirs. You put on an open-friendly face, try to make neutral conversation, and wait for someone else to address them by name. This time, though, it would be easy — only five people on the tour, and I knew two of their names already: David's and my own.

I helped my two companions order drinks, as they were from California, where French is normally limited to Chardonnay and Perrier. I was getting their names now. Leonard was the tall black guy with the thick rimless glasses, and Elsa was the older woman, slender, with short pale hair and sharp features. No problem. Then a commotion outside intruded, even over the loud music, and the three of us moved to the door. A Japanese taxi was pulled up in front of the hotel, and David was helping the driver lift a boxed bicycle out of the trunk. Our fifth rider had arrived, and she stood looking on, her hands moving as if she wanted to help but didn't know what to do. I couldn't remember her name from the roster, but David came to my rescue. "This is Annie." While I shook her hand I tried to stamp it into my memory. Okay, Annie. Leonard is the tall black guy; Elsa is the older woman, and Annie is the...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: ECW Press,Canada
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2004
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 1550226657
• ISBN 13: 9781550226652
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 298
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: eucomply OÜ; hello@eucompliancepartner.com; ; Pärnu mnt 139b-14; Tallinn; 11317; Estland