The Boy Who Biked the World: On the Road to Africa

Alastair Humphreys's The Boy Who Biked the World Part One is a round-the-world adventure for 9 year olds about a daydreamer who says he'll cycle round the planet, and then actually goes.

What happens

Tom is supposed to be doing long division. He's actually somewhere in the Amazon. When his teacher asks where he's drifted off to this time, it just pops out. He's going to be an explorer! The whole class laughs, so he says he'll do it on his bike.

The more people tell him it's impossible, the more he wants to prove them wrong. His first packing list includes his computer, his guitar and a globe (his little sister Jo soon sorts that out). Then he turns left at the end of the road, because Dad says that's the way to Africa.

This first part takes him across Europe, through the Middle East and down into Africa. He rides the whole length of the Danube. He crosses the Sudanese desert shaking scorpions out of his shoes, and drinks a bowl of cow's blood and milk with a circle of Maasai warriors watching.

It's based on the author's own ride round the world, and it's packed with real places and facts. Petra, the pyramids, the Suez Canal, the Nile. It never feels like a textbook, though, because you're always seeing it through Tom's eyes. He gets lonely, and in Ethiopia he sits in the dust and cries. Then a boy called Abai pushes through the crowd and says hello in English, and everything feels better.

The best bit is how kind people are. A ticket lady waves him onto the ferry for nothing. Strangers point the way. Two border guards who've ignored each other for years end up having a cup of tea because of him.

The sentences are simple and friendly, and there's a LOT of banana sandwiches. Have you got a daydreamer who stares at maps? This is the book for them.

What to read next

If they want to keep pedalling, Tom's journey carries on in Riding the Americas, where he has to race back from the shops with a trolley full of bananas so a grumpy sea captain doesn't sail across the Atlantic without him.