When Karo embarked on her Journey she knew very little. She decided to make very little plans and to let her heart choose a direction. She didn’t know exactly WHERE she was going. She didn’t know exactly HOW LONG she was going for. In fact, she doesn’t even know NOW, two years and two months after her departure.

Karo only knew that she wanted to start her Journey from her Home in Austria, a little village called Zeillern. She knew she wanted to go SOUTH. She knew she wanted to go AS LONG as her Journey made her happy and she knew she wanted to go with a bicycle.

 

 

Karo took her Dad’s 20 year old mountain bike (of course she asked for permission) brought it to her good, old friend and favourite bicycle mechanic Tarek and asked him to do whatever is necessary to make her aluminium horse ready for a big adventure. Tarek did the best he could and transformed the bike into Karo’s new mobile home ready for the world.

 

 

And here HE is, Karo’s beloved two-wheeler, who meanwhile got baptized and is known as “Baraka”, the Swahili word for blessing and that’s what he really is. Baraka is a blessing for Karo. The last two years and two months Karo and Baraka became very close. They spent so much time together and went side by side through good and bad. Baraka never let Karo down.

Interestingly, Karo’s passion for cycling developed comparatively late. She always liked it, but she was not insanely crazy about it. From 2013 her passion gradually increased and when she hosted two young, absolutely adorable and fascinating French men, Simon and Quentin in July 2015, a whole new world magically opened in front of Karo’s eyes. Simon and Quentin were biking from Paris to Kathmandu and since Zeillern was on route, Karo offered a place to stay. Since then Karo wanted to know more about touring cycling and since then, she knew, when the time for her Journey had come, she would do it with a bike and that’s what she did and still does …

Since 26th of May 2016 Karo cycled 29.354 km. Yes, I know, it could be a lot more, but Karo’s main aim is not to pedal through as many countries as possible in the shortest period of time. Her aim is to DISCOVER the world and herSELF and that takes time. Her aim is to really FEEL a country, to spend time there, to cycle “off the beaten tracks” and most important of all, to meet its people and make new friends.

 

 

“QUALITY rather than QUANTITY” says Karo and that’s why Karo is taking her time to do what she loves to do and therefore to keep her little light, her soul, shining.

Since May 2016 Karo has cycled through 18 countries. Eight of them are in Europe (Austria, Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Hercegovina, Montenegro, Albania, Kosovo, Greece) and ten are in Africa (Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, Zambia, Botswana, South Africa, Namibia, Swaziland, Mozambique and Malawi).

The map above gives a rough overview of her Journey. The shuffled green dots, which are overlapping each other are actually all the places, where Karo put her little tent, stayed in somebody’s home or found some other form of accommodation.

From the more detailed maps below you see, that Karo’s Journey is not very systematic. Just as I explained earlier, she is not very keen on planning. Her Journey took her South just as she wanted, but there are many “excursions” to the East and West, Up and Down, Back to where she has already been etc. Karo usually doesn’t plan more than a month ahead. She has some kind of guideline, but that guideline is very flexible. If somebody tells her “You have to go to ABC … It’s so beautiful, you will love it!” she will most likely do that, even if it’s actually a detour of 2.000 km.

That’s just how she is, very “unsystematic” because Karo never liked systems and probably never will!

 

 

For transparency’s sake it has to be mentioned that since Karo had started her Journey, Baraka has not been her absolute ONLY means of transport. Karo has (for various reasons) used  planes, trains, busses, cars, lorries, motorbikes, ferries and boats as well, but Karo has no idea how many kilometers she traveled with those means. It also doesn’t matter to her. She only knows she has cycled more than 29.000 km and when she went somewhere without Baraka (or with Baraka in a box) then there was a pretty good reason for it (like the wedding of her soulsister back in Europe; charity work in Tanzania; a waiting friend in Zambia; a route which she had already cycled; time pressure because of Visa regulations; an ill-tempered oryx antelope etc.).

The beauty is, when Karo looks at the world map NOW, glimpsing at the countries she has been cycling through, she doesn’t just see borders and topographical information, she sees Humans – beautiful souls, friends are popping up in her memory. Each country represents AT LEAST one smiling face! 🙂

Thanks to Karo’s Journey, for her, the world has become more HUMAN!