Great Brak River to Windhoek, via Jupiter and Sirius.

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Joined
Sep 13, 2010
Messages
3,589
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156
Location
I would rather be in Great Brak...
Bike
Honda CRF-1000L Africa Twin
The idea here was not to cover great distances in short periods of time but rather to see and experience the open road, some old some new in this, our amazing part of the world. The research was done as best as one can, I read prodigious amounts of incredible ride reports posted on the forum... and this just in the last few months, needless to say the inspiration was huge and the enthusiasm and impatience to get going massive.... given the slight logistical problem that I was in the Bahamas, on a 40 x 20 km island as flat as the top of Table mountain and on average all of 6m above sea level...oh, and the fact I felt I needed a better bike ...

Well, Delta flies Atlanta to Jo'burg, all of 13 000 odd km's in 15 hours, a long bloody trip in any stretch of the imagination. Further research had been done with the intention to see what deal I could get on a new XT 1200... the STen proved to be a very good purchase indeed.




Great Brak is as good a spot as any on the garden route to start a long trip, so less than 1km and a right turn leads to the first gravel section. The R328 soon led up Robinson pass and the turn off to the left and the first of 16 farmers gates made themselves known, the trip had started !



Great farmers track that leads past De Hoop to Calitzdorp




Seweweekspoort proved to be a revelation...I could just imagine what Meiringspoort must have been like a hundred years ago before the tar was laid, little traffic and perfect for photo opportunities.




Creative use of old car parts, with the real thing looking on just across the road...



"who does not dream, sleeps his life away" ... very appropriate for this forum me thinks



Laingsburg came and went and the Moordenaarskaroo was next, an area I had been very keen to experience and it was just as expected. On this road one bakkie passed me so one can imagine how isolated it must have been 150 years ago.







In contrast to the greener southern side of the N2 this part of the country was really dry... there was however one spot of greenery that gave me the opportunity for a quick self portrait.



The Roggeberg area is so different... die regte, egte Karoo.



I have always wanted to get to Sutherland and this was todays destination, good thing too as it was an experience not to be missed!



I had left it too late to get permission to see the famous planetarium and the amazing views that one can see, nevertheless each guest house in Sutherland offers an excellent evenings viewing of the stars with a local amateur astronomer who does a very good job. We were eventually a group of 35 or so and he had 5 computer controlled telescopes to use, each one set up via GPS and the stars name, the telescopes then track their object automatically with some minor adjustments needed at times. Clearly seen was the rings of Jupiter, 3 of her 16 moons and the magnificent Sirius all of 8.6 light years away. Apparently if our moon was the size of a cricket ball the Earth would be the size of a soccer ball, our Sun that of a VW Beetle and Sirius the size of a London bus....and 25 times as light intensive.... stunning how bright it is through a descent telescope.!!

I had no real destination or time frame here...it's a solo trip...ons sal maar sien wat gebeur...that said I'd told all who would listen that I wanted to view Angola across the Kunene...yeah right... many better adventurers than I have skietted through Namibia doing 400km + days, mostly in groups but some oke's have also done lekker trips solo...and this was what I had in mind. Whilst the Noord Kaap was and is an amazing place to cruise through on the surprisingly comfortable Yam with her Tourance EXP's, a new tyre design from Metzeler I'm told... here I should add that I had a set of Mitas E 10's neatly stacked in the garage next to the Varadero (which I am very pleased to see a pair of them recently doing Namibia very successfully in another excellent RR, but for clarity I had told the vrou that the 'dero was no good and I needed a new bike or I was going to fall on my moer at some stage....blaa blaa, well, she did not buy this bullshit story then and has not now) anyway, the Sten is quite something, bloody heavy as I did drop it at the 13th farmers gate encountered on the way to Calitzdorp just after opening a gate, as I jumped back on the "Creature" as I call it, it just keep on going to the right and I laid her down nice on Mr Droomers nice new top crash bars.... needless to say within the time it took to say "blixem" I has 70 ostriches going great guns for the now wide open gate... not wanting to risk the option of a bedonnerde boer as I chase down his 70 km an hour birds I hastened to maak die blerrie hek toe ! ... and yes, I could not lift the bloody Yam with all the kak on it... so whilst contemplating all this, said famer arrived in his trusted Toyota and we got her back upright.  

Anyway, all this has little to do with Calvinia and ultimately Noordoewer, today's destination... in fact, I had had enough of gravel for today and at Calvinia proceeded to Vanrhynsdorp and North on the N7 as I wanted to clear Customs and Immigration and find a camp site at Felix Unite before the crazzzy overlanders arrived in their battlewagons...







This koppie made me think of chocolate milk for some strange reason...



Vanrhynspass... never been there before and a perfect day to see it for the first time in all it's splendor.








Namibian Immigration was easily completed even though I had no police clearance for the bike, but I could prove that I had bought it 6 days previously and as such should be proof enough of it's authenticity...they were cool about it too so despite the 38'C outside temp all went well.
   



I've known Felix since he sold real estate out of a tiny little building in Paarden Island just off the highway and also heard the folks say how difficult it was going to be to get Capies to drive 700km's to the Nam border to go river rafting .. well, that was 20 odd years ago and the rest is history as we know it.... I did initially have some drama as they were not keen on me camping but I stated it's a Wilddog tradition to do so here and this was enough for them, also Carlo was soon involved and the site cost me all of R100 for the night.



The Orange... or is that the Gariep ? ...anyway, both rivers were in full flow due to the lekker rains way out to the East and the place was not as busy as expected... not for that day that is as the previous day had seen over 100 people there. A recent fire in one of their structures had given them the impetus to rebuild and work was progressing well on this front. Nice place indeed!





Anyone know why the SA side of the border is not as developed in any way as the Namib side is ? Is it all private over there ?





So now the Namibian adventure had started in earnest for me, as lekker as it was to camp the usual 6.30 am departure ment I was ready to roll at 6, but it was cool, only 16'C, a temperature that was to fluctuate between 10'C and 17'C each morning from now on but it's also without doubt the best time of day to be on a bike in this part of the world. The lighting is spectacular as is the quiet of the day.



The C13 to Rosh Pinah was perfect, newly graded and above all quiet, in fact I was to be amazed at how few vehicles, be it 2 or 4 wheels I was to encounter from now onwards. The slight Westerly breeze kept temperatures agreeable untill about 11 when it would be in the high 30's. In hindsight December is not the time of year to be in Namibia if at all possible and this might have something to do with the quiet roads I encountered.





So one follows the Orange River for about 40 km's and it was an amazing first impression of Nam for me...having flown over it at 36000 ft twice before I had developed a crick in my neck from the view out of the RHS window seat on the big Boeing 777, as one comes in from crossing 11000 km of Atlantic ocean seeing land just North of Swakop and the country below is as clear as a bell with all roads clearly visible.



One intrepid local farmer has had some fun collecting number plates falling off the various vehicles passing his front gate and offers a lekker camp site about 50 km's down the road from Felix Unite.







At times the road is very close to the river and the temptation to stop for a swim is difficult to resist... but I was on a roll and just kept going... next time I will stop and do so.







Coming over one of many small crests in the road I saw a small group of Kudu off to my right and just had enough time to kill the bike, coast to a quiet stop, get my camera out and fire off a shot aimed at the middle of the road and it produced this shot of a female Kudu in full flight that effortlessly cleared the 5ft fence on the opposite side of the road  





A little further on I had to stop at my first Quiver Tree, I had heard that much research is being done to determine their age as they do not have the usual rings others have that determine their age... quite some stories this old timer could tell I'm sure.







The sense that time has little yet all meaning is nowhere as apparent as in Namibia I feel, distances is neither vast nor great in the grand scheme of things here because it's all in perfect harmony with nature and again I thought of the good advice read on this forum about keeping daily mileage low, in some cases 250 km a day being enough and how true this is out here.



Spot the Yamaha...





In Rosh Pinah a friendly Tannie told me about the D 727 to Aukam that was a nice road, so 70km along the C 13 I turned off to the right and what a gem it turned out to be, newly graded and with no traffic that day as far that I could tell.





This also produced the photo of the trip that now is my desktop screen saver as it's the essence of Namibia for me with the perfect contrast in colours: the blue, pink, yellow, green and sky blue is my favorite.








As lekker as the 90 odd km D727 was the next part the 70 odd km D446 wasn't. It had clearly had plenty rain recently with large areas of the roadway washed away, and the roads dept. had even felt it necessary to place orange cones in places to warn the foreigners to take it easy as they come skietting down the road... here also for the first time I encountered the short, steep donga style sandy river beds with real loose sand, and it had me at full concentration as dropping the Creature out here was simply not an option.

For some reason I have no photo's of this section.... sorry about that as it would have been good to hear your thoughts on it but suffice to say: stand up, look up and open up being the modus opperandi here, with the STen fishtailing bedonnered, this was not Tourance country estate as clearly the Mitas E 10's would have been far better suited but I had made the decision to do the trip on the standard tyres as a base line for the next adventure out here in the future.

This shot had an unusual rock formation in the back ground to my right.



Aus too came and went with Helmeringhausen the destination for today.



And what a gem of a town it turned out to be... all of 6 houses with half of it a very capable hotel.




 
Here the friendly hotel staff packed a lekker lunch packet for the next day as my customary 6.30 am departure was a little too early for breakfast. Plenty things a Yamaha is useful for too...





I had heard about what a great place Betta would be and was keen to see it, and then to follow the D826 via Sesriem to Solitaire...ah..well that was the plan at least...



This would prove to be some of the nicest roads on this my first Namibian excursion







 
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