Tulip
Pack Dog
This is Noble Steed posting under a suitable alias (I'm sure family names are allowed...) as I am unable to access my account ???
Tulip and I needed one last holiday before we leave behind the relaxed comfort of Tshwane for the fast paced stressed lifestyle of the Natal South Coast at the end of the month, so we took a long weekend up to Magoebaskloof area, since we've never been there and it's a whole lot closer to Pretoria than Natal. Unfortunately could not get any leave, so only 2 nights away
Had a late start on Saturday after sleeping in and neglecting to pack the night before. Luckily, a short trip, so not much caution needed when packing! 2 panniers of nothing but food!! ;D ;D ;D And a big bag of warm clothes.
We headed north past Reitvlei dam up to marble hall, then took what we thought would be gravel further north, the road marked as D3600, but newly tarred most of the way, only about 30km gravel where still under construction.
The terrein goes from poor quality bushveld belonging to communities, to sudden well developed farm lands of lemons and cotton, to poor overused bushveld again. Sad.
Posing amongst the lemons...
A little later we found a dam somewhere north of mable hall. Not sure of its name - olifants dam?
Somewhere on the D3600. Very dusty. Else road in good condition. We where glad to get back oto tar though, firstly all the dust, secondly as we only left 11am from pretoria, it was already getting rather late, and wanted to reach our place of rest before dark!
Last stop for the day at Nkupi dam. From then on past Polokwane to Haenertsburg
We stayed at a little camp site of pre-erected tents, no electricity, but gas stove and power in kitchen 50m up the hill. got fit climbing that hill! very cosy, a little cold, and the 2 single beds where different heights, so both tried to squish into one, not much space...
view from the top...
(actually, just from the breakfast table, the top was somewhat higher to climb!)
Please excuse the romance. It was meant to be a romantic weekend! :-*
So for all our 2 panniers of food, all we could manage for breakfast was warm milk and squillos! The cameras lens was fogging up a bit in the cold air. And we didn't feel like cooking all the pork sausages and eggs in a rush - wanted to get out on the road!
Obviously we weren't the only people having a romantic weekend... I thought grasshoppers only did it in spring? ???
We headed out in the general direction of the wolkberg nature reserve, some nice views from mountain passes, very dry though. Guess it is winter afterall. First view of the valley below
Passed a couple of these big cactussy trees. very dramatic
Very important to keep hydration levels up!
Some scenes from the mountain pass. Had a very rustig slow ride, lots of stops to appreciate the view
Once the mountain pass was over we started entering some forest area, nothing too dense, very pretty to ride through
All OK!!
These boots are made for riding, and that's just what they'll do...
Eventually hit the Wolkberg Nature Reserve. NO BIKES. At least they're not discriminating. NO CARS either. They where happy for us to park our bikes with the other cars and walk 5km to the pretty waterfall. 5km in riding boots. We headed back again.
On the way back tried a shortcut through the forest the park ranger had told us of. after about 200m started seeing large red PRIVATE PROPERTY signs, so we turned around and went back the way we came.
On the way back we encountered a chameleon trying to cross the road. We didn't ask why. Instead we thought we'd ask him to turn yellow. He didn't. Instead he turned blue and white.
Okay, instead he turned black >
Had a quick lunch back at our tent, and some much needed liquid refreshment. After that a 15 minute nap, and we where ready to head off again. North, this time.
Finally found some roads that we'd been expecting to find. nice bumpy roads with tall trees either side, lots of hills. Unfortunately the nice pretty road eventually dead ended at a saw mill, so again was back to the beginning and find a new nice pretty road. Which isn't difficult, there are many!
Some more beautiful roads around Ebenezer dam. The light on the trees was amazing. unfortunately our photography skills didn't play along so exposures aren't ideal, but you get the idea!
Having fun on the Strom
And I've never seen a sewage pond look so lovely!
Back again for our last night. We had stopped to buy fire lighters during the day, I wasn't very happy with dunking sticks in my fuel tank the night before to get a fire going! But a lovely fire was made, some juicy steaks with mushroom sauce ended a lovely tiring day.
This morning up late again... Left eventually at 11am, stopped at Tulips primary and high schools along the way home (she was a plaas-meisie back in the day). She may add some of those pics later. Lots of traffic coming into Pta, last 60km took over an hour! But home at last, a lovely but far too short weekend away!
Tulip and I needed one last holiday before we leave behind the relaxed comfort of Tshwane for the fast paced stressed lifestyle of the Natal South Coast at the end of the month, so we took a long weekend up to Magoebaskloof area, since we've never been there and it's a whole lot closer to Pretoria than Natal. Unfortunately could not get any leave, so only 2 nights away
Had a late start on Saturday after sleeping in and neglecting to pack the night before. Luckily, a short trip, so not much caution needed when packing! 2 panniers of nothing but food!! ;D ;D ;D And a big bag of warm clothes.
We headed north past Reitvlei dam up to marble hall, then took what we thought would be gravel further north, the road marked as D3600, but newly tarred most of the way, only about 30km gravel where still under construction.
The terrein goes from poor quality bushveld belonging to communities, to sudden well developed farm lands of lemons and cotton, to poor overused bushveld again. Sad.
Posing amongst the lemons...
A little later we found a dam somewhere north of mable hall. Not sure of its name - olifants dam?
Somewhere on the D3600. Very dusty. Else road in good condition. We where glad to get back oto tar though, firstly all the dust, secondly as we only left 11am from pretoria, it was already getting rather late, and wanted to reach our place of rest before dark!
Last stop for the day at Nkupi dam. From then on past Polokwane to Haenertsburg
We stayed at a little camp site of pre-erected tents, no electricity, but gas stove and power in kitchen 50m up the hill. got fit climbing that hill! very cosy, a little cold, and the 2 single beds where different heights, so both tried to squish into one, not much space...
view from the top...
(actually, just from the breakfast table, the top was somewhat higher to climb!)
Please excuse the romance. It was meant to be a romantic weekend!
:-* So for all our 2 panniers of food, all we could manage for breakfast was warm milk and squillos! The cameras lens was fogging up a bit in the cold air. And we didn't feel like cooking all the pork sausages and eggs in a rush - wanted to get out on the road!
Obviously we weren't the only people having a romantic weekend... I thought grasshoppers only did it in spring? ???
We headed out in the general direction of the wolkberg nature reserve, some nice views from mountain passes, very dry though. Guess it is winter afterall. First view of the valley below
Passed a couple of these big cactussy trees. very dramatic
Very important to keep hydration levels up!
Some scenes from the mountain pass. Had a very rustig slow ride, lots of stops to appreciate the view
Once the mountain pass was over we started entering some forest area, nothing too dense, very pretty to ride through
All OK!!
These boots are made for riding, and that's just what they'll do...
Eventually hit the Wolkberg Nature Reserve. NO BIKES. At least they're not discriminating. NO CARS either. They where happy for us to park our bikes with the other cars and walk 5km to the pretty waterfall. 5km in riding boots. We headed back again.
On the way back tried a shortcut through the forest the park ranger had told us of. after about 200m started seeing large red PRIVATE PROPERTY signs, so we turned around and went back the way we came.
On the way back we encountered a chameleon trying to cross the road. We didn't ask why. Instead we thought we'd ask him to turn yellow. He didn't. Instead he turned blue and white.
Okay, instead he turned black >
Had a quick lunch back at our tent, and some much needed liquid refreshment. After that a 15 minute nap, and we where ready to head off again. North, this time.
Finally found some roads that we'd been expecting to find. nice bumpy roads with tall trees either side, lots of hills. Unfortunately the nice pretty road eventually dead ended at a saw mill, so again was back to the beginning and find a new nice pretty road. Which isn't difficult, there are many!
Some more beautiful roads around Ebenezer dam. The light on the trees was amazing. unfortunately our photography skills didn't play along so exposures aren't ideal, but you get the idea!
Having fun on the Strom
And I've never seen a sewage pond look so lovely!
Back again for our last night. We had stopped to buy fire lighters during the day, I wasn't very happy with dunking sticks in my fuel tank the night before to get a fire going! But a lovely fire was made, some juicy steaks with mushroom sauce ended a lovely tiring day.
This morning up late again... Left eventually at 11am, stopped at Tulips primary and high schools along the way home (she was a plaas-meisie back in the day). She may add some of those pics later. Lots of traffic coming into Pta, last 60km took over an hour! But home at last, a lovely but far too short weekend away!
