CAPIES VERSUS VALIES

Ok lets just get one thing clear. Here in Gauteng the people don’t know how to braai. They either use charcoal or fancy gas griller jobbies. When the Capies practice their favorite pastime, we build a fire big enough to grill the whole neighbourhood’s wors and half a sheep. We are all potential pyromaniacs.

Being able to step outside without being blown across the yard as often happens in the Cape or riding your bike upright as apposed to a 45 degree angle through the Cape winelands in gusting wind is pretty cool. The wind never blows here. Never ever. A slight breeze has everyone up in arms.

I miss the way the Capies talk about eiwe virrie lywe en tamaties virrie parties. Here it’s all “neea ak gaan narens” or “ak gaan nou wark”, or “ak bly by my maw en my paw”.

In Cape Town you’ve basically got the N1, the N2 and that other watchemecalit road to the southern peninsula, not too hard to get lost, well for most people anyway. Here it’s a network of roads all leading in different directions to different places. Very confusing. There’s hardly any crock cars to be seen. Even the lighties drive fancy bling bling cars whereas in Cape Town you see loads of vrot rust heaps since they drive their cars till they stop and then they’ve still got resale value. Some cars have a bucket so your feet aren’t in a puddle and rust cavities are great for mounting speakers. The Capies complain about peak hour traffic. Ha, wait until they check out these traffic jams, all the friggin toll gates and crappy road surfaces. Valies all work a full day, clearly they don’t get the concept of working half day on a Friday like we do in Cape Town, so thousands more Valies all jostle for first place, flashing their bling bling, whereas the Capies are more like, what a cool day dude (that’s when the wind isn’t blowing), lets ditch work today and head off to the beach dude. Hey dude, where’s my car dude.

The beach. Yes, the one place the Capies rush to whenever they feel like it. Whether its to eat Kentucky in your rusty car while watching the sunset, to walk the dogs after work, to jog down the pavilion in you tight spandex, to catch a wave, or to spend the day grilling in the sun watching hot bods in G-strings strutting their stuff while the kids build sandcastles, whatever floats your boat there’s something for you. Holiday trips to the west coast usually include eating bokkoms with the friendly locals while you watch your tent blow away, or east coast where you pay a fortune for everything cos that’s where the valies go for Xmas to spend their hard earned moola to boost the tourist trade.

Here in valieland they all go to “die dam”. Sunday morning and we were off to Hartebeespoort Dam. Excitedly I stripped off my bullet proof vest, grabbed a towel and cossie, expecting to spend the day at the waterside. We stopped at the bottlestore, a big plus point for valieland since in Cape Town the only booze you will find on a Sunday is from a shabeen. Turns out Hartebeespoort Dam is a town of restaurants and flee markets, nowhere near the waterside, which hundreds of bikers go to for their breakfast run and there’s no swimming to speak of. In Cape Town the only time you see that many bikers together is for a day jol or rally.

Some Capies wake up to feed the pigeons but here the valies wake up to the call of the Grey Lourie (Kwe-voël) who squeezes out a nasal, drawn out “kwe” to persistently coach the people how to pronounce “e” as in “ek” and not “aak”. In Cape Town the only wild animals you’ll come across is the men standing around the braai, drinking klippies and coke and having a heated discussion about the rugby match. In Valieland the chances of seeing a lion or elephant on your way to work are high since most towns are surrounded with game parks, bush lodges or wedding/conference centres all packed with animals.

In Cape Town if you leave crisps out overnight, guaranteed they will be pap by next morning. Here the air is thin and dry and you can leave crisps out the whole week but the problem is the air is also so electrically charged that I’m too frightened to touch anything, never mind have sex since a combination of friction and moisture could result in self combustion.

Besides all the above, its basically same shit, different place.

GAUTENGELENG

We drove from Bloemfontein up to Krugersdorp without stopping at laybyes since there just weren’t any but we stopped at a awesome dam outside Welkom, which hundreds of flamingoes and other birds called home. We spent 2 days with binocs glued to our faces and the bird book got well utilized. We were the only people there to enjoy the stunning red sunset skies dotted with red flamingo wings.

We arrived at Krugersdorp in the North West where the pace picked up. We’re staying with Theo’s cousin, Berdien & Jan, who have gone all out to entertain us and make us feel at home. We spent a long weekend with their friends who own property in the Kruger National Park, my first exposure to big game and nogal in their back yard. There are a 100 or so privately owned plots within the park, most without border fences so effectively it means watch your arse when you’re braaing cos you could become supper for a hungry lion. You don’t stray far from the firelight at night and you definitely don’t want to share the river with the crocs in the river running past the front garden. A family of warthogs grazed on the lawn a few meters from us while a family of baboons watched us from a discreet distance. We watched a variety of buck come down for a drink at the river and giraffe moved silently through the tree tops. I’ve seen antelope before but never as part of the food chain. What a great experience. Later that day I plucked up the courage to swing from a moerse high tree in the front garden. All it took was a few beers to pretend the crocs sunning themselves on the riverbank a few meters ahead were plastic ornaments. I yelled for dear life as I did my tarzan thing. I think I’m turning into a pucker game ranger.

We stopped at a few stunning view sites on the 6 hour return trip from Mpumalanga. I’m especially name dropping the provinces cos I’m getting the hang of knowing what lies where, much to my mothers surprise I’m sure. Drie Rondawels and Gods Window offer breathtaking views from the end of the highveld plateau , overlooking the lowveld. I didn’t realize we were talking altitude differences here, I thought highveld and lowveld referred to the length of the actual grass.

Back at Berdien’s house it’s like a miniature friggin petting zoo. They share their house with 11 cats, 2 dogs, 2 birds, 2 tortoises, 2 chickens and a pot belly pig who calls like a baby when he wants to come indoors. She’s nuts about animals – go figure.

I spent yesterday scrubbing the bus; the back inside corner was black from the exhaust fumes and in hindsight I think all those times we stopped to rave about the view we were probably high as a kite for most of the trip. Oh well, Theo has stuck some gum gum on the hole in the exhaust and some silicon to cover the hole where it’s coming inside. We’ll see what happens when we leave here.

I’m seriously worried about our sex life. I can’t even stroke the cats without building up static friction from the electricity in the air but sooner or later we’ll have to give it a go, possibly with a rubber condom and rubber shoes to earth myself. I have anxious memories of collecting Theo a few times after work back in Cape Town, when a greeting kiss would turn into a hair raising spark as we changed seats. And I’m not even talking tongue, imagine what will happen if you put body fluids into the picture. I asked a few people for advice and they told me to always dangle one leg over the side of the bed to earth myself on the floor. They said a little shock now and then kept things spicy anyway and sex in the passage saved many a marriage. In the interim I’ve been a bit tense but it could be due to over exposure of people’s paranoia in the city life again.

I’ve also just discovered that for some reason I thought we were going to do the course at Pilansberg Nature Reserve. Well I got my facts wrong, we’re doing it at Combretum Nature reserve which is 2 or 3 hours drive from here. Don’t know how I got that mixed up, I thought I was getting good at directions. Oh well we got here, tomorrows worries are for tomorrow.

HOWDY DOODY

I’ve been blogging about places we’ve seen, but you might be wondering about the nitty gritty’s of the trip. I’ve come to the realization that when you’re on the move you just can’t plan ahead cos things never work out accordingly and you only end up screwing yourself if you put expectations on where you’ll be next. I’m also holding thumbs that the bus doesn’t give any more problems cos Theo is learning about maintenance but I suspect he’s learning the hard way but so far we are still on the move and getting there.

I definitely prefer small one horse towns to the bigger cities since they have so much more character and you feel as though you’ve stepped back in time, also less chance of getting lost. We stopped at Bloemfontein, capital of the Frystaat, to visit Theo’s brother and wife, and the city is big and ugly and uninviting. It’s also raining which probably adds to the dreariness of this large brown city.

We spend most days driving (top speed is 80 km/hr), stopping to make food or tea and sometimes we do museums, some are interesting some are old and dusty, or a quick bit of shopping, but mostly its just us, loads of laybyes, and a changing view from the bus window. When we stop in the middle of nowhere you can feel the quietness all around – it’s cool.

My hands have cuts and the dusty cracks tell me my skin is dry but I make a bee line for soaking in the bath and a good pampering when we stay over with people. Whether or not you wear underwear is also determined by your dwindling cupboard and how far before the next washing machine stop.

We’re eating really well; braaing most nights, Theo’s lekker bread, divine buttermilk flapjacks for brekkies, vetkoek and carrot salad are but a few. And then of course the huge parmeham and pancetta which he made 4 months ago is getting smaller and smaller and works as a good standby.

We’re unfit and fatter and the birds and vegetation have changed so I can’t identify anything. I hope I do ok on the Field Guide course starting 21^st August but I’d better start learning to identify stuff around here. Yesterday we drove past either a jackal or a fox. It was roadkill which made it difficult to match up to the picture in my mammal book. I’ve noticed that the hundreds of termite hills around here have been broken open by animals but I haven’t seen them yet.

Other people collect teaspoons or porcelain frogs but we collect toilet paper from petrol garages for when you have to pee in the bushes (not that I’ve seen many bushes lately).

We mostly only have each others company although we don’t talk to each other too much when driving since the engine is noisy. The exhaust fumes generally billow around the back end of the bus, so when we wanna get goofed we pull over for matinee sex.

I sit with the map to see where we are and to get a sense of direction. Ha – my favorite pastime. Well I’m not lost yet although sometimes the Garmin doesn’t work so lekker. I’m learning where the provinces are, anything north of the karoo is unfamiliar to me. All those new names of towns and provinces are foreign but I see the Free State is still called the Free State according to my map.

It rains in winter in the Western Cape and then it gets cold. Makes sense. Now we’re traveling north, climbing altitude all the time, its still winter, it’s warm, we’ve passed snow on the mountains, the grass is dry yellowy browny and it rains in the summer. I’m confused as to when the people suntan.

Anyway so far I love every minute of the journey. Things will change I imagine when we run out of money but hopefully by then we’ll be qualified field guides and can look for work in that line.

Who knows what tomorrow will bring. I think I’m living life as it was meant to be, I'm enjoying it and I’m happy.

VULTURES AND HISTORY

We arrived in Willowmore with more bus problems ho hum. Same thing – sucking air. Dam. Luckily we didn’t have too hectic a deadline but this wasn’t part of the plan. Theo tried but couldn’t fix the problem so we headed for the garage where they suggested we get an electrical fuel pump which they fitted but after a test drive, the problem persisted. It was 1 o clock and the town closed so it looked like we were there for the weekend. Piet, the very friendly garage owner, insisted we could park in his workshop yard with electricity access and keys to toilets until Monday morning but we were happy to park at a laybye where we could braai and enjoy nature. Later Piet drove the 2km out of town to make sure we were ok and for a chat. He told us he enjoyed flying his microlight and later that afternoon we looked up to see him flying over and wave, satisfied that all’s well. Next morning Theo decided to have another look under the bus and seemed to sort out the problem. We drove around a little to make sure the problem didn’t come back, phoned Piet to tell him we were on our way again and later that day we stopped outside Aberdeen, 200 km past Willowmore, looked up and so wraggies waar we saw Piet flying overhead to wave us on our way. No that’s what you call country service. If it was Cape Town you could confuse Piet’s enthusiasm with the eager roadside tow truck vultures out scanning the tarmac for possible business.

We left the green Rhenosterbos behind us and headed for Graaf Reinette, where we strolled through the military museum and educated ourselves about the Anglo Boer War. The vegetation had turned a dull yellowy brown. I imagined a lion would blend in easily with the grass and I got a kind of a African feeling staring out the window. Well the first few hours anyway, by day 2 it was just more and more boring yellowy browny grass. I was used to green stuff in winter in the Western Cape not this dry open space unfolding for km after km ahead. The book said we’d left the arid region and were in savannah grassland. We overnighted just outside Colesburg and tried our shower out for the first time. It worked perfectly and I felt good. We’d been sleeping at pullovers all the time, (except of course the times we stayed with friends) and we’d always felt safe. I don’t know what all the fuss is about being safe out on the road in SA. The crime is way less out in the gamadoelas, probably cos there’s like a whole 6 people living in the whole Freestate but we are op en wakker and Theo keeps the tazer (stun shock thingie) handy. He wears it on his belt these days since the other day he shocked his leg from the inside of his pocket, not that I’m complaining since a day or 2 recuperating from sex was a relief.

We arrived in Bethulie, a town steeped in Anglo Boer War history, and stayed at Lupo, a biker friend who had sold up his stuff to travel SA and Namibia with Anette on their GS’s but they stopped in Bethulie, bought a house, converted it into a bike packer, and stayed. Lupo was our inspiration to get out of the ratrace so we were keen to see him. He showed us grave sites, the huge concentration camp site where just under 2 000 people died in tents. He took us to the museum, we read letters written by the Khakies to their families, read about first shots being fired at Novalspoort, and by the time we left Bethulie, the Anglo Boer war wasn’t just an event written about in history books, it became real, involving real people suffering horrific conditions.

Lupo showed us the massive, I mean maase massive Gariep dam. Not a person, not a boat, canoe, picnic table or tourist in site. What a pity the dusty, vertragte, town seemed to show little interest in putting itself on the map. If you do find yourself in the historical Bethulie, stop over at Lupo's Bike packers phone 083 251 3555 or check out his website www.BikerPackers.Bethulie.za.net. He will give you a guided tour of the place and is good company.

Back on the bus, a vehicle with a view, and on to Bloemfontein.

OSTRICH EGGS AND CLAMPED PIPES

We arrived in Cape Town without further incident and spent 2 weeks fixing things. We had the king pin in the steering column repaired, we shopped for pipes and engineering places for braising, filters, bike spares for servicing my bike, food, more pipes, books, clamps, etc. Theo fitted the inverter, the solar panel on the roof, the fridge is working on gas as well as electricity, our shower works and he’s fitted pipes to run the veggie oil. We managed to catch up with old friends but I felt like a foreigner balancing on a bar stool and all that concrete and noise and throwing banana skins in the dustbin seemed wasteful. Pavements, shops and electrical gadgets replaced mountains, peacefulness and fynbos. I missed simplicity but was disappointed in how easy it is to slip back in.

A friend decided to catch a lift with us as far as Oudtshorn to visit some friends. Luckily Arno, our passenger, is easy go lucky since our trip started with problems. Previous mishaps like broken gear levers seemed trivial compared to this. We got as far as the Worcester tunnel when the fuel pipe started sucking air so we plakked there for 2 nights while Theo tried to tighten the clamps and bleed the fuel pipe. We eventually got Keith (brother in law) and his diesel mechanic buddie to come through to help us out. They were startled at Theo’s assortment of connections, pipes and clamps but they managed to get us going again.

The Meiringspoort Pass between Prince Alfred Hamlet and Oudtshoorn is really pretty and I lost count of the times we crossed the river drifts. Unfortunately the Swartberg Pass was not possible in our long bus since the sign recommended 4 x 4 vehicles.

We arrived at Oudtshoorn, a town renowned for ostriches, the Cango Caves and crocodile farms and stayed with our biker friends, Martin and Peta. We enjoyed their hospitality for 2 nights, braaied yummy ostrich steaks and ostrich sausage, visited a dusty museum, and bought a ostrich egg. I’m looking forward to it for breakfast although 1 ostrich egg is the same size as 24 regular eggs. I’ll tell my mother, who is fascinated at the amount of eggs we go through, that we’ve progressed to ostrich eggs, that should give her a laugh.

Then we joined Arno at the farm in Oudtshoorn. His friend works and stays on a huge, busy, dairy farm called Bakenkloof. Life there is simple and I loved it. I was in my element walking around in wellies in the mud and brushing the horses, and drinking wine around a fire watching the sunset, and feeding the calves milk from a bottle and picking peacan nuts and sitting on a crate in the sun shelling them. Piet’s wife showed me how to make butter and she gave me delicious buttermilk, yoghurt and milk. Theo made a huge peacan pie for everyone and we were ready to leave to travel further north.

Going Into The Wild (good movie) has been a great adventure for us. Each day here is like man, life’s good.

We didn’t know what to expect at Simonskloof Organic Farm since the webpage had phrases like “lots of time to meditate” so we weren’t sure if we’d sit around eating tofu or run naked through the fields clutching a crystal in search of our inner self.

Turns out the place superseded all our expectations and Jurgen totally applies the concept of WWOOFING (Willing Workers On Organic Farms) and the 3 of us interacted full time, working and eating together. Simonskloof is a retreat off the grid (no Escom) situated 50km into the Koo valley. There’s just space, tranquility and harmony. We didn’t do any meditation or call on the spirits but we did drink loads of red wine, and had conversations about life, the universe, AC DC and the best way to cook potatoes. I thrived.

Living in a world without light switches, a microwave oven or cell phone reception takes getting used to but you learn to pee by candle light and to find the salt in the dark with just a lantern. I didn’t know much about the whole Permaculture thing so washing tiny tomato paste cans, squashing up egg trays, rinsing beer cans, drying out tea bags and putting biodegradable stuff back into the earth was all very new to me. On top of all that Jurgen is a pedantic Swiss German with many peculiar ways such as colour coding his washing on the line cos it’s aesthetically pleasing and not boring he reckons. I’m a slap dash no frills kinda gal and Theo also takes the shortest route, unless there’s food involved, but the 3 of us got on fantastically. He likes thing in an exact place cos its easier than searching in the dark – makes sense. Folding the spare blankets to resemble a French Chocolate Bun instead of a neat square, well lets just say that’s a bit odd, but it’s those kind of things which make him so unique, (and I thought thoroughly entertaining), and which makes his rustic yet spotless guest houses such a popular weekend getaway. By the time we left I enjoyed laying the table (a task done for all meals) symmetrically cos it looked nice.

Maraletta, Jurgen’s newly wedded bubbly wife, still has a business in Cape Town so at the moment is only able to come through for stretched out weekends to the farm but once the 3 door house is ready she will be adding her personal touch and making more of her delicious Apricot jam and fragrant salts.

Jurgen enjoys cooking as much as Theo does so while they cooked up a storm, I cleaned up, making sure the cheese grater went back on the right hook and wondered why my clothes were shrinking.

We stayed in our camper bus down at the campsite although it was really just for sleeping since we were busy all day long building a reed roof on the soon to be finished new house and we did general work including spotlessly cleaning the 2 guest houses. Coffee breaks on the farm stoep, watching hundreds of oak leaves drift in the wind with backdrop of spectacular valleys and mountains, can cut into a working day, ho hum, but the only stress out there was chasing the chickens off the stoep and squeezing the last coffee out of the plunger to dunk your chocolate biscuit into.

I re-discovered a book which I read 20 years ago called Illusions by Richard Bach. I was probably too young and spaced out to really understand it properly first time round but wow, did I hang on every word when I re-read it. Damm, it’s so profound – you just have to read it, if it’s the one thing you do that’s important.

Being Winter, we had a few days of icy wind blowing from the snow surrounding mountains and cracking my face, but mostly we worked in a T shirt and just bundled up at night to keep out the minus zero degrees. I even got used to using the cold outdoor shower at the campsite. The water can be heated but it takes too long and what the heck, a good nipple stand and an instant face lift is a damn good way to start the day although when I washed my hair, the brain freeze made me move in slow motion for about 10 minutes thereafter making it difficult to dress while balanced naked on a rock under a tree.

The campsite’s long drop is great for the daytime if you take your binocs with to watch the birds and it takes the concept of “Leaving no trace” nicely to new frontiers since you don’t even leave skidmarks.

On an off day we rode our bikes down the valley to Keerom dam where Theo had an unsuccessful attempt at trout fishing. I enjoyed the tricky ride even though I hit the deck making me realize the importance of wearing safety clothes – I wasn’t wearing my bike boots and could have prevented a bruise or two on my legs but I was wearing my helmet (even though we were on the farm still) and protected my head when it bumped against a rock.

Another off weekend it was the yearly Wacky Wine Weekend and of course we went. We hooked up with Kyro, our son, and a bunch of our biker friends from Cape Town and for R60 p/p we tasted red wine until eventually they all tasted the same to me. Well, they do anyway but I’m practicing. We slept over with our friends but I’m afraid I don’t remember much of the evening since I got horribly drunk.

Anyway our time at Simonskloof was fantastic but after a month we decided its time to head back to Cape Town to fix the steering, complete the veggie oil conversion and be off on our long trip up to Pilansburg to do the course which we’d finally booked. We could only leave 2 days later than planned cos the bus was stuck in the mud after some heavy rain and we had to wait for the road to dry out. After much digging and towing and revving and smoke and spinning wheels we were pulled out. It was a learning curve but I’ll put money on it that we’ll make the same mistake again. Anyway we eventually got on our way, happy to see the roof completed. We’d stripped and cleaned the reeds which were nailed in as a ceiling. Theo and Jurgen covered them in hessian, then a layer of insulator and finally they cut and nailed in corrugated iron sheeting on the top. I helped wherever I could, but in between all of the work I ended up getting tick bite fever which had me down for a few days with a migraine, body aches and a fever but I managed some interesting reading in the meantime.

I’m starting to have my doubts as to what kind of Field Guides Theo and I will make cos on our trip to Simonskloof, we stopped overnight at the Montagu tunnel. We were surrounded by awesome sheer rock mountain walls and across the road lower down, a river meandered through bushes and reeds.

We stopped in time to watch the sun go down, made a fire, tried to ignore the surprising heavy traffic rushing between Montagu and Ashton (country towns with peak hour traffic??) and polished off the last of Theo’s home made Cherry Liqueur. As it got darker we heard scuttling around in the bushes and wondered if it was a porcupine. The scuttling got noisier and noisier and we even heard grunts and pants. Too late for sleeping baboons, we nervously considered a leopard but the mammal book (after quick reference) stated that leopards are shy animals. Theo was inside the bus, probably pouring the last of the liqueur, but the point is he was inside and I was outside when the grunts and pants started getting nearer and louder and it only took me 3 seconds to cover the 100m from the braai fire back to the bus door, jump in and slam the door shut. We stayed there the rest of the evening except for once when Theo dashed out to fetch the meat off the fire. Field Guides in the making!

Our trip back was as to be expected; eventful. We stopped overnight at a pullover but next morning we realized the battery was flat (we left the lights on?!?). Luckily we had just bought a solar panel in Montagu after seeing how well it worked at Simonskloof. We propped the panel up against the wheel and 3 hours later the battery was charged and we where on our way to Cape Town where…. life…. seems….. strange…………….

Burning Rubber

After staying at Jamaka for 3 weeks, we contacted a farm in Montague offering the same setup, and the owner, a Swiss guy, invited us to come through on the 27^th of May. We were just getting used to our new, slow lifestyle in the Cederberg but it was time to move on. It had gone from fun to boredom to finally really appreciating our surroundings once we found our groove.

Our trial run up to Clan William confirmed that the bus was taking a strain with the extra weight of the bikes on the back and Theo struggled to keep the bus in a straight line. We planned to stop in Cape Town on our way and sort out the smell of burning rubber which was more worrying than the constant smell of exhaust fumes wafting in the back.

Last day on the farm we hiked up the mountain to look at the caves right up on the top. We made it all the way up, puffing and panting, even scaled a rocky bit, and were very impressed with ourselves. I was sure we’d built up some muscles in the time we’d been there and Theo’s calves were looking particularly sexy that day through the sweat dripping in my eyes.

It took us a day to pack up, load the bikes, have a last huge bonfire braai and then we were on our way. We stopped overnight in Elands Bay where Theo managed to smokkel some crayfish from the locals. Next morning we visited the cave to see the bushmen paintings, which sadly did nothing to satisfy my curiosity about the origins of man, and we stopped at the harbour to watch the fishermen launch their snoek bakkies. The early morning hazy flat sea was dotted with the little boats, manned by very abled fishermen who rowed out to sea to make a living.

Back on the road and the increased traffic indicated we were near Cape Town again. We headed up the busy road through Table View in peak hour traffic. Not wanting to make the trip boring, Theo decided to dislocate and detach the gear lever between first and second which left us stranded in the middle of road with a string of cars behind us. Ho hum, never a dull moment. He coasted onto the pavement to let the traffic pass. A few “oh f*ck ” later, we scratched our heads but a boer maak a plan so he grabbed the long hollow handled axe from behind his seat, wedged it over the 2 inch stump of the gear lever sticking out of the floor, gripped the axe blade to put it in 3^rd and we managed to make it to my moms house. We smelt a new aroma of burning clutch as we mounted the pavement in 3^rd gear but that was tomorrows problem. My mother seemed happy to see us although she said she had only just finished scrubbing her stove and pots.

Next day we took the bus in to be seen to including having the back window replaced. (remember the going up trip when we left the road in a hurry), and a new back tyre. The clutch smelt fine luckily and our idea of having to refit the double set of back tyres (removed by the previous owner) to carry the extra load seemed unnecessary. We were told that adding 2 extra feathers to the back springs, would sort us out. Cost a lot but cheaper than running extra tyres. When we collected the bus, they told us that the front king pin would sort out our steering problem but they could only attend to it the following week. We decided to leave the front repairs until after our trip to Montague since we were keen to get going and wanted to stop at Theos folks in Struuibaai for a week or 2 first. Theo was also looking forward to visiting our friends in the same area before the rainy season set in so that he could do some fishing before heading to Montague.

And so we were back on the move again