63magic
Race Dog
- Joined
- May 13, 2009
- Messages
- 583
- Reaction score
- 0
- Location
- Pretoria, Gauteng
- Bike
- BMW G650 X-challenge
DAY 1 – 15 December, 2009
The Tuesday morning dawned quietly, with a soft drizzle that fell intermittently. I suppose I had slept, but it didn’t feel like it – my eyes were burning and my head felt a bit woozy. Today is the day my father (aged 72) and I are leaving on our road trip through the south-western part of South Africa - Dad on the Kawa KLE500, me on my BMW XCountry 650.
I had prepared a preliminary route and itinerary, and the reason for the little sleep was putting in final touches and loading and reloading the routes into my Garmin Nuvi 500. This was the plan, as far as the most westerly point of our trip was concerned anyway.. the way home we would play by ear:
All packed up and ready to go! Note the “reënpakkies” - much cheaper than and just as effective as branded rain suits… not to mention the visibility!!
This is the first long distance trip for both me and my dad, so we took it easy… sticking to tar but keeping away from the highways.
Breakfast in Heidelberg and somewhere on the road:
Somewhere on the road between Reitz and ??, I stopped on the side of the road, thinking an oncoming truck had flashed its lights at me because something was wrong…
Dad stopped next to me on the broad shoulder… but too close to the edge of a 2meter high steep embankment (in the pic above, the start of the embankment shows as a darker piece of gravel in the foreground).
Pulling away, he lost his balance and tipped over! I watched in horror as Dad came off the bike head first, and the KLE was lying on its (wrong) side halfway down the embankment, the topbox a few meters away, having spilled its contents... I scrambled down to my dad and checked, he was OK, but shaken up pretty badly.
We struggled with the weight of the 180 kg KLE, managing to first turn it around so the wheels faced the bottom of the embankment, and then managed to get it upright. Fortunately I had a protein bar in the first aid kit, and some water in my camelback.
We rested a bit, and then Dad said, OK, let’s get going. I got back to my bike, got on and looked back for my dad. He had to turn around, having been facing the wrong direction when we set the bike upright.. and as I watched, he went up the embankment, got to the edge of the tar and while turning around, dropped the KLE again!!
Oh boy… this was so not good!! I raced back to him, and we struggled with the topheavy KLE again... trying a different technique this time (thanks to the training I went on, I was very grateful for that!). A few cars went by, but no-one stopped… but we somehow managed to get the bike upright again.
As we rode away, exhausted and tense, I had a few second and third and fourth thoughts about the rest of the planned tour and the places we had planned to visit… Baviaanskloof.. die Hell… and wondered what we were going to do if we had more tumbles on those roads…
We got to Clarens, and the rain started up again. By the time we got to Golden Gate, it was late afternoon. The original plan was to camp there and I had booked a campsite for us at Glen Reenen. By this time it started raining a bit harder, and I ducked into the reception area to announce our arrival. I talked to the clerk behind the counter, and eventually walked out with a key in my hand. Got back to my dad who stayed with the bikes, and told him the happy news… We got a rondavel!
I could see my dad was quite relieved (and so was I) at not having to pitch our tents in the rain, and even worse, having to pack up the wet gear the next morning! Call us wussy if you like - it had been a long day and nerve-racking having to ride in the rain with brand new knobblies. (Did I mention I put new tyres on my Xcountry just before we left home? TKC in front and a Kenda on the back, but more about tyres later) not to mention the tipping over incidents..and the constant irritation of the Nuvi switching on and off the whole time, because the connection into the unit is a bit sensitive.
All’s well that ends well, and I have always loved this area... it is stunning scenery.
Distance for the day: a butt-numbing 530 km. I am going to have to do something about the seat…Dad was keeping track of distances and fuel consumption of the KLE all through the trip. I wasn’t too concerned, but in hindsight, it would have been nice to have accurate consumption figures for the XC. According to Dad’s calcs, at one point I got well over 32 kms per liter...and against a heavy cross-wind with a laden bike, I managed 28 km/l. Not too shabby, hey Nige??
more later...
The Tuesday morning dawned quietly, with a soft drizzle that fell intermittently. I suppose I had slept, but it didn’t feel like it – my eyes were burning and my head felt a bit woozy. Today is the day my father (aged 72) and I are leaving on our road trip through the south-western part of South Africa - Dad on the Kawa KLE500, me on my BMW XCountry 650.
I had prepared a preliminary route and itinerary, and the reason for the little sleep was putting in final touches and loading and reloading the routes into my Garmin Nuvi 500. This was the plan, as far as the most westerly point of our trip was concerned anyway.. the way home we would play by ear:
All packed up and ready to go! Note the “reënpakkies” - much cheaper than and just as effective as branded rain suits… not to mention the visibility!!
This is the first long distance trip for both me and my dad, so we took it easy… sticking to tar but keeping away from the highways.
Breakfast in Heidelberg and somewhere on the road:
Somewhere on the road between Reitz and ??, I stopped on the side of the road, thinking an oncoming truck had flashed its lights at me because something was wrong…
Dad stopped next to me on the broad shoulder… but too close to the edge of a 2meter high steep embankment (in the pic above, the start of the embankment shows as a darker piece of gravel in the foreground).
Pulling away, he lost his balance and tipped over! I watched in horror as Dad came off the bike head first, and the KLE was lying on its (wrong) side halfway down the embankment, the topbox a few meters away, having spilled its contents... I scrambled down to my dad and checked, he was OK, but shaken up pretty badly.
We struggled with the weight of the 180 kg KLE, managing to first turn it around so the wheels faced the bottom of the embankment, and then managed to get it upright. Fortunately I had a protein bar in the first aid kit, and some water in my camelback.
We rested a bit, and then Dad said, OK, let’s get going. I got back to my bike, got on and looked back for my dad. He had to turn around, having been facing the wrong direction when we set the bike upright.. and as I watched, he went up the embankment, got to the edge of the tar and while turning around, dropped the KLE again!!
Oh boy… this was so not good!! I raced back to him, and we struggled with the topheavy KLE again... trying a different technique this time (thanks to the training I went on, I was very grateful for that!). A few cars went by, but no-one stopped… but we somehow managed to get the bike upright again.
As we rode away, exhausted and tense, I had a few second and third and fourth thoughts about the rest of the planned tour and the places we had planned to visit… Baviaanskloof.. die Hell… and wondered what we were going to do if we had more tumbles on those roads…
We got to Clarens, and the rain started up again. By the time we got to Golden Gate, it was late afternoon. The original plan was to camp there and I had booked a campsite for us at Glen Reenen. By this time it started raining a bit harder, and I ducked into the reception area to announce our arrival. I talked to the clerk behind the counter, and eventually walked out with a key in my hand. Got back to my dad who stayed with the bikes, and told him the happy news… We got a rondavel!
I could see my dad was quite relieved (and so was I) at not having to pitch our tents in the rain, and even worse, having to pack up the wet gear the next morning! Call us wussy if you like - it had been a long day and nerve-racking having to ride in the rain with brand new knobblies. (Did I mention I put new tyres on my Xcountry just before we left home? TKC in front and a Kenda on the back, but more about tyres later) not to mention the tipping over incidents..and the constant irritation of the Nuvi switching on and off the whole time, because the connection into the unit is a bit sensitive.
All’s well that ends well, and I have always loved this area... it is stunning scenery.
Distance for the day: a butt-numbing 530 km. I am going to have to do something about the seat…Dad was keeping track of distances and fuel consumption of the KLE all through the trip. I wasn’t too concerned, but in hindsight, it would have been nice to have accurate consumption figures for the XC. According to Dad’s calcs, at one point I got well over 32 kms per liter...and against a heavy cross-wind with a laden bike, I managed 28 km/l. Not too shabby, hey Nige??
more later...
