My annual leave. The hell , Baviaans and some more.

[Hanno @ Mad Macs]

The internet has recently celebrated its 24 year of existence. With the coming of the internet has come a lot of evils , but also a lot of good. Amongst other things the internet has made the world a lot smaller.  So it is that through the internet I have come to meet some wonderful people. And the internet has shown me places such as the Hell and Baviaanskloof. But seeing it on a PC screen is not same as being there yourself and experiencing a place on your own. And so with my annual leave due I started to make plans to go and see some of those places for myself.

DAY 1

I start my day by packing Jemima and making sure that everying is tied down nicely and ready for the trip. Actually, I did the packing the previous night and all I need do is strap everything down and get into my bike gear.

My first stop is at the fuel station where I spend a few minutes checking and adjusting my tire pressures.



Because I ride the area around Cape Town a lot I do not stop for pics but I do decide to stop for a pic when I cross the Berg river near Francshoek.



A quick stop at the top of the pass to look at the scenery





And I am off again.

I make a point of relaxing and taking it easy. And I force myself to get into the holiday mode by stopping a lot to take pictures.



I go through Villiersdorp and just after the pass I turn right onto a gravel road that points in the general direction I want to go.

Now if you are on a Dualsport bike , then signs like this are what you want to see :



And roads like these are what we ride for :







I pass the Breede bash site and cross the river just after the site. The next road to the right takes me along the river valley and towards Robertson.

You have to wonder what frightens someone to run out of his shoes like this :



The road follows the river for a distance.



I go through Robertson and Ashton.

In Ashton I stop at the train for a pic and grab something to eat.



The idea was to go through Montagu and then follow a dirt road past Rietkraal se rivier towards Koedoeskloof , but talking to the local at the restaurant he tells me that the road is closed because it goes through a nature reserve. Not having been that way before I have to believe him and so I stay on the tar road hoping to turn left onto the dirt at a later stage.

Close to the Op de Tradouw pass I turn left onto a dirt road that looks promising. But about 7kms down the road I am met by a gate proclaiming that in front of me lies Sanbona Nature reserve.

The toothless security guard at the gate was very unhelpful and just flatly denied me thoroughfare. I suspect that my spinning rear wheel roosting him and his office might have given him an indication of what I felt like when I had to turn around.

I stopped down the Sanbona road to grab a pic of two of the locals.



Back onto the R62 I continued towards Barrydale stopping for some pics along the way.





I have done the Tradouw pass in a car before but never on a bike and so I decided to go down and back up the pass.







I turned around





and stopped to just soak in the view and the sounds.

I was amazed at how much of the Fynbos I could smell. What really tickled me though was that I could really smell the fynbos every time after I put helmet on. It was somewhere on day two that I realized the I was not smelling the fynbos , but that my helmet inners needed a serious meeting with some soap and water.



Then it was past Barrydale and on towards Ladismith and Koedoeskloof.



I went past a VW Jetta lying on the embankment and looking a bit battered so I turned around to investigate how and why someone would park their vehicle like that.

The evidence was fairly straight forward.





and the damage quite spectacular.



I do suspect that some locals came and helped themselves to some of spares available while the car was lying there.

I turned left past Buffelsdrift,  dealt with a local traffic jam



admired the view



and stopped at Velbrandt and Debi at Koedoeskloof where I pitched my tent and chilled.



A warm shower and an awesome Koedoe burger later and I was sleeping like a baby.





 

[Lem]

 

[gwild]

  keep it coming 

[Matewis]

Subscribe

[Karoo Rider]

 

[whitedelight]

Nice Hanno,you are seriously gifted when it comes to taking nice photos..

[trevorwb]

Fantastic photos.More pls

[troos]

Subscribed

[DCR]

Nice! One of these days I'll be doing the same.

[J-dog]

 

[Teapot]

[>>Thump°C]

Nice

[Operator]

Nice RR


Het geweet Carrots het gese dat hy familie in die Kaap het, maar ek het nie geweet hulle woon tussen Franschoek en Villiersdorp
nie. 

[4 Kays]

Great photography  Waiting for the rest 

[Hanno @ Mad Macs]

DAY 2

I awoke to a glorious sunrise and spent some time walking around and taking some pics in the 'golden hour'.













I packed my goodies and said my goodbyes to Debi and Eugene and took the road towards Ladismith and Calitzdorp.

Just after turning onto the tar road I spotted this kitten sitting on a car port. At first I rode past ,  but forcing myself into holiday mode I turned around and went to grab a pic of this okie. He was very intrigued with the swaying leaces above him and I suspect that at some point he would have made an attempt to catch them if he could.




I stopped at the spar in Ladismith and bought some goodies to munch .

I stopped in Huisrivier pass and had a breakfast of sorts.







Into Calitzdorp and left towards the town dam.





I have done this road once before with Tweets when we were at the Springbok Rally about two years back and I took a nice photo then. So when I passed the spot where I took the pic I stopped and took one for comparison.

THEN :



and NOW



The road runs parallel with the Swartberg mountains



Until it meats up with the Swartberg pass.

I turned left towards the Swartberg pass and met two other Adventure Riders one on an 800GS and one on a 1200GS.
During our quick chat they indicated that they were also planning to go into Die Hell and back out before going further towards Loxton I think. My plans were to go in and out and then head towards George for the night.

We said our goodbyes and I made my way up the pass.



The view back down the pass:



And the view down the mountain. The road that I came up with is just visible.





The view further up the pass



I turned left at the entrance to Die Hell. And for the next 11kms I wished that I had a bike with better suspension. The road conditions were really crappy and I could hardly maintain 40km/h with lots of braking for dips , ruts and holes. Eventually though the conditions improved and my average speed started to look better.





Every now and then I would come across a little Steenbokkie pair. They were so relaxed that I would ride right past them , stop and take a pic and continue off without them moving.





A Nice piece of road



and another Steenbokkie.



I also saw some Grey Ribbok , but they did not care for me taking photos of them.

I had to stop to take a photo of the (in)famous pass down to the Hell.



And having negotiated the tight turns and steep downhills I stopped at Ouma Sannie se Winkel for some refreshments.





I rode down the valley towards the information centre and stopped at the crossing of the Gamka River for this pic.



On our trip to Springbok Rally we went down Bosluiskloof pass towards the Gamkapoort Dam. This is then the other side of that poort .



Then it was time to make my way back up the pass and towards George for the night.

As I turned around I met the Gent on the 800GS coming from ahead and we had a quick chat where he informed me that his friend on the 1200 turned around in that first 11 kms and was waiting for him in Prince Albert.

I stopped at the campsite at the entrance to Die Hell and soaked my T-shirt and buff under a tap before putting on my jacket again.

Just a few hundred meters up the pass I got stuck behind a 4x4 making it's way up , but the driver was very friendly and moved over as soon as was possible for me to pass. With my hands full on the loose surface and steep incline I did not dare wave but managed to hoot my thanks.

A while later I got stuck behind an oomie in a blue Isuzu who did not understand that my average speed over the terrain was a lot faster than his. I had to sit behind him slipping the clutch every now and then until eventually he gave me a spot to pass.

I took some pics of the rock formations and the road ahead





and the watercrossing on the way out



before being shaken to my core again on the last 11kms back to the Swartberg pass.

From there I pointed my bike towards Gorge and did not really stop again for a photo except for the pic at the view point on Outeniqua pass. It was here at the viewpoint that I first smelled what smelled like radiator coolant burning. I replaced the waterpump a few thousand kilometers back and my first thought was that the seals had gone again but a check on the weephole showed that all was dry.



I placed the worry on the back burner for my mind to chew on and made my way into George where I would spend a delightful evening having a braai and a lekker chat with Sonja and her daughter whom I met on an Afrikaans blog site a year or so back. Once again the internet has allowed me to meet new people and have a lekker kuier.

[Bring It On]

Thank Hanno for sharing your trip so far Looking forward to the rest.

[Goose]

Ai, ai maar jy skryf lekker Hanno en jou pics is meestervol.....  Thanks for writing and sharing boet .... makes one lus for the road.

So who's "Wesley" ...........?  I see you shared a coke with him in die Hel...

[Hanno @ Mad Macs]

Haha Goose.

I saw that as well and just knew someone will chirp about it.

[DikZol]

Was waiting for this one. Gooi!!!!!

[Hanno @ Mad Macs]

DAY 3

Day 3 would be rated as the best day of my trip. It would see me do some roads that I have done before and also some new ones that was still a mystery to me. On the menu for the day was Seven passes , Kom se pad, Prins Alfred Pass and a piece of Baviaanskloof.

I left George towards Saasveld and stopped in front of Saasveld college to lube my chain that was now heated up.



Because I had done this road the year before I did not stop for too many pics on this section. At some point I wanted to turn around for a photo and very nearly dropped my bike when the front wheel lost grip on the loose sand next to the road. Some serious groin tearing effort managed to keep her upright.



I crossed a lot of bridges and stopped for one of them.



With all of the lekker kuier with Sonja I had completely forgotten to recharge my coms unit and it was now making noises about having a low battery. My stomach was also making some noises of it's own and so I figured that a stop at a coffee shop in Knysna will solve both problems.

I gave the waitress my coms unit to charge while I had an overpriced breakfast.



It was in this time that Hentie phoned me to say that a business decision had been made and that we would be moving the Tygervalley shop back to Somerset West and that I would need to relocate back to Somerset. This after I had completed my move into my new dwelling place 4 days prior.

I decided to not let any of that spoil my fun and just placed it out of my mind for the time being. At about the same time the power went out in Knysna which meant that I could also no longer charge my coms unit. There was nothing for it but to get back on the bike and head out onto Kom se pad.

Sitting behind a bakkie on the way out of town I realized that I could not see my headlight's reflection in his canopy window. A quick stand on the pegs with a look over the screen confirmed that my high beam has blown , but that dims were still working.

Kom se pad is a treat as always and I expected to see one of the elusive Knysna Elephants around every turn. This was sadly not to be.





I made my way out of Kom se pad and turned left towards Uniondale.
The first part of the road was full of potholes and big lumber trucks throwing up huge clouds of dust but once past Rabbers eiland this was no problem any more.

Jemima however developed a new habbit of attacking me with left hand mirror every time I crossed a bump.



At least the scenery made up for that small irritation. Eventually I removed the mirror and strapped it to my luggage.





The heat was starting to get to me and so when I passed a water stream I made a stop and went to soak my shirt in the river .



I also took this not so good looking selfie



I was really in a much better mood than this photo suggested. In fact , for the next few kilometers I had an absolute ball in the pass towards de Vlugt. The road was good , the corners nicely cambered and I had Jemima running hard between 3500 and 5500 RPM in 3rd and 4th gear with some hard braking and a blip down to 3rd gear before every corner. So spirited was my riding and braking that Jemima's rear brake started to fail in the last few corners before de Vlugt. I have heard of other people boiling the GS and Dakar rear brakes , but this was the first time it happened to me. I did enjoy that piece of road thoroughly .

Now it was time to go up Prince Alfred pass and I slowed way down and made sure that I stuck close to the left hand side of the turns as the pass was narrow and I was in no mood to meet a racing 4x4 coming the other way. As it turned out I only had to deal with some 4x4's at the top of the pass as I neared Avontuur.

Looking back



and some more pics







And looking back again from the top of the pass





I stopped in Uniondale for a Pink Sterri Stumpie and a tin of Viennas just for in case. I fueled up at the Shell and begged a new headlight globe of the local motor mechanic.

And then it was on to new uncharted roads.







Slowly the landscape was changing. A sign told me that I was 50kms from the Baviaanskloof police station.



And then a little ridge and a corner and Baviaanskloof opens before you.





I stopped at Uitspan and had a glorious Coke with Ice whilst talking to Nico the owner.



With the coke done justice I got back on the road towards Doornkloof where I would over night. I once again dealt with some local traffic



and enjoyed the rock formations and scenery.



Towards the east it looked like a small thunderstorm brewing.



With some more scenery and water crossings I made it to Doornkloof.

Jemima was startng to worry me a little. Every time I stopped I still smelled the coolant but the weephole remained dry. I could also not see any obvious leaks. This left one possibility. A leak in the radiator. High mileage F650's are know to have the fan shroud eat into the radiator over long periods of time. With Jemima on 116000km I guess that it was about due for me.  She had also developed another nasty little habbit. The Neutral light would stay on when I put her in gear and would then flicker out over time. This became more and more pronounced after every water crossing. I put this down to a chaffed wire and made a not to sort out on one of me rest days.





I picked a lekker spot and made my camp.



I was the only soul there except for a very inquisitive Coot whom I called Koot.



Koot would walk right up to me and then start ripping at the grass like he is eating it. Trying his best to convince me that he was a hungry and deserving local who would gladly take any food off my hands that I may not have need for.





I got hold of Barend who sold me a braai pack and some wood and with my tent pitched and the fire lit it was time to chill.





I did have one small little problem in that the loo's did not have toilet paper and that was the one thing I did not pack. That problem was solved by raiding the little cottages next to the dam. Sorry Barend.

With the meat on the coals I started unpacking my cutlery only to discover that my unbreakable plastic plate had become holy.



Ahh well - not a problem . We will just cover the hole.



I ate like a king and had a view like none other.





That night I lay in front of my tent looking at the stars for nearly three hours.



Eventually I went to bed happy and content.  To quote another wilddog :"Another tough day in Africa".