South African Road Trip

Big day today. It was wet and miserable so thought we might as well get plenty of essential mileage, or in fact Kilometres under our belt. Started at 5.50am and arrived in Port Alfred at 4pm.

The first part of the drive which headed inland along route 2 was like going through Scottish woodland, very nice in fact. Once we turned south on route 2 it was townships on and off all the way. I hate to say it but I was bloody glad we didn’t get a puncture or break down. We’d been advised by South African friends not to do it but we wanted to see it, not just get to see the privileged parts of South Africa. The stories we’d been told about the road being terrible and broken up were untrue and the traffic compared to UK traffic was very light but it was a Sunday so perhaps less trucks.

There had been an accident on the road when we went through one township. It looked like someone crossing the road may well have been hit by a car. Several cars and ‘backies’ had shunted. One was completely destroyed on the side of the road and there was an ominous pair of boots protruding from makeshift coverings on the edge of the road. Police and ambulances were already there. Terrible.

We pressed on and when we stopped to refuel I gave a very poor looking local our toasted chicken sandwiches. We’d resolved to do this and when we left Dulcinea (aka the Mrs) said ;

‘It’s his lucky day, I stuck 20Rand in there as well’.
‘Really? Good’.

He gave me the thumbs up as we drove off. It’s a good thing to help in a small way, it’s a big deal for them. I’d rather do that than give money to a charity that burns most of the money on salaries, conferences and advertising anyway.

On days like today you, or should I say ‘I’ really get to see how lucky we are.



Gqeberha is the new name for Port Elizabeth. I’ve no idea how it’s meant to be pronounced.

 

Thanks Gandalf. We chatted about it yesterday evening. As we drove through the region we noticed a lot of young men had sticks, some of these sticks were pretty hefty and quite a few serious looking men had what looked more like clubs. They definitely weren’t walking sticks but seemed more like accoutrements. There was no violence and nobody harassed us in any way, nor did they even give us a second look, we made sure we kept moving except when we queued at the road accident. Fortunately everything went well but if it hadn’t it could have gone very wrong and you wouldn’t have wanted to get on the wrong end of these items.

It’s certainly a deprived area and without doubt we were naive. You just don’t understand until you’ve experienced it.

 

I had trouble posting photos from here, mainly because of lousy wifi. I’ve loaded a few on the previous thread about Drakensberg but I’ll have to backtrack as it were and post up some more here.


The drive to Drakensberg around the north of Lesotho was mainly flat and pretty boring. We didn’t want to do it again so that’s one of the reasons we went round the southern route on our way back towards Cape Town.

 

Views from the Drakensberg mountains.

My guide and an interesting looking fella.

 

Glad you like it.

 

Pictures from the Spion Kop. This was the terrible scene at the end. All British Soldiers. Jan 24 1900


Nowonder they couldn’t dig a trench, look at all the rock.

One of the memorials at the top.

This is where one of the trenches were. It’s now a mass grave.






Memorial to the Indian stretcher bearers, they were there in the thick of the action. I don’t know how many were lost or survived but check out the 6th name down ( below), he definitely survived.
General Redvers Buller, Commander in Chief of the British forces. Where do you get a name like that from?
Looks like a pompous ass if you ask me but of course that’s only my opinion and I don’t wish to lead the Jury. What do you think?
General Louis Botha, Commander of the Boer forces at Spion Kop. Looks like he’s got that madness in his eyes in this picture but he became a great negotiator, peacemaker and politician. Subsequently he became the first Prime Minister of South Africa.

Incredible that Churchill, Ghandi and Botha were all involved albeit in different ways, in the same Battle in the same location. Who knows, history could have been very different if they didn’t survive.

 

Drove from Port Alfred to Plettenberg. Basically it was an uneventful drive. More than I can say for the drive in the opposite direction but I’ll update about that later, when I have more time.


We did stop off at Nature bay which was fantastic.

Nature, not Naturist! We’d been there before in 2016, just had to take another look.


Mind you, we did go past this place.

 

The Mrs decided it would be a good idea to take me on a 5hr walk around the Peninsula at Plettenberg, which is called Robberg Nature reserve. Lots of steep climbs and narrow paths.

I can ride a bike all day, that is a bicycle or a motorbike come to that but 5 hrs walking
steep climbs and descent’s, I was totally fkd.

Now recovering with a beer or two.
Weird rock formations. No it’s not man made.

We walked along this really narrow path. If you slipped you’d be a gonner, bashing your brains out on the way down. So the conversation went like this.
Me, ‘If you want to get rid of me this is the place to do it’.
‘ I haven’t got access to all your bank accounts yet’
‘ No and you’re not getting them either’. And so I made it back.
People in diving suits swimming with Seals in the sea way down below us, look carefully. When the Seals were lying around on the rocks they looked just like my son did when he was a teenager lying around in the living room with half a dozen of his teenage mates. They made the same noise and both the seals and teenagers stank!



By the end of it!

 

Glad you’re enjoying it.
Yes he has. In fact I’ve recently become a grandfather so I’m looking forward to all the grief my grandson gives my son.

 

We decided to extend for a day in Plettenberg and have been rewarded with grey wet drizzle and rain.
We’ll have a look around the place anyway.

Tomorrow it’ll be an early start and off to Franschoek. Beautiful place.