CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
Ordered leg totals agree within rounding. Stop distances are approximate sums of rounded legs. Stops, delays, approach and any separate return travel add time. Basis: producer-declared routed record.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distance and riding time are measured on the routed road. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
521 km from Nzega to Nzega, about 13 h 35 of riding. It goes by way of Nyungwe National Park, Gisakura Natural Forest, Cyamudongo Natural Forest and Nyungwe National Forest. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 2,200 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. A steady touring day rather than a sprint.
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For about 84 km this is Rwanda Congo Nile Scenic Road, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
Murambi sits on a green hill in southern Rwanda, and the buildings on it were meant to be a technical school. In April 1994, tens of thousands of Tutsi from the surrounding area gathered here, told that they would be protected, and instead the school became a place of mass killing. The number who died in a few days is estimated at around fifty thousand, though the exact toll is not known. After the genocide, bodies were exhumed and preserved with lime, and some are displayed in the school's classrooms, as a stark testimony that no visitor forgets. It is one of the most harrowing places in Africa, and it is now a national memorial and, since 2023, a World Heritage site along with Nyamata, Bisesero and the memorial in Kigali.
Read the complete Murambi write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Murambi is where the day begins. Next is Nyungwe National Park.
Nyungwe is one of the oldest rainforests in Africa, a mountain forest spread over the ridges of south-western Rwanda between Lake Kivu and the Burundi border. It is high, wet and green in a way that makes the rest of the world feel dry: tree ferns taller than a house, orchids on the branches, mist pouring through the valleys in the morning, and the sound of water everywhere. The ridges here form part of the great divide between the Congo and Nile basins, and Rwanda proudly claims one of the remotest sources of the Nile in these hills.
Read the complete Nyungwe National Park write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Nyungwe National Park comes up about 73 km into the recorded legs. Next is Gisakura Natural Forest.
In the far southwest of Rwanda, a small patch of forest surrounded by tea plantations is home to one of the most charming wildlife encounters in Africa. Gisakura forest lies on the western edge of Nyungwe National Park, near the tea estate that shares its name, and a large troop of Ruwenzori colobus monkeys lives there, black and white with long tails and flowing capes of fur. Watching them leap through the canopy, sometimes in groups of dozens, is a joy. The forest is a remnant of the great montane rainforest that once covered these mountains, isolated now by the tea fields.
Read the complete Gisakura Natural Forest write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 157 km into the recorded legs you reach Gisakura Natural Forest. Next is Cyamudongo Natural Forest.
In the far southwest corner of Rwanda, the land drops toward Lake Kivu and the Ruzizi river, and the green hills here are mostly tea, banana and small farms. Cyamudongo is the exception: a patch of natural forest, a few hundred hectares at most, standing as an island of tall trees in the middle of cultivation. It is separated from the great Nyungwe forest by a belt of farmland, yet it still shelters a small population of chimpanzees, along with other primates and a remarkable range of birds and butterflies.
Read the complete Cyamudongo Natural Forest write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Cyamudongo Natural Forest, about halfway. Next is Nyungwe National Forest.
Nyungwe is one of the oldest rainforests in Africa and one of the wettest, a block of mountain forest in the south-west of Rwanda that survived the ice ages when so much of the continent dried out. It holds around a thousand square kilometres of dense growth on steep ridges between about 1,600 and 3,000 metres, and it shelters thirteen species of primate, including chimpanzees, L'Hoest's monkeys and large troops of black-and-white Angolan colobus that move through the canopy in loud, tumbling groups. Birdlife is exceptional, with over three hundred species, many found only in the Albertine Rift. Some of the headwaters of the Nile are said to start in its streams.
Read the complete Nyungwe National Forest write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Nyungwe National Forest sits at 139 km, about halfway. Next is back through Cyamudongo Natural Forest.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Cyamudongo Natural Forest write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Cyamudongo Natural Forest comes up about 331 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Gisakura Natural Forest.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Gisakura Natural Forest write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 366 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Gisakura Natural Forest. Next is back through Nyungwe National Park.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Nyungwe National Park write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Nyungwe National Park, late in the day. Next is Murambi.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Murambi write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 521 km.
Murambi → Nyungwe National Park is 73 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Nyungwe National Park → Gisakura Natural Forest is 84 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Gisakura Natural Forest → Cyamudongo Natural Forest is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Cyamudongo Natural Forest → Nyungwe National Forest is 76 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Nyungwe National Forest → back through Cyamudongo Natural Forest is 64 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Cyamudongo Natural Forest → back through Gisakura Natural Forest is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Gisakura Natural Forest → back through Nyungwe National Park is 83 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Nyungwe National Park → Murambi is 73 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.