Before we head out, "there are a few essential rules you need to survive in the bush. In the event of an elephant attack, grab your bike by the top tube, do a 180, and bike as hard as you can in the opposite direction while I draw a line of pepper spray on the ground. If buffaloes charge, stop in your tracks and whatever you do, don’t move. If there’s a tree nearby, climb the tree.”
This is just the start of our guide Anton’s safety instructions. If it wasn’t clear to me before, it is now. This is no walk in the park. It's serious. If you've ever visited a national wildlife park in Africa, you know that under no circumstances should you get out of your vehicle. All we’re travelling with is our bikes. And Anton. While Anton’s equipped with lots of knowledge, a gun, pepper spray and an air pressure horn, will that be enough if we find ourselves face-to-face with a herd of wild animals?
It has to be. There’s no Plan B.
Welcome to the wilds of Africa!

Above: The cycling team sets out into the wilds of Africa with the help of a park ranger.

Anton’s safety instructions continue: “If we meet up with rhinos, let’s hope they're white rhinos. They're peaceful and relatively harmless. But if they're black rhinos, it’s a whole different situation. Stand totally still and don’t make a sound. If the rhino seems confrontational, retreat to the nearest bush and whatever you do, don’t move. The rhino will stamp its feet, snort and make quite an angry racket. But luckily, its vision is pretty poor, and it won't find you if you keep out of sight in the bush and keep still. And then there are the big cats. The same applies here: stay calm. Do not in any case run or ride away, because then the cat will see you as prey. Retreat slowly, but keep your gaze on the predator. In general, animals are more scared of us humans, and there are rarely confrontations.”
Let’s hope Anton is right.
Our guide is one of 14  property owners who share the land making up the 27,000-hectare Selati Game Reserve. The reserve is private and actually not open to the public, unless you know someone like Anton. Then, you can even ride a mountain bike through the park, which is home to an incredible number of birds, antelopes, gazelles, zebras, crocodiles, but also the Big Five: lions, buffalo, rhinos, elephants and leopards.
Before our tour, I’d wondered if we’d even see all these animals. But now, I’m not sure I really want to.

Above: It's not long before the wonders of Africa reveal themselves to our cyclists.

We head off on our bikes. By we, I mean photographers Paul Ingpen, Zandri Strydom, Fräni Gobeli,  Anton Wood and me. Paul Ingpen is the reason I’m even on this trip. As the publisher of several magazines in South Africa, in addition to magazines about triathlons, golfing and running, he also publishes one about mountain biking. He regularly features my photo-stories.
When he called me and asked if I wanted to do a biking story in a game reserve with the Big Five, I didn't hesitate in the least. And he said I should bring someone along.
“How about Fränzi, who was on the cover in the last two issues?” I asked. “Perfect!” And so Fränzi Gobeli and I found ourselves en route from Switzerland to South Africa.
Once we’re there, Zandri Strydom joins our group. The 19-year-old specialized rider is South Africa’s most promising young mountain biking talent, having already won many national and continental titles. With Anton, our group is complete. A large landowner, a passionate mountain biker and adventurer, our lives would be in his hands.

 Above:  After a hard day of cycling, our adventurers look out on where they'll be riding tomorrow.

On your right: cheetahs

We leave our lodge at 6:30 in the morning, about half an hour before sunrise. We want to take advantage of the beautiful morning light for the first photographs. In June, the southern hemisphere is very cold, and I’m happy I packed my down jacket, because until the sun comes up, the temperature is just a few degrees above zero.
We all stay close to Anton. His instructions the night before have clearly left an impression. We bike along gravel roads, crossing steppes and small forests. Everyone’s looking left and right as they bike along. We startle at every sound and snapping of branches. Who knows? It could be an elephant scrounging for breakfast. Or a leopard that’s decided that meals on wheels would make a tasty alternative. Even Anton seems on edge. Our lack of knowledge manifests itself as fear, in sharp contrast to the obvious respect he has for his surroundings.
We bike wordlessly and apprehensively along the bumpy tracks. Suddenly, Anton brakes and holds up his hand: Stop! Something appears to be moving up ahead. We approach slowly and see two cheetahs on a mound of earth soaking up the first rays of sun! They see us and don't seem particularly disturbed by our presence. We keep our distance. Not because they pose a threat to us, but because we want to give them their space. And of course I want to get a few shots before the big cats head off.
Never in my wildest dreams had I imagined myself taking photos of bikers and cheetahs. We quietly and carefully circle around behind the animals. All I need to do is change my position so I can shoot the cats and the bikers from a different angle. After about 10 or 15 minutes, our animal models have had enough and they leave their sunny hill. What a sight for the first day!

Above: An old runway provides our cyclists with a race course and they follow a truck through the outback.

Runway 25: Clear for takeoff

But we were to be treated to more than just cheetahs. Over the next three days, we see pretty much everything you can imagine seeing if you picture biking through a game reserve in Africa: rhinos and elephants from a good and safe distance; lions who are just as scared to see us as we are to see them and immediately take off; zebra herds and their babies grazing under the morning sun; giraffes nibbling on the highest tree-top leaves; plus many of the more than 50 different types of medium-sized to large mammals that call the park their home. We cross the reserve from west to east, zigzagging back and forth and putting in about 40 to 60 kilometres every day.
We ride mostly on vehicle tracks, and now and then, Anton leads us straight through the bush, following the well-worn paths of herds of animals. There are no set routes here, we simply crisscross the vast expanses, stopping for breaks at watering holes. Here we're met by our support vehicle and are provided with water and food.
We bike over old bridges and between wild granite rock formations, and suddenly find ourselves on a wide road in the middle of the wilderness. It seems so strange to see this black asphalt highway with a carefully painted middle line in the wilds of nowhere. But something about it seems different. The highway is just a few hundred metres long and marked with a huge 25. That’s when it dawns on me: We’re on a runway for bush planes. Luckily, this isn't a busy city airport, so we race up and down the airstrip a few times.

Above: There's always time to have some fun or teach local kids how to ride.

Rudi, head of counter-poaching

While I’m still getting a few shots of my team tearing up the abandoned tarmac, a white pickup approaches. When the vehicle comes to a stop, I see the lettering on the doors: Counter-Poaching Unit. A giant of a man gets out of the truck, grinning from ear to ear.
“Cheers guys, I’m Rudi,” he says, introducing himself. Rudi is the epitome of what you’d imagine a ranger to be. As strong and big as a bear, he’s the head of a team of five rangers who monitor the park.
“Actually, we'd need a troop of at least 15 for a park this size. Unfortunately, that’s not on the budget, so we do the best we can with our little team to keep poachers out of our park,” he explains.
I’m eager to find out more about his exciting work and Rudi gladyly tells me about his duties and the challenges.
 “We’ve got a helicopter and a couple of pickups at our disposal. We use them to monitor and count the population on our watch. The biggest problem is the poachers, who often travel here from abroad and conduct their operations. Their target is the rhinos. A rhino horn weighs between 5 and 10 kgs. On the black market in Asia, it fetches up to $30,000 U.S. per kg. The poachers, who are at the very bottom of the supply chain, only get a fraction of that. It’s the criminal gangs from Asia who contract out the shooting and who sell the horn to Vietnam or China.”
However, Rudi and his troop aren't entirely powerless in the face of the poachers. They proactively beat the criminals to the chase and remove the rhinos’ horns. The animals are sedated for this procedure, which is conducted by a veterinarian and takes several hours. As Rudi explains: “This is painless for the animal and can make the difference between life and death. The only downside is that the horn of a rhino is like human fingernails and grows back after two to three years, so the whole process needs to be repeated. We're definitely guaranteed a long-term job,” Rudi laughs.
We talk for a long time, and Rudi shows me his bulletproof vest and his gun. He tells me stories and anecdotes from his life, and I could have talked to him for hours. But we have to keep rolling. Our next stop, Kruger National Park, awaits.

Above: Meeting new friends in the local villages was one of the most enjoyable parts of the trip.

From tourists to the main attraction

After our first four exciting days, we continue on, heading northeast. We stop just before Kruger National Park in Masisi. The small village is about 20km from the Pafuri Gate, the northernmost entrance to South Africa’s largest wildlife reserve.
We make use of this time to get food for the days ahead and to look around on our bikes. Paul treats himself to a shave at an open air barbershop, while Fränzi, with her blond hair, soon becomes the star attraction for all the children in the village. Add to that Zandri’s wheelie skills, and before too long, a large crowd has gathered. The roles are quickly reversed, and we, the white tourists, quickly transform from visitors to the focal point of the villagers’ cellphone cameras. After visiting the school, which includes mountain bike lessons for the kids, it’s time that we ride into the second part of our bike safari.

Above: The cycling team relied on a lot of local help to complete their journey.

With Shiluva in the Land of the Makuleke

Shiluva is waiting for us on the other side of the Pafuri Gate. She is one of very few female rangers and will accompany us over the coming days. More than 90 per cent of her colleagues are men. Shiluva belongs to the Makuleke People, who have allowed us to be guests on their land.
The northernmost part of the national park borders on Zimbabwe and Mozambique. Because it is so far from Johannesburg, this park is a hidden treasure that gets very few visitors. This territory belongs to the Kruger National Park in a way, but in a way, it doesn’t. Although we’re within the Kruger park boundaries, the Makuleke have negotiated a special deal. They’ve adjoined their lands to the wildlife reserve, but the earnings from entrance fees and overnight stays go to the community. In addition, most of the employees are recruited from the community and other rules apply here as compared to the rest of the area. One of them includes being allowed to travel on mountain bikes, but naturally only under the supervision of the rangers. We’re in luck.
Shiluva guides us through “her” land over the next three days. We always head out in the early morning hours and end our days late in the afternoon. Here, just like in the Selati Game Reserve, the bike routes aren’t especially challenging, but they make up for it by being more exciting and varied.

Above: One last cycle trick for the local kids.

We bike mostly on the well-used truck trails, and sometimes we take a single-track detour through tall grasses and bushes. We find ourselves making frequent stops, watching monkeys carrying their babies on their back, crocodiles sunning on riverbanks, herds of hippos snorting happily in the water and parades of elephants purposefully plowing their way through the bush. On the last evening, we ask Shiluva to show us her favourite spot. She climbs behind the steering wheel of a converted Range Rover and we follow on our bikes up a hill to magnificent baobab trees that are hundreds of years old. From here, we have a wonderful view of the park, and the last metres of our adventure have us biking into the African sun.
Shiluva is already waiting at the bottom of the hill with a cold gin and tonic. We listen to her tales, enraptured, surrounded by animal sounds.
 We bike through the darkness to our tents, guided only by the truck’s headlights. After a week in the African bush, I once again come to appreciate that most of the excitement isn’t about what happens on 29-inch wheels, it’s about encounters with people like Anton, Rudi or Shiluva and the time in between. Thank you, Paul, for calling me and asking, “Hey Marty, you wanna come to South Africa for an unforgettable bike adventure?”
How right he was. It was the trip of a lifetime.