3 Brothers, 2 Mates – oh & a key, a tyre, a clutch cable, ligaments, and battery

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rubiblue

Race Dog
Joined
Sep 8, 2008
Messages
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Location
Randburg
Bike
KTM 790 Adventure R
I love planning rides, yip I am one of those. I enjoy every second of it and truth be told I don’t think this ride would have happened if I was not so anally-retentive.  ;)

This ride was supposed to happen in March, I think, but after breaking my collar bone on a short routine outride to harden my ass before we left, the ride fell to pieces. Good thing it was postponed actually, as this second pre-arrangement included a younger and older brother. I truely enjoy riding with my brothers, yes you too Colin and Kent, but it feels like we are connected while riding, I suppose we have all been riding for 20+ years each on all the riding platforms, so it comes to reason that this would occur, however we pretty much enjoy riding together, say “yes” brothers cos I certainly enjoy your company.

THE KEY
2 Days before leaving for the trip, my mom called me and said she was trying to get hold of either of the 2 of my brothers, as bubs had left his bike key at home in PE(he was already in Maseru). To cut a long story short, everyone was giving him a hard time, but in the end someone managed to get the key to his Hotel in Lesotho. Thanks for Sisters-in-laws bubs, otherwise we would have been shorting the KLR into life at every stop. More to come on the KLR later...

Last Minute Prep


T minus 35 seconds...


Anyway to get back on a straight line here, we were all going to meet in Himeville on Day 1. My 2 brothers went to assist some mates on the roof so they were already in Roma/Maseru the day before. Colin and Kent had left the previous day from PE, having a stop-over in Hogsbacks with Kent’s old man. I think Kent decided to stay at a back packer to try chase some tail, but who knows, he won’t admit it.  :biggrin:
I was coming down from Joburg so decided to hit the black stuff along the N3 all the way to Harrismith, where I would meet up with my brothers (shorty and bubs). It started off pretty boring, but I really didn’t care, several hours of planning made me aware of what lay ahead. It was timed perfectly as I popped the fuel tank open I heard 2 bikes pull in alongside me, shorty on my oldest boets 800GS and bubs on his trusty KLR steed. We had a quick breakfast in Harrismith, enjoyed the normal brotherly rip-offs and laughs. We chatted about the roof and how hectic it was, shorty reckoned that if he had done it this year he seriously doubted if he would have finished, and he can certainly ride, think he come 2nd the 1 year, maybe even first, sorry dude I don’t care much for awards,  :).

After breakfast we turned onto some gravel heading towards Bezuidenhouts Pass. Malibu had warned me that it may be wet and that they passed through 2 weeks earlier on plastics and said it was a bit muddy. Oh well, wasn’t raining today. We enjoyed some fast gravel sections before reaching the pass. It was enjoyable, there was a large mudhole right at the top, but otherwise it was cool. I think if it had rained it would have been very very interesting (looks like it had the potential to become very clay like very quickly). The temperature started getting really warm, I think I recall seeing 34 on the Bike’s temp gauge. We went through the pass, hit Bergville and then started realising that we were now hugging the berg toward Himeville. The roads were cool, good portion of gravel, a road busy being tarred (careful of the loose marbles boys!), and a very light drizzle. We had all purchased Vuka rainsuits because I knew December was Lesotho’s highest rainfall month and we wanted to ensure that we would be relatively dry during one of the many downpours expected. It spat twice... but the suits are good buys, I am sure it will come in handy at some point.

We also passed a group on mountain bikes, looked like one of the dude’s front wheel had come off going downhill, he looked very daized and confused. We offered help but they said help was already on the way, we waved goodbye, about 5 kilometres later, we were passed by 2 speeding bakkies, one of which almost took me out, I realised that was the poor guys help (a freaked out wife, driving 120 on the gravel hugging ALL the inside lines on the road, DANGER,  ???).

Bezuidenthouts Pass Top (bubs closest, with shorty in the background)






Top of some Tar pass, we took a detour at the top to find a better backdrop




Then suddenly we were in Himeville, it was a long day, so we decided to quickly sort out the rooms, shower and wait for the others that we were expecting shortly. Himeville is cool. It’s small and friendly and it’s very easy to understand why this is a popular pit stop before Sani.









Then the rains came, It pissed down, like very hectically, so we thought Sani was going to be a bit of a laugh in the morning. Time started ticking by as the 3 of us, had a few beers talked to quite a few of the guys that had come down the Sani Pass after Roof of Africa on their way home. One of the guys had broken his collar-bone near the base of the Pass, luckily one of the Roof riders drove his bike all the way back to Durban whilst he enjoyed the car ride home. By now Kent and Colin were late. We dropped them a call, apparently Colin wanted to change his tyre mid route and they experienced 2 punctures on the way up front Hogsback. About 3 hours later they rocked up, a bit wet from the storm and looking more tired than us. We all had some chow, several more beers, by 9pm we were all looking very drooping eyed and decided to hit the sack early as we need to change the Rear tyre on Colin’s bike and then hit Sani Pass. The First days shooters were handed out for misconduct on the day which set the precedent for the riding ahead.

The room, holy crap it stank after we got back from dinner, 3 okes dirty sweaty riding kit, not drying due to the weather, knee braces and socks especially, my fok!



About 580kms for the day, about 8 hours on the bike.
 
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