Exclusive Interview with Rhiane Fatinikun, Founder of the Largest Black Women’s Outdoor Community in Europe

Interview by Leroy Adams

When Rhiane Fatinikun founded Black Girls Hike, she didn’t own hiking boots or know how to read a map. What she had was a vision — and a commitment to making the outdoors a space of belonging for Black women. Since 2019, that vision has grown into one of the most powerful grassroots movements in the UK and beyond, drawing thousands of women to trails, hills, and hikes across the globe.

From surviving an earthquake in Morocco to being invited to speak alongside Barack Obama, Rhiane’s journey is one of resilience, joy, and intentional sisterhood.

We caught up with her to talk about travel mishaps, mental health, and why she never set out to lead a movement.

Watch the complete interview here.

Leroy: The last time I saw you in person was in 2022, we were hanging in Colombia. Now you’re in the New York Times, featured in Elle Magazine, National Geographic, got a book out — must I keep going? You’ve built the largest outdoor network for Black women in Europe. Did you ever think you would have to lead them through an earthquake in Morocco? Tell us about that experience, ’cause I love this quote you had — “I’m a baddie. And I got through this natural disaster.” 

Rhiane: [Laughter] So yeah, we’re in Morocco, we’re on a ten-day tour. We’ve got six women on this tour. We had just come back from a day trip and ’m in bed, scrolling on my phone, and then the building starts shaking.

I’ve never— we don’t have earthquakes in England. So, we don’t know what’s going on. It [the ground] was shaking. I went to hide under my quilt, but then I noticed things falling down off the ceiling— plaster and everything. So I jumped out of bed and stood in the bathroom doorframe.

I only knew to do that from films. Afterwards, my friend was like, “I thought you were supposed to get under a table.” And I was like, “I don’t know, I just saw that one film.” On TV I’d seen people get under a doorframe during an earthquake, so that’s what I did.

Then I could hear people screaming. After the shaking stopped I ran down the stairs. As I turned a corner, it looked like part of the building, like an extension, had a huge crack and could just fall off.

When I got downstairs, there was dust everywhere. Everyone was running out of their rooms asking, “What’s happening?” Then someone screamed, “Get out of the building!”

We ran outside. The building next door had completely collapsed. It was chaos—people running around on motorbikes, people screaming. No one really knew what had happened.

All the members of my group were behind me, and I’m still in pajama pants. The hotel guy pointed us toward these big doors in a wall leading to a mosque. We slept in the mosque courtyard because I didn’t want to go inside a building. They brought us quilts and we sat there all night.

I was scared. I’ve never been so scared in my life. And one of the things about hosting international trips is you never know what you’re going to get. I rang our tour guide and said, “There’s been an earthquake.” He was like, “Okay, Rhiane.” Then he called me back and went, “Oh my God, Rhiane, it’s a 6.9. It’s a proper earthquake.” And I was like, “I know.”

The next day, our guide got us in the minibus and we spent the whole day in internet cafes trying to find alternative accommodation. 

Leroy How did you get hypnotized in Mexico?

Rhiane: So, this happened during a trip to Costa Rica… well, it was supposed to be Costa Rica.

I was meant to go to Costa Rica. I booked a flight—had it set from July—ready for my end-of-year burnout trip. You know when you’ve just been working all year and you’re so excited? I even had tours booked for my first couple of days.

Then I get on my connecting flight in Dallas, and the woman says, “California.” I’m thinking, this woman doesn’t know what she’s talking about. I’m like, “Excuse me?” And she’s like, “No, California.”

So I’m like—shit. I had to stay in a Dallas hotel overnight, then fly to California the next day, pick up my bag, go to this random motel, and just sit there thinking, “I don’t want to be in America.” I booked some random motel for the night. I found a flight to Mexico for the next day—so I just went. Ended up spending three weeks in Mexico.

I met three people, including one girl named Rhiane, in Mexico.  She was half-Nigerian, just like me. She asked what I do, and I told her I run a nonprofit called Black Girls Hike. She said, “I think I’m in your group.” And she was—she was a member!

Then I asked what she did, and she said she was a hypnotherapist. I’d been wanting to get hypnotized for ages because I felt like I had these blockages. We hung out on holiday, and when I came back, I booked a session with her online—and it worked. I was like, “That’s crazy.”

Leroy: Black Girls Hike is in year six now. What are Black women saying about their experiences? What are the women in your community saying about the peace and mental health support it brings them?

Rhiane: Last week, we were interviewing for a role and one of the girls—when I asked, “Why do you want to work for BGH?”—started crying. She was talking about what it’s meant to be a Black woman in other workforces she’s been in, how isolating it’s been, all the microaggressions, all the racism she’s experienced, not feeling seen… you know what I mean? Being othered all the time.

I think that experience, over time, it just… she exploded, and she cried. And that’s not the first time I’ve had somebody—either being interviewed for a role or becoming one of our volunteers—who’s cried about previous experiences they’ve had in the world.

I’ve also had people—one woman told me she’d been able to come off all of her medication for anxiety and depression since she started coming to Black Girls Hike. She told her doctor, and her doctor said to her, “Just keep hiking.”

So it’s been great for people to find new networks. And also, it’s a big support system. Every time you go along to a walk, you’ll always end up having a deeper, meaningful conversation with somebody.

I always feel like you get centered. And when I’m solo traveling, the people I meet—it’s like I meet them for a reason. I feel like that’s the kind of conversations you have on these walks as well. You always come away feeling empowered, inspired, and supported.

But mainly, I think for people, it’s about being seen. It empowers people to take up space in other places and be unapologetic. They come to an all-Black women’s group—even when we get a lot of hostility—and they still feel empowered to come. I think when they go into other spaces, even if they’re maybe the only Black person there, it gives them a little more confidence to speak up. Big up.

Leroy: How does having an intergenerational network support that confidence development?

Rhiane: I imagine that in addition to mental health, there are conversations you all are probably having about romance, motherhood… all of these different topics come up, and you’ve got generational perspectives feeding into that space.

That is one of my favorite things at the moment. So—I’m 38, single, don’t have children. All the older women are like, “Just go and have a baby with somebody—anybody. You don’t want to regret it.”

It’s just so interesting hearing all these different perspectives from people. You’ve got people that have been married for 30-odd years, people that are single, people that have “missed the boat,” people that haven’t had the outcome they wanted. And I feel like there’s so much wisdom the older women can impart on you.

A lot of the time, they don’t even realize they’re actually sharing all of that wisdom and knowledge with you.

My best friend at Black Girls Hike is 70—nearly 71—and she’s called Liz. She was actually the first Black councillor in a place called Liverpool in the UK. She was elected in 1987. She was a trailblazer in her own right, and she blazed the way for people like me, you know what I mean?

So I think it is a beautiful space because there’s so many significant people that are part of Black Girls Hike. We’ve got leaders in there, changemakers in there.

And I love the intergenerational aspect of it. I was having a conversation with someone the other day, and she was saying, “How often do you get the opportunity to have those intergenerational friendships?” Unless maybe you work with someone that’s older, most of the time you’re just in your own little bubble.

So yes—now I hang out with a 70-year-old, I’ve got mates that are grannies. And I love it.

Leroy: Yo, when do you think the next time you will be in the States will be? Do you have any plans to be in the States anytime soon?

Rhiane: If someone’s paying for me to go out there and do anything, then yeah. Other than that—no. America is not for me. It’s not for me.

Do you know what I find? I feel like when I’m in America, I’m Black. I’m like—ooh.

Leroy: Yo, you know what’s crazy? You say that… all non-American Blacks who are honest, when they come to America, they admit for the first time, “I did not know I was Black.”

And it’s not that they didn’t know they were Black—they didn’t know what Blackness felt like within the American context.

Rhiane: But also for me it’s a bit different because I’m getting a little bit of privilege. I’ve got British privilege, obviously. I’ve got a British accent. One thing I noticed when I was in America was that my accent transcended race.

So when I was in Colorado Springs with Patricia—she runs Black Packers—Colorado Springs is super white. We were in this shop one day, and people would hear my accent and start talking to me, but it was like she was invisible. No acknowledgement whatsoever.

They’d be like, “Oh my God, I could hear you talk all day,” and they would completely ignore her.

Leroy: Well, Americans are obsessed with the British accent.

Rhiane: Yeah, they are. I know they are. Sometimes it’s super weird how obsessed we still are with British culture, British people, and British accents.

Leroy: We won that war. Why are we still so obsessed?

Rhiane: Yeah. So, I don’t like being Black in America. I hate the fact that they’ve got guns. I hate just feeling like—

In the UK, I think all you ever get exported from America is that everybody’s racist. Everybody’s racist. Like, it’s just really dangerous. And it makes me feel uneasy.

When I was there in Colorado, it was during the elections. They had these “F** Joe Biden”* signs, and they’re all like, “Trump this, Trump that.” And I’m like, Wow—you actually… I’m scared of you now because you support him.

It just makes me think you’re crazy, incapable of anything… like you’re not a stable person. So I’m scared of you.

Leroy: In Colombia, you were dating the dude from Atlanta. How’s that been? What was the difference between dating an African, a Ghanaian, Ghanaian-African, and an African American?

Rhiane: But do you know what was interesting? They were very, very, very different people.

The first guy that I met was very much into Black history—went to Morehouse—it was all part of his identity. He was a Morehouse guy.

Leroy: This is the dude from Atlanta?

Rhiane: Yeah, this is the guy from Atlanta. But he was born in Chicago and lived in Atlanta. He was really into Black history, would go and do all those Black history tours in all the different countries.

Whereas the other guy I dated—he was raised in foster care, so he was obviously raised by predominantly white people. He moved out to Colorado Springs and had kind of a weird relationship, I think, with the Black community.

He said he never felt like he was fully accepted into it, and I thought that was really interesting because I never thought I would ever meet an American like that.

I don’t know why… in my mind, I never realized that Americans like that existed as well. In my mind, I’m like, they’re Black—they’re all Black Black there.

Leroy: One of your favorite brands to work with—are there one or two that you could say are just incredibly authentic and genuine in their approach and execution in working with Black Girls Hike?

Rhiane: Patagonia.

Patagonia are an absolute, fantastic organization. They funded us for a Hidden Communities program a few years ago—Hidden Communities just meaning people that we weren’t reaching through social media: people that might not have access to the internet, might not speak English, etc.

They basically just gave us money and said, like, We’re not gonna micromanage it. Even if you just got one extra person out, that would be beneficial.

Leroy: How do you handle trolls or public scrutiny—especially the backlash that can come from focusing on Black women? Do you still go back and forth with people in the comments?

Rhiane: I just absolutely ignore it. I completely ignore it.

We’ve been running for about six years now. When we first started, if we got profiled in a high-profile publication, we’d get loads and loads of trolling. We once randomly got featured by Russia Today. They’d done a story about Black American hikers and another about UK hikers—and instead of separating them, they mixed it all up into one piece. The politics and history are so different, but that didn’t matter to them. That just opened the floodgates.

Honestly, now, I don’t read any of the comments. On social media, you can filter out certain words, so I’ve blocked all the different spellings of racist slurs. That way, they can’t even post them.

In the first couple of years, I wanted to smash windows—I was that angry. It felt like being a lion in a cage with someone constantly poking you, and there’s nothing you can do about it. It’s infuriating, these keyboard warriors.

Now, I just think to myself, You’re sat there typing about me online while I’m having a fabulous life. I hope you’re okay. Go heal, babes.

It doesn’t bother me anymore because I feel like I’ve transcended it—I’m above it. And honestly, the success of Black Girls Hike is proof it’s needed. We’ve been validated by the features we’ve received, the publications we’ve worked with, and the fact that I have an MBE—letters after my name. Society clearly doesn’t agree with the trolls.

Leroy: I’m going to name three or four countries you’ve been to, and I want you to say the first thing that comes to mind. Let’s start with Brazil.

Rhiane: The vibes. Black culture.

Brazil is one of my favorite countries to visit as a Black person because you genuinely just exist there—you blend in. If you don’t open your mouth, everyone thinks you’re Brazilian. It’s just nice not to have to lead with your race.

I’ve been to Brazil three times. I’ve been learning Portuguese for six months, and I’m going back for two months. Honestly, I could live in Brazil—it’s such a part of me.

Leroy: Norway.

Rhiane: You can drink out of a puddle in Norway—it’s that clean.

I was very pleasantly surprised by Norway. In a lot of European countries, if you’re not white, you can face hostility, especially with the political climate around migration. But in Norway, you don’t get that vibe. It’s a wealthy country with good resources, and it feels like the government and media aren’t doing the whole “divide and conquer” thing.

I didn’t experience racism, microaggressions, or funny looks. I even said to my friend, I’m actually in a white European country and everybody’s really nice.

It’s kind of sad that we can be so pleasantly surprised by simply not experiencing racism—but that’s the reality. Norway was really nice.

Leroy: What advice would you give to someone who says, “Rhiane, I want to do what you’re doing. How do I get where you’re at?”

Rhiane: Be authentic and be consistent.

I think authenticity is key. A lot of people now see something popular online and just try to replicate it—sometimes copying word-for-word. Have you noticed people even recreating TikToks exactly as they are? It’s wild. I’d just say, keep it authentic.

Leroy: I appreciate you, my friend. This was fun.

Rhiane: Thank you, my dear. Take care.