In the end, after a long drive, I arrived at my billet for the night. Homestead B&B - a mixture of rooms, chalets, caravans and tents. I had decided to treat myself to a bit of luxury and had a room out in the garden with an en suite and TV. It was very twee: everything was covered in quilted fabric - I had to search for the flush handle under its folds, the toilet seat was clad in quilt as was the air freshener can.
I popped down the road for a quick look at the Addo Elephants NP which was my venue for tomorrow. In the short time I was there I only saw a small family group of Kudu, a single Warthog and a small group of Buffalo on the way down to drink as the sun set. However, I did manage to book myself on a night drive for the following day. In the past, both in South Lluangua and Kruger, these have always been very fruitful and interesting.
Tonight was pure luxury - a soft double bed to myself, TV in bed (there was a programme about the Sani Pass between Lesotho and SA we are due to scale later in the trip - scary!), free tea and coffee and a hot water bottle (though that soon got the elbow: I was too hot).
The intention was for an early rise (0615) to have breakfast, pack the Landy and get to the park for when the gates opened at 0700. Fat chance!! The warm bed clung on to me for too long and it was a slightly later than anticipated start.
Now Addo Elephant Nation Park is famous, as one might suspect for elephants and is described in The Rough Guide as "one of SA's most rewarding game reserves": (bear this in mind for later). It brags that, as it's extended boundary stretches down to the coast, it is the first to have the "Big 7". The "Big 5" are traditionally those animals thought most dangerous to hunt: Lion, Leopard, Elephant, Buffalo and Rhino - they have also become the holy grail for tourists and guides bust a gut to try they are seen. Addo's two additions are: the Whale and the Great White Shark.
In addition to its original population of 'local' elephants, a number of big tuskers from Kruger had been shipped in to add diversity to the gene pool. The park also contained two of the other 'target' animals for wildlife afficianardoes(?): lion and black rhino. These all roam in the park's indigenous spekboom veld: these tends to mean that the ground is thickly covered by bushes up to a 3 or 4 metres tall. This means that seeing any animal in this thick cover is difficult. Now, elephants are fairly large & grey and, even in sparse cover, are surprisingly difficult to see. In 5 hours driving around I saw plenty of Ostrich and Warthog, together with the occasional Kudu. I was busily composing acerbic words to suggest that the park should be renamed Addo Warthog National Park, when a big brown rock about 4 metres into the scrub moved as I drove past. At last, an elephant (covered in mud) - but the only part visible was his backside. Better than none I suppose.
I gave up and went back at the Rest Camp to get a good pitch for the tent before everybody else arrived. Before that I thought I'd have a look at the waterhole at the camp - and there was a family herd of about 20 drinking: why did I bother going for a long slow drive when I could have just remained here?
A sign at the Park entrance showed that they didn't only think about their larger animals and I though about my friend Lou - stuck in the UK - who had a thing about elephants and dung beetles.
Traveling from Cape Town to Hermanus the road ascends steeply to a pass through the mountains that encircle the bottom 20 miles of the Cape. It had been disconcerting to see the Landy's temperature guage reach the ¾ mark. Although it had not happened again, despite going up some not so long hills (but not quite as steep) this had not reoccurred. But it still preyed on my mind as Lesotho (and especially the Sani Pass) was bound to present a challenge. As an experiment, I removed the Landy's thermostat to see what difference that would make - that and a couple of visits to the camp's waterhole took up most of the afternoon.
Soon it was 1845 and time to board the Park's viewing truck for the night drive. We were all offered a fleece lined poncho and most people took them more for the possibility of rain than anything else. Off we set with a guide up front to tell us all about what we saw highlighted in the spot light he oscillated to cover the ground in front and on both sides. The idea is that this light is reflected by the eyes of animals and you get to see both the smaller ones you would normally miss and the nocturnal ones. It didn't bode well for the evening when he announced “birds in the tree” without attempting to identify them - hopefully he did know that they were Bald Ibis and just thought that we were only interested in mammals. However, when he announced that only bull elephants carried tusks one began to wonder. He redeemed himself when he found us a small family group of elephants close to the road. There would have been a great picture - had I not only taken my telephoto lens! The rest of the drive was a repeat of my own excursion: Ostriches and Kudu. By this time I think many people were more concerned about wrapping themselves in their ponchos to keep the invading cold wind at bay. This is Africa - where has this obsession with the cold come from? At least by the time I get further North and certainly when in Namibia & Botswana I will welcome some cool days.
The drive to my next destination was through a very gently rolling landscape with the horizon in the far distance - like the Mid-West of the USofA but without the wheat and lines of combine harvesters. As a result of taking the thermostat out the Landy was running very cool and even on steep hills such as Olphantskopnek (Elephants Head Pass) it seemed to behave itself. That was until I was nearly at my destination when the road seemed to go into an orbital trajectory up to Hogsback. And the engine temperature headed up again - but not quite as far as before. And to top it all the tar road expired and the road converted into a bumpy earthen surface. I resolved to put the thermostat back in for the run up to Bloemfontein as it didn't look from the map as there were any steep ascents. Sods law! As I put it back in, I ripped the gasket: luckily I had a tube of liquid gasket which seemed to do the job. Just in case, I cut some spare gaskets from the cover of a note book. One of the local girls worked in the accommodation saw me in my Blue Peter efforts and suggested that I should use a milk carton which her brother always used - so a couple more were made from this medium. I was beginning to be glad that I had joined the local AA!
Back to tonight's accommodation: "Away with the Fairies" [link: www.awaywiththefaries.co.za] in Hogsback. Evidently, it obtained its name thanks to the local mountain ridge that looks like a pig's spine. Unfortunately, the whole area was hidden in a thick mist that made the whole area look like a scene from one of the recent Chinese martial arts films. The whole area had an unreal feel with houses called Hobbiton, Moonshine, a myriad of arty potteries and its own brand of locally made exfoliants. It is supposed to be a really beautiful place with fabulous walks down steep gorges to spectacular waterfalls. I was told that "Away with the Fairies" sat on the edge of a steep valley covered in pine trees - I took their word for this as the mist kept its secrets. I had intended to spend 2 nights here but decided to leave the following day to get to Bloemfontein ASAP to, hopefully, get the Landy sorted before heading towards Lesotho with Mary who arrives next Monday. By the morning the mist had lifted to reveal the other site of the gorge and the ridge on the other side.
Today's my birthday - perhaps I'll treat myself!
The road North out of Hogsback was marked on one of my maps but not on the other. I asked the Glaswegian who ran the hostel whether it was there or not. He hesitated and said "for most cars no, but as you're in a Landy, you should be OK!" I should have listen more closely, the earthen road I had entered on ran through the village and then, as the summit was passed, started to degrade until calling it a farm track was flattering - it continued on for 20+ miles through rolling hills with no sign of life until I came across a sign that had me reaching for the map to see which was the right way.
Once back on the main drag northwards the land reverted to the large open plains punctuated by the occasional dorps (small towns) and whilst the road sometimes looked completely flat it was often a deceptive incline which occasionally worried me as hadn't noticed and speed seemingly declined without any reason. Half way through the morning I stopped to top up with fuel (I always do this when the tank is half-full to give plenty of leeway if garages become sparse in the middle if nowhere). I bought myself a block of Cadbury's chocolate - the first in South Africa - for a birthday treat. At one of the dorps I found an Internet cafe in the back of a dusty and disorganised TV repair shop. Picking up a few emails, I also found the Land Rover dealer in Bloemfontein.
To pass the time on this long featureless drive, I passed the time listening to SAFM - the nationwide talk and information radio station: part Government information and part phone in. Topics for the day's phone in were wide spread: the length of a medical degree course, school examination standards, chemical castration of sex offenders and AA (affirmative action - the Government programme to increase the proportion of non-whites in the higher levels of orgainastions).
Another milestone - I've passed from pages 8/9 in the road atlas to 12/13!
By mid-afternoon I reached Bloem and entered down Church Street - it was evident that one of the main religions worshiped here was the car - for about 2 miles every enterprise was vehicle related: main dealers, second hand, tyres, batteries, windscreen etc etc. I thought that this was a good sign for finding somebody to fix a Landy. And there it was - my (hopeful) savior, main agents Land Rover Bloemfontein. Despite having a full workshop, they immediately started work on mine. By closing time they hadn't had chance to track down the fault so they asked me to leave it with them over night and the next day they would take the radiator out to a specialist company for testing. One of the managers asked if I had somewhere to stay and offered me to drive me there. On the way we got talking and he mentioned that this was where J R R Tolkien had been born (his father was a local bank manager) but left when he was only 3 years old. Despite local publicity I don't think that, at such a tender age, either here or Hogsback (which also claimed a link) really had much influence on his writing of Lord of the Rings.
And so to my bed for the next few nights - Naval Heights Backpackers! A novel place: the shell of a building that had once been a Victorian pumping station. The rooms/cells were in a cavernous part of the building and their walls were made of corrugated iron, metal doors and reed ceilings. The other half of the building must have been where the pump & engine had been and was divided horizontally with lounging areas on both levels. As it was still my birthday, I walked down the hill to the Minnesota Spur - a steak house - and had the best steak ever and watched England thrashing the Aussies at Old Trafford live on TV.
The hostel owner was in residence - he told me he had recently sacked his manager for having his hand in the till. He said that he usually lived in Cape Town but was staying here whilst he interviewed prospective managers - whilst in residence he slept on a sofa in the lower lounge and had the TV down there on all night. As the night progressed he told me he was a world famous heart surgeon (having operated on the Queen Mother, Elton John, Mel Gibson and many other of the great and the good) and a millionaire (at various times he mentioned the million rand value of many of his houses). He also related being invited to Sandringham and having conversation with a drunken Prince Charles! Sometime, I'm going to have to do some research to see if he was who he claimed. Later in the stay I was watching the local TV news and somebody looking a lot like him was shown as a defendant in a 'Kidneys for Cash' court case.
Back to the Landy, they spent all day playing with it and when I went back mid-afternoon, it looked as if they had fitted a new radiator: great I thinks - that was the problem. Not so, the testing firm had resprayed it after testing. I was taken out on a test drive - the problem was still there and I listened to the mechanics discussing the problem and, even in Afrikaner's, I heard the works "cylinder head". Yet another Disco of mine with this problem!! By this time it was closing time on Friday and I was invited to bring it back at 0630 on Monday - they promised that, if there was no complications: i.e. Having to skim either the head and/or block, I would have it back by 1500 on Monday. I rang Mary to tell her that we would have to amend our plans for the first few days.
Saturday I audited the food situation and shopped to fill the gaps. Then I watched the All Blacks beat the Aussies. Later I went into town and on the way down the hostel drive there was a little dove with a yogurt carton tied to its leg. Thanks to watching Granddad Smith and his pigeons, I caught it and carried it back up to the hostel where I was able to cut it free. Once outside, I threw it in the air and it weekly flapped to the near by trees - hopefully it will survive! Eventually down at the Waterfront I watched "The Island" at the flicks - a waste of time!
Sunday, I did some washing, cut my own hair and repacked everything: Landy and luggage prior to having to fit in Mary and her stuff the following day. The French people arrived at the hostel who I had camped next door to at the Addo NP. After updating these words and having a, hopefully, final meal at the Spur, it was off early to bed so I could be bright and breezy at some ungodly hour the following day.
The alarm tolled at 0600 and I was parked out side the workshop within 20 minutes. After reading all the magazines in the reception area until the rest of the town woke up, I wandered around trying to find an internet cafe that would allow me to plug in my laptop: no luck! Midday saw me back at the garage for an update: no major problem had been found but they were sending off the cylinder head for a final check. One of the staff ran me out to the airport to meet Mary's flight: at last somebody to talk to during the day. Once back in the metropolis, I showed Mary the highlights. She almost immediately experienced the joys of Africa: 45 minutes standing at a bank cashier's window waiting to cash a few travelers cheques. Just as I was heading of to pick up the Landy the garage phoned to say that the outside firm hadn't returned the head until late PM and it wouldn't be ready until tomorrow lunchtime - a day lost from our planned itinerary!
In the end it wasn't ready until 1700 and we set off eastwards towards Lesotho. For the first 50 miles it was fine - then the mega disappointment: the temperature shot up again. We pulled over on the side of the road and I got out to say some choice words about Land Rover and their mechanics. Almost as soon as we had stopped, a local pulled over to see if we were OK and promised to come back in an hour to ensure we weren't stranded. I phoned Rupert at LR and it was agreed that we would return to Bloem for them to have a further prod and ponder. A this rate it's going to be more economical for me to buy a local house but we phoned the hostel and booked our 'usual' room. On the way back we stopped off at a fish restaurant in the Waterfront complex - an excellent meal: Mary had Sole and I had Kingklip - its flesh was tasty and solid: highly recommended. During the night it sounded as if the "Tap Dogs" [a very good Aussie tap dance troupe which was appearing in town] was practicing on the roof as thunder bounced around the hills and rain machine gunned the corrugated iron roof.
And so it was an early rise the next morning to revisit my second home - LR Bloemfontein - and they said that they would have a 'brains trust' to see what was really the problem. A couple of hours later I wandered down to see what progress had been made. It sounded as if my Landy had dumbfounded their collective brains - one final course of action was suggested: replace the bit of the radiator fan that reacted to heat. 60 minutes later - job done and my bank balance was now missing a further R3k. Although Rupert kindly let me off the labour costs: good of him - especially as it only took a couple of minutes to do.
Now we had a second attempt to head to the hills. I held my breath as we approached the hill that had stopped us last night and offered up a prayer to whatever deity oversaw Land Rovers. With a collective sigh we breasted the top with out the temperature guage needle even shivering from the half-point. Cross fingers (and everything else) that a fix has been achieved. Shame I had to spend 11,000 Rand, approx £1,000, when a new fan at £300 would have solved it and not wasted two days of Mary's holiday.
Going eastwards, the High Plains Drifter theme of the countryside continued and even became more pronounced as high isolated buttes began to appear - I expected John Wayne to appear at any moment in his calvary uniform being chased by red indians.
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