Off to Mpumalanga and a bit of Swaziland

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

Wayne Duck

Race Dog
Joined
Aug 29, 2011
Messages
944
Reaction score
299
Location
No fixed address...Travelling Southern Africa in a
Greetings once again, I think this is my 5th or 6th ride report here, I hope that this gives you some motivation to get out there and enjoy!

A bit of a preamble -
Recently one of my good friends bought a Yamaha 660R, "to commute with to work". Now all of you know, when you've been riding plastics off-road all your life, your new "dual sport for commuting" will definitely not only be used for commuting! Very soon you'll want to see how it performs on a gravel road, then you'll try a bit of dirt twin-spoor tracks, and then, what the hell, let's take it properly off-road! And so it was that Brett let me know that it was time for him to join me on a little multi-day trip  ;D

Martin, on the other hand, surprised Brett and I by, out-of-the-blue, buying a brand new (demo) "baby blue" 800GS...he was going to join us! Martin has had road and dirt bikes in his past, but I honestly was worried about his ability to ride a heavy dual sport on gravel, sand, or worse. I made him buy and fit the essentials - barkbusters, crash bars and a bash plate, I did not want a small fall ending our trip at any stage. With these items fitted, and the 1000 km service just done, I took him on a quick 250 km loop through the farm roads of the North West...I was impressed, that 800GS was not going to intimidate him!

Now for the actual ride report -

Day one - Harties Dam to Dullstroom, via Cullinan, Loskop and Tontledoos, 350 km

We hit the Sunday morning breakfast run traffic (those revvy revvy, styf-gespan-in-their-leather-suits sooper baark riders...some nice bikes though!) to Cullinan where we had breakfast. Knowing that most of the other bikers were going to have to ride home that day while we had five days of riding ahead of us was a great feeling!
Out of Cullinan on the R513, then onto a dirt link to the D1241 to the R25. After a few k's we turned right to follow the gravel roads to near Loskop. After a refuel at Loskop it was down the N11 for a short distance then sharp left onto the gravel... I finally start to get the "out in the sticks" feeling on this great stretch of road!

By the condition of the road one could see that this area had some recent heavy rains. Nothing too drastic, but one had to watch for donga's and puddles. One of the bigger puddles...

038_zps13bd3ca5.jpg


As can be seen, I negotiated this slowly, not wanting to get too wet and muddy but also to show Martin how he should tackle this, his first mud puddle on his new bike. Well, as can be seen in the next few photos, I had not even had time to dismount and offer advice when Martin (actually at that stage I did not know if it was Martin or Brett, all I could see from the front was a wall of water!) hit the water with a "stink spoed"...(pics taken by Brett from the back obviously)

039_zpsa4167f6d.jpg


You will see above that I'm still dismounting, unaware of what is heading toward me!

040_zps77b4f23a.jpg


When I do look back I see this almighty "bow wave". Well, he got through ok, but very very wet after all that water showered down onto him. He said he went fast because "there was no way I was going to get stuck in THAT"  :exclaim:

Then Brett's turn, nice and slow, not even getting his boots wet  :thumleft:

IMGP4316_zps63a81527.jpg


After a lazy afternoon stop for lunch at Tontledoos (The Cheese Shop) it was a short hop into Dullstroom where we spent the first night.

IMGP4322_zps28dda80f.jpg


As you can see, I told them to pack light, and they did! Solo my 35L "big river" bag (that mustard thing on my seat) is plenty big enough for any length trip - a few changes of socks and underwear, my slip slops and toiletries. The little bag on the back is always there - has all my tyre repair stuff and weighs 3.3kg (my rims are sealed so tubeless). The tank bag is also a permanent feature...snacks and drinks, paperwork, camera, first aid kit and other odds.

In planning the route and stops I badly misjudged what our average speed would be, hence each day we arrived at our destination a bit too early in the afternoon. In my defense though, being the guys first adventure ride, I was thinking they'd be a lot slower. They surprised me! But, this did give us time to explore, discuss the day's riding, check the bikes over and, of course talk k_k over a few cold beverages before going to bed (very) early each evening  :thumleft:

...Day two next...
 
Top