Midlothian brothers complete 3,600-mile cycle through 13 countries in 50C heat

Two Midlothian brothers have returned to Edinburgh after spending nearly three months completing a gruelling 3,635-mile cycle to raise funds for charity.

Abdul Rahman Ali, 34 and Reehan Ali, 29, set off on April 1 and took on the groundbreaking Pedal 2 Hajj challenge to raise money for Gaza.

Hajj is a "mandatory religious duty" that must be carried out by Muslims once during their life.

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Reehan lives between Germany and Bonnyrigg and is a joiner and Abdul lives in Bonnyrigg and works as a mechanic.

Reehan said: “We initially wanted to camp, as well as stay wherever we could, maybe hotels or mosques here and there. We never camped at all. Through Europe all the way until Vienna we had people sort of hosting us. We stayed in a few hotels but mostly we had people reaching out to host us.

“It was really nice. We had friends who flew out from Vienna who wanted to support us, and they also took the bags off of us to make it a bit easier. Some friends covered certain countries. We were covered through Serbia, Slovakia, Hungary, Bulgaria, and Turkey.

“In Lebanon the country we work for they have projects out there so they had a guy support us there. To enter Syria you need to have a tour group booked. We had to be accompanied at all times.

“There was a tour group in Jordan that reached out to us and said they wanted to host us throughout the country and with hotels, tourist attractions”

Reehan added: “Our younger brother flew out to Saudia Arabia to cover us there. It was really a big blessing that everybody came out to support us and made it easier for us.”

On spending nearly three months with his older brother, Reehan said: “You spend enough time with someone, you can get on each other's nerves. We reined it in before it got anything worse! We are brothers at the end of the day.”

“We cycled growing up, doing paper rounds. Then 10 years ago we were both off work at the same time. We decided to cycle to our cousins in Huddersfield and we done that in one go, which was 240 miles. We cycled through the day and the night without a rest.

“My brother enjoys cycling more than me, doing routes like the North Coast 500 and Edinburgh to Paris.”

The brothers completed their 'small hajj' which got the ball rolling for them to start planning their main pilgrimage. The joiner said: "In November 2022 we did our small pilgrimage which you can do at any time of the year. After that, we were thinking maybe we should work towards fulfilling our Hajj.”

It is recommended that everyone with the means to complete Hajj which is one of the five pillars of Islam, at least once in their lifetime.

Reehan said: “Abdul phoned me one day when I was in Germany that we should cycle to Saudi Arabia, and he had made a plan of the route and asked if I was game, so I said okay, yeah let's do it.

“It also slows the journey down a bit instead of just flying in, so you take it in more and make you think about why you are doing the journey. Get to see places and meet new people.”

Once they arrived in the last of 13 countries to cycle through, Reehan said: “Once we arrived in Saudi Arabia it took us about eight days to reach our final destination there was a lot of ground to cover and it was mostly all desert.

“We had to cycle through the night to get away from the heat. During the day it was over 51C, it was like we were walking in an oven, it was bad.”

“Even at night time, it was still above 30C and even reaching 40C on the hottest night."

Reehan adds: we tried cycling one day for around a mile and a half during 47C that was brutal, so I can't imagine trying to attempt a full day's cycle under the sun."

He continues: “People over there are just used to living in that heat, when we told them that we get a lot of rain, they got really jealous!”

“We were lucky because we cycled through Turkey, then Lebanon, Syria, and Jordan it got gradually warmer as we went.

“So we had time to acclimatise and then when we actually done our pilgrimage we were as used to the heat as we could be compared to people who just flew in.”

Over 1.8 million people completed Hajj this year. It is reported that over 1,000 people died making the pilgrimage due to the extreme heat.

The hardest part physically for Reehan was the first week. He said: “I never really trained for it, I was quite fit from my running but I don’t really cycle."

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He adds: "For me, it was also food, not being able to eat what I usually eat. We just had to eat what was there which was mostly junk food, eating a lot of sugar and fizzy drinks to get the energy in. That and keeping up to date with my Invisalign treatment, I am always losing retainers!”

Reehan said his brother Abdul is married with two young daughters and was getting homesick a lot.

Speaking of the once-in-a-lifetime journey, Reehan said: “We’ve got contacts in every country now! I could see us doing something like this again. Germany was great for cycling, such a beautiful country.

"It’s a shame with the war going on in Syria, the people there, the culture, the history, there’s so much there. I’d love to go back there, it’s one of the oldest countries and civilisation in the world, and the people are just so lovely.”

Chatting about the incredible amount the brothers have raised with their cycle through 13 countries, Reehan said: “We didn't expect to raise almost £120,000. It’s not us that did it, we gave people a reason to donate, that's all. Everybody else gave the money.

“It’s now a case of working with the charity and finding a way to put the money to good use. The situation there is quite dire. We want to build shelters and have something a bit more longstanding for them.

“We just did the cycle, and everybody did the rest.”

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