Jumping is Easy
Landing is Another Story

The Congo Basin’s dense, sparsely populated rain forest, covers an area the size of Europe. It is a tropical wilderness without paved roads, or any other form of infrastructure. The main transportation route is the Congo River and its maze of tributaries. 

For the most part, the trails were composed of packed earth that quickly turned into muddy ditches when it rained. In places the leafy canopy over them was so tight that only a dim light managed to seep through the foliage and it seemed as though we rode in a constant twilight.

If the road was intersected by a river, there weren’t any bridges.

We had been traveling through the forest for weeks, first by boat up the fifteen-hundred-kilometer stretch of the Congo River to the equator in Kisangani, and then by an overland route to West Africa.

According to the symbols on our Michelin map the rutted, narrow track that we had been following was designated a "semi-improved road” but in reality, was just a path worn by generations of bare feet, kept open by a machete chop here and there to prevent the aggressive jungle vegetation from swallowing it. 

Without warning it ended in a tangle of undergrowth on the shore of one of the rivers that formed the web of tributaries that poured into the Congo River’s main channel.

Tied a bit from shore was a craft that seemed to be about the size of a billiard table, fashioned from logs with rough-hewn planks laid horizontally over them.  They were lashed together with a frayed hemp rope, and gave the craft a provisional look, as though it was a patchwork made from whatever materials could be gathered from the jungle.

A barefoot ferryman in shorts and a T-shirt that bore the image of the Congo’s president Mobutu Sese Seko on the front and back, stood ready to take us across. I asked him if the ferry was safe and he pointed towards it, and said, in perhaps the only French he knew, “bon”, and by that I assumed that he didn’t want to end up in the river as a meal for a crocodile any more than we did.

I convinced myself that this log raft had to be more stable than the narrow, motorized dugout that took us and our motorcycle across the Ubangi River in a hair-raising voyage a month or so earlier. That river crossing came close to ending in mid-stream when we veered sharply to avoid a sand bar.

The makeshift ferry was bobbing unsteadily in the current three or four feet below us, but the more pressing problem was not whether it would support our weight, but how I would get the motorcycle down onto it.

In another situation I would have considered this silky, green river and the majestic forest that surrounded it beautiful, but without a means to cross, it was just one of those unpleasant surprises that came in some form or another every day. 

From what I could surmise, it looked as though the river had breached its banks during a storm and the current had swept away the regular landing, and with it the ferry that ordinarily carried passengers and vehicles.

Now, instead of a gentle slope that would enable us to roll the bike onto the float, there was a sharp, vertical drop.  Lifting a two-hundred and fifty-kilo motorcycle down the steep, slippery riverbank was a precarious undertaking, and I reckoned would require four or five men.

Remembering the weeks we spent on the shore of the Ubangi River, hoping every day that a ferry or boat would arrive to carry us across to the Congo still fresh in our memory, waiting for help or turning back and finding another route and another ferry wasn't an alternative.

If we wanted to cross, even if it was risky, we would have to jump the bike onto the ferry from the riverbank. I hopped down to see how it would react if I managed to land on it.

Out of habit, we haggled with the ferryman over the fare for taking us across. At that time in the Congo, the river ferries were state run and free of charge, but the poorly paid ferrymen took the chance to earn a little extra when they could. I knew that, but rather than pressing the point, I settled the dispute by giving him a small sum.

I paid him and we exchanged glances. This was a moment when I could have used some good advice, but he repeated his standard phrase, “C’est bon."

I looked at Kersti. She said encouragingly, "Jump it. You can do it".

We unpacked the bike and spread out the essentials of our itinerant life. There were jerry cans filled with water and petrol, sleeping bags, our tent, food, spare parts for the motorcycle and a spare tire, our "embassy clothes", for official business consisting of a decent shirt and pants, our Primus camping stove, and most important of all, our passports and travel documents.

At least if I missed the jump, and tumbled to the bottom of the river along with the motorcycle, we'd still have our gear.

Like every experienced motorcyclist, I knew that jumping with one was the easy part, landing was when the difficulties began.  I rolled the bike back, and focused on the jump and not what the consequences would be if I missed the raft or slid off.

I opened the throttle with the thumb and palm of my right hand and placed the other fingers on the front wheel brake lever ready to pull it hard as soon as I was air-born.

I backed up two or three meters, put the bike in gear, revved the engine and released the clutch. The back wheel spun in the loose dirt and I was in the air….

Thump! Stop!

One hurtle cleared and on to the next one that was invariably waiting someplace farther on.