Luckily My Cycling Training is More Advanced Than This Blog!

This was driving me nuts not to at least get something up and going to share in some of my thoughts and preparations for the Burundi trip, so, for better or worse, here it is.  Some quick thoughts prior to heading to the beach with the family (Saturday is a training day off!).  Certainly take the blog as a work in process.

In 10 days, I leave the "bubble" happily known as Sitges and head to Bujambura, Burundi to spend 10 days there seeing first hand some of the projects of Great Lakes Outreach ("GLO"), a Christian charitable group led by British friend Simon Guillebaud.  Oh yeah, for seven of those days Simon will be leading myself and 20 other men on the 2014 "Tour du Burundi", a 600km (373 miles) bike ride around the country.  This trip and the bike tour are focused on increasing or giving everyone that we know some awareness of Burundi, a small nation in Central Africa in the not so upscale neighborhood of Rwanda and Democratic Republic of the Congo, as well as raising funds in support of GLO's projects in Burundi.

My introduction to Burundi was over ten years ago via my good friend Brian Gimotty, whose wife worked with GLO and Simon.  Brian and Paula spent time in Burundi after their wedding and also introduced me to Simon, who just awes me with his faith and energy for God and Burundi.  After financial support over the past few years and now with my own children being near an age when some Daddy time away will not be the end of the world at home (so to speak), Ola and I decided this year would be the time to go to Burundi and really see GLO up close.  The added challenge of the cycling tour makes it that much more interesting of a way to spread the word to my friends and colleagues about GLO, Burundi and Simon.

For more on the fundraising efforts, check out my fundraising site.  I am matching any donations up to my goal of $30,000 USD for GLO.  So please, spend my money by considering your own donation now.

This gets the ball rolling.  More updates to follow very soon!  Thanks for reading and stay informed on my preparations, thoughts and the experience itself by using the RSS subscription feed to this blog or just bookmarking this site and check in regularly over the coming 3 weeks.