A quiet week

“Our problem is not that we desire too much, but that we desire too little.”
C.S. Lewis

This week has been refreshingly quiet and uneventful compared to the last months. Possibly the easiest border crossing in Africa from Lesotho to SA, breakfast in Fouriesburg then a 50-60km dash to Ficksburg (20km slipstreaming a combine harvester).

Ficksburg though nothing special does have a backpackers which means affordable accommodation. The owner had obviously forgotten her medicine in recent weeks but the barman Francois(?) gave the quiet reserved balance the place needed as well as great barman ship and was also a kindled spirit on the opinion of these narrow minded free state farmers. The “boers” really wouldn’t be surprised if the redcoats came over the hill next week, many aren’t past 1894 let alone 1994.

The ghost town

Three days cycling from Ficksburg is the ghost town of Verkeerdevlei(Which means wrong valley) which on my map looked just as big as the last couple of towns. I arrived at about 5pm after a hot 90km looking for somewhere to camp or get a room. But as luck would have it I really was in the wrong valley, 1 bottle shop, 1 church and about 10 houses with residents.

Next to the bottle shop I saw a family just about to enter their house, desperate times need desperate measures, it was time for cyclists dirty trick number 1.

Cyclists dirty trick number 1

We cyclists have many tricks up our sleeves which may only be used in times of need. Asking outright if you can camp in someone’s garden just won’t work in SA, they’re all so paranoid. Dirty trick number 1 goes like this.

Cyclist : “good afternoon mr/mrs/sir /madam etc, I’ve just cycled a long hard day and I’m really tired, do you know anywhere nearby that is safe to camp”

This is a nice opener and gives you and your unsuspecting victim  time to size each other up and decide if the other is a serial killer (most South Africans assume that a stranger is a serial killer).

Obviously there’s no campsite nearby so the victim is confused and points out a hotel of campsite 50km away.

Cyclist : “Thats a shame I really can’t cycle that far, any other ideas?”

The more aggressive cyclist (not me) will now ask about camping in the garden of the victim, now that the victim has had a little time to size the cyclist up.

I took the soft route and just said well thanks for your time, I’ll buy some water here at the bottle shop and work something out.

The good Samaritan

Leaving the bottle shop with a can of coke and a bottle of water a little disappointed that my victim didn’t come up with a good plan I once again grabbed Mr Hyde ready to set off into the sunset when someone tapped me on the shoulder.

“You know if you’re just looking for somewhere to sleep for the night you can camp in our back garden”.

Cyclist : “Bingo”.

Cobus had been a little overwhelmed by my questions and assumed that I was looking for a caravan park type campground, once the penny dropped that I was just desperate to sleep somewhere he’d raced after me to play the good Samaritan.

Not only are people in the Free state a little old fashioned they’re big on God. Thats fine with me, I don’t mind why people are kind whether it be a mission from God, Budda, the Profit, or like me just to buy karma credits. What started off as camping in the back garden soon became the spare bed and later kicking the oldest son out of his room followed by a BBQ and great meal. Thank you Cobus and family for making a stranger welcome in your home.

Boers fears

All through the Free State I was warned not to go to Bloemfontein the weekend I planned to because the ANC was celebrating its 100^th anniversary. A few days before arriving I placed a message on twitter along the lines of `will there be trouble or is this just typical SA paranoia` to which someone replied `only the whites are paranoid the rest of us are just having fun`. Settled, I had a great weekend in Bloem and ended up helping some ANC senior members drink their whiskey.

The warm up

From Bloem it was time to head into the oven, 2 days cycling on a crappy dirt road to Kimberly in the height of summer, the first day was uneventful apart from the storm that almost blew my tent away. I´d quickly put my tent up in a farmers’ field when I saw the storm coming, when it hit the tent pegs went flying out of the freshly ploughed field and left me in the tent hanging onto the poles for dear life while the hailstones came in almost horizontal and lightening was hitting the ground within a couple of hundred meters. Myself and the tent lived to tell the tail and from now on I will always sleep in a self supporting tent, had I had another tent it would of blown away.

Day 2 started at 5.30 am because I didn´t want a farmer finding me in his freshly ploughed field, cool morning, nice tailwind, good dirt road now we´re talking. After breakfast at 9am it was good old fashion corrugated road, sand, headwind and 30 degrees (42 by lunch). At the end of the day I´d cycled 110km and had been on the road for 12 hours.

Why? who knows that’s just what I do when I know there’s cold beer and shade at the end of the day. It also seemed like a good warm up for the desert adventure of the coming weeks.

Stay tuned…… mum and any mums for that matter shouldn’t read the  blog post next week….