Cyimbili on the Congo Nile Trail: Now & 50 Years Ago
Cyimbili may well be the most peculiar overnight stay on the Congo Nile Trail. It’s staggeringly picturesque, lying right on the sandy Kivu waterfront and with an iconic island just off shore — yet it does not feature on everybody’s itinerary! Cyclists skip it because it’s a bit too close to Gisenyi/Rubavu while some hikers find the bare-bones standards of its only guesthouse’s a bit stark (for example, shower water is cold and may not always flow when you wish).
Rustic but clean, its twin room is USD 50, a double USD 40, a single USD 20, a dorm bed USD 10 and camping USD 5. A dinner buffet costs USD 5 and breakfast USD 3. You can get more info from the guesthouse manager (+250783781306) but for some historical background we are here to serve!
For example, why does one enter the guesthouse through a school?
Once upon a time this was an American-owned coffee plantation with a beach home, and was passed to the Conservative Baptist Foreign Missoinary Society (CBFMS) in the 1970s. Under the leadership of E.J. Kile — whose grave can now be found on-site — the Baptists decided to build a vocational school. The idea was to equip future disciples with practical skills they could bring into their communities along with the Word.
For agricultural know-how CBFMS recruited Fred Way, a US agronomist who worked in Zaire at the time. He accepted the job and ended up staying in Cyimbili for a few years, serving both as a teacher and an emergency doctor (he had some veterinary background). Fred’s photos now grace this post.
If you consider the road to the place rough now, it’s nothing compared to what he had to deal with. A drive to Gisenyi could take 8 hours — and you wouldn’t embark on it without dozens of helpers by your side to pull you out of the mud whenever needed. The motorboat was a much better alternative, or a dugout canoe for shorter distances.
Fred’s fondest Cyimbili memories are of the swimming cattle (they grazed on the island), waterskiing Dutch beer brewers of Rubona (who inspired local kids to make “skis” of banana fronds, pulling each other along the beach) and astonishing sunsets (featured photo) … Come and make your own!
photos by Fred Way, Miha Logar and the guesthouse
