I love bus rides and road trips! I keep telling myself that I’ll take a day or two off work, pay a driver to take me round the city, while I just enjoy the ride, allow the environment sink through my membrane and new ideas shoot out. There is nothing better than a little bit of rad road trip innovation.

Now, imagine a bus ride in and around Africa with a lot of young entrepreneurial minds building technology products that can solve unique problems particular to the environment.

Nope! Don’t imagine it. It’s actually happening.

Ampion is bringing together change makers and tech experts on a 5-day road trip across the continent, to turn business ideas in to real projects. It’s called the Ampion Venture Bus Africa trip and I’d love to be on it!

Along the journey, the Ampioneers conceive and launch startups and contribute to creating a community of entrepreneurial talent in Africa. The buses stop in different cities every day, allowing the Ampioneers to interact with local entrepreneurs and innovators.

It’s going to be a 5-day Ampion Venture Bus Africa hackathon in 15 African nations & incubating 10 winning startups for 6 months with funding, mentors and more. The best part? 50% of the innovators on the bus will be women! Whoop whoop!

The Ampion Venture Bus Africa trips kick off today in Lagos and run until December 2014. Here’s the schedule:

West Africa: Lagos to Abidjan 27.10.2014 – 01.11.2014

Southern Africa: Harare to Cape Town 07.11.2014 – 13.11.2014

East Africa: Dar Es Salaam to Kigali 15.11.2014 – 20.11.2014

North Africa: Oran to Tunis 14.Dec – 19.Dec 2014 2014

This is the second edition of the Ampion Venture Bus Africa, and Ampion will be taking 160 Ampioneers on four buses. The first edition of the bus birthed 3 successful startups:

me, a mobile education system via sms

Workforce, a platform bringing together job seekers and potential employers

Bribed, a crowdsourcing app to tackle corruption by providing real time prices on bribes.

The founder of Ampion, Fabian Guhl, is super-excited about this road trip starting today.

“I believe that innovation can improve the lives of people. I truly believe our AMPION Venture Buses can enable young people to create solutions for local challenges on the continent.” he says.