Water in die Waterberg, Sterkrivier, Bakenberg, Marken 7-9 Maart

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Armpie

Pack Dog
Joined
Apr 30, 2013
Messages
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Location
Pretoria
Bike
Kawasaki KLR 650

So my heavy and me says to each other we want adventure.  So much he wanted adventure he actually boughted  a new BMWF800 Adventure.  So we believe adventure in the Waterberg is a commodity to share.  So we invite Tertius and the rest of the JRAD (Just rode across dirt).  All three of them.  Tertius on his friend’s GS1200, also Wynand on his GS1200 and Hennie on his Super  Tenere.  I climb on my Red Mare, my favorite 2006 KLR on earth.

For adventure we picked in advance bad weather.  We takes the wetest weekend for many years.  In driving rain we get to Warmbad from Pretoria on a Friday afternoon.  When we get to the mainstreet (Nelson Mandelastreet- all mainstreets in the New South Africa is named so),  and we see the first caravan comes floating in front of the bakkie past  Klein Kariba, we was going to got serious fun.  My KLR’s 21 inch rim was halfway in the water.  Strew as bob.  But it rained so much we did not take out a camera. A had thought of bringing my tooter from the water scooter.

Past Naboomspruit we took the Bronne road and here the sports started. Mud was everywhere.  But we survived the first 30km of mud without too much as 5 slips.  Wynand was the first one to take the unplanned detour, skirting the game fence for a few meters.  But the KLR also took one or two slips.  When we arrive at my brother’s farm it is still raining and my sidestand decided to test the ground on the side in China.  But my riding companions showed no interest in  the hardy KLR, so they just took out cameras and started filming.  They is too scared to be on a photo with a KLR I realized.

The say “friends do not llet friend ride KLR’s”.  So after me threating them that they will all sleep in the rain, they agrees to help if all cameras was off.  So much for their sense of adventure!


So next morning we go for a 280km trip across the Waterberg.  

But plans they can change. So we goes to Bakenberg.  Then we leafes the road for a road with no name.  It is a road less traveled.  But I knows this road is called the “Elandskuiling  Pass”.

So we struggled through the wet sand and slippery mud until we reach rocks and stuff.  We can even see waterfalls in the Waterberg.  Behind our backs is a beautiful site of nice nature.
So about 8km of the pass, we turn right up a little road of two tracks into the mountains.  Both the two tracks is streams with watercoming down.  First Hennie goes up with his Super Tenere, .  Then I goes.  I nearly flattens a tree with my front wheel.  But luckily I miss the tree and after about 200m I am with Hennie on top.  Then we waited some time.  After many minutes Tertius arrives.  He says I must go back as my heavy thinks this is not enough adventure for him.  On the way to the rear, I come across Wynand, he also took a dive where I nearly hit the tree.  When I get to the bottom, my heavy says this is it.  His new 250km old  bike is not ready for this.  So he turns back.  He sort of lost it and we only later find him back in Pretoria.

So the 4 of us continue on the 2 tracks.  The road is very slippery and at some places the water is 20cm deep coming down the tracks.

We go through a gate.  Made of wires.




Likie a soft copy of a gate. Then we reach a stream.  I think it must be the “Stofstroom” (that is Dusty River)but today it is a raging river, about 50 meters wide, and in the centre of the usual road 1 meter deep.  But on the sides about 400mm.  .
Me and Tertius, the 101 Battalion Platoon Lieutenant , decided on how to make a tactical withdrawal or a full frontal charge.  But the old Policeman Hennie stormed the water and came across the 50m crossing.  Not without some faster heartbeat. So the tactical withdrawal idea was for sissies.  We all crosses once upon a time.  Not twice.  We reaches an old man with his cattle.                  He says the road is blocked by a wirefence. After 3 times we understand that we will have to make a tactical withdrawal after all.  So through the rain and the mud we crossed the river for a second time.

We again go back down the little road, then down the Elandskuiling Pass, then we turn left and go north towards Baken berg.  For the next 20km we skid and slide forward, then we turn left and go in a valley up through the Moepelberg.                        It is wet and the rain has just fallen.  So we ride the last 10km to Marken.

At Marken we took lunch.  The world famous Russian and chips, we took while sitting on the trappie.  But now it really rained.  

The farmers thought we are mad, because we ride a motorbike on a mud road in heavy rain.

Our idea change.  We did 120km from 8 o’clock and it is already 2 o’clock in the afternoon.  We took the shortcut back on the clean tar road, until we stop on the birt road back to Sterkrivier.  Here the lieutenant say we must park the motorbikes in a line to be “marsgereed”.  Then we brew coffee on an kettle with some fancy jetfuel stove.  Hennie says it can burn high, so I thinks it must be jetfuel.
We went back to base to drink some otherstuff and to eat meat and break (it was too much work to was the porridge pot).  The next morning we clean the base and went off to Vingerkraal near Mabula.

Here we plan to Visit my friend formerly from 32 Battalion and Koevoet, Gomes.  Again we encounter mud and some adventure terrain.  Close to Vingerkraal.  I picks up a dead jackal and Hennie cuts of his tail.                  The photo shows one dead jackal  wrapped over the KLR.  So everybody thinks I murders the fox with the KLR, BUT for a jackal I will cry harder than Oscar for his girlfriend.

At Vingerkraal we pull Gomes from his church.  So we drink somemore brew from the kettle.

We give Gomies some stuff and other goods in his pocket.               Then we leave for home.  When we reaches Warmbad it is still raining.  Again it is too much adventure for a camera.  On the old Pretoria Road it rains until Hammanskraal.

Man 48 hours of serious fun.  Dankie aan my mede rijders.  Volgende keer doen ons die ander helfte wat ons die keer gelos het.
 
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