I have to backtrack a bit now, found a few more pics of this ride in the big cardboard box and scanned them, so hopefully the sequence will make sense.
We left PE early in the morning heading towards George from where we would head inland and take a few dirt road passes to get to Swartberg Pass and hit
a left into die Hel. This was the plan. This would be the last trip that we would do together as I would return to Durban for good and embark on an illustrious career
or so I thought and Jörn was headed to Pretoria for the Christmas break before continuing with his studies.
The main tar road there was easy cruising and we made good progress. Things got better when we left the tar and headed up our first dirt road pass.
After the last few months of hard labour at varsity the sense of freedom was incredible and we didn't have a care in the world. No need to worry about extra tools
either as the old BMW's came with a full toolkit with which you could literally take the whole bike apart. A spare tube, some patches and bicycle pump and we
reckoned we were well equipped. Things started to get interesting when we got to the bottom of Swartberg Pass. Incredible scenery and the bikes were handling
good. A short stop on top at the viewsite and we were soon underway again. As I remember it was slowish going once we had turned off towards die Hel, stunning
scenery with many switchbacks.
We had by now removed our helmets and clipped them onto the back of the bikes. It was a hot day and riding without a lid just added to the whole experience.
Once in the valley we were amazed to see most homesteads abandoned. There was one old farmer in his 70's who was out and about though. We could see him
ploughing his field by hand literally. The old man was pulling the ploughshare as if he were the ox or horse. We greeted him and had a short chat. On our inquiry
why he did not just use his horse to pull the heavy plough his short answer was: perd het gevrek. We wished him goodbye and carried on. Late afternoon we
arrived at our destination at the end of the valley. We were fairly tired by then and looking forward to just chilling out.
Our new home from home was this little establishment at the end of the road run by two brothers who could not have looked more differently than each other.
There was normal brother and then the otherwise brother. This guy looked like a guy straight out of "Deliverance" but on steroids. Heavily built and strong as an ox
no doubt but with little going on between the earlobes then. He could kind of talk though and looked at us all weird. Normal brother could sense our apprehension but
was quick to reasure us, claiming that weird brother had a slight problem at birth because of the mixed bloodlines, but: Don't worry, I have this oke under control -
you are safe here!
As our accommodation options were somewhat limited at this moment in time we agreed to give this place a go and make the best of a slightly weird situation.
The place looked pretty legit otherwise though, they had a visitors book and on reading, it revealed that someone had been through here a fortnight ago. Lots of other
entries too from all over the place and some foreigners too. Some jokes and a bit of homebrew witblitz later we were shown to our camping site next to a little spruit
with running water. We had a dip in the spruit and feeling refreshed started to get sorted for our braai and the few beers we had brought along......................
Next: Weird brother gets even weirder and rifleshots over our heads
Topic: die Hel in 1989 (Read 2743 times)
