The place that almost didn't exist

Day 1 & 2

Distance travelled: about 900km

 

With bellies mostly full, and still buzzing off the high of the Shoe Drop we exited Khayelitsha very quickly and hit the road North towards Clanwilliam. 

HQ had warned us that the shoe drop would take up the whole morning, and advised us to aim for a two or three hour drive north. With that in mind I had Googled accommodation around Ceres, and after much gasping at prices had located a place which we will call KHC (in the interests of protecting their reputation), which, Safari-Now reassured me was easily accessible.



beautiful scenery near Ceres. photo curtsey of Marissa



About 100 kms before Clanwilliam we hit roadworks. The kind where you stop, switch off your engine and try not to get disheartened by the rapidly sinking sun for 20 minutes at a go. It felt like there were HUNDREDS of these stops – and we never got it right to arrive at one when the sign was pleasantly showing “GO”.

 

At one such stop I dared Zo to get out, run to the other teams who were about 10 cars ahead, and make it back to our car before we were moving again. Zo jumped out, ran away and didn’t come back for ages. The cars in front of us eventually started up their engines, and just as I was ready to pull away Zo came charging down the road flushed and grinning. She’d found the Norwegians with their many bottles of champagne and had been enjoying one such bottle. None was brought back for us. Apparently the Norwegians asked if she was from ‘that car of girls driving so slowly’.  This made my blood boil – I DO NOT like to be called slow!

The Norwegians - Team "Idiots Abroad" taking advantage of one of the MANY stops

 

We bonded with the Triton boys in a small dorp over huge bottles of OBS, compared directions with SuzuKings (now dubbed SlowZu as we were beating them in our slow Hilux, while they had a zooty Suzuki!) and pushed on.
 

We finally reached Clanwilliam as the sun disappeared, and plugged the address of KHC into the GPS. I had also printed the directions off the website on the advice of a reviewer who said it had been difficult to find.

MANY u-turns, bad words, kilometres and a couple of phone calls later we were on a dirt road in the pitch black wondering if I’d been scammed and the place didn’t exist. I absconded from all future accommodation booking and worried that I was driving the girls to a premature death in the MIDDLE OF NOWHERE WITH NO CELLPHONE SIGNAL.

Eventually, much to my relief, we found the place. We were handed keys by a very drunk security guard, who at first had told us no one was home and let us reverse into an almost impossible-to-get-back-out-of hole (which I am very proud of being able to get out of, all circumstances considered), but then remembered that he did have keys for us.

SlowZu had decided to come to the same place on my recommendation (oops) and last we had heard, their GPS had taken them to some orange orchard and they weren’t sure what was happening. With no cell signal there wasn’t much we could do to help them, so we called it a day and prayed that they would make it.

this is all we saw of KHC - as we arrived and left in the dark. we could have been in the middle of the Bermuda Triangle or next to the missing Malaysian Airways plane and we wouldn't have known!

 

We were up early the next morning, excited to be heading for the Namibian border! Luckily SlowZu had made it, and had left before us.

Many many more roadworks later we were on open road and pushing The Erwinator as best we could until we reached the Namibian border.

we discovered how these guys manage the night shift when, as we drove past, windows open, our noses were bombarded with a definite weed(y) odour

 

As luck would have it, a bus of Tekkie Tramps/Terrorists/Overland Back-packers got there just before us, and caused some kind of logistical nightmare that saw us in the queue for a good two hours.

 

Normally this would be a bad thing, but for us it meant an introduction to BRUCE.

 

HQ arrived not too long after us, and soon Bruce was in full swing, his Australian accent bellowing good-natured abuse across the immigration office. Sheep references, and general Aussie/Kiwi/confused Cockney banter kept us highly entertained, and I will be ever grateful to Bruce for lightening the mood, and making the time pass easily.

By the time the Terrorists had cleared immigration almost half of the crews were in the line behind us – and we realised – we were winning! J It was only ever a ‘race’ when we were in the lead.

 

Border crossed we came across a WIMPYYYYY (I should really hit them up for Sponsorship next time!), refuelled, plugged Cannon Road House into the GPS and set forth.

 

Again I had printed out directions for just in case, and I must say, the lesson we learned was ALWAYS LISTEN TO THE GPS AND NOT WRITTEN INSTRUCTIONS. Perhaps we just decipher written directions incorrectly.
Or it could have had something to do with the pit-stop. It was here, in Namibia that the 100km-to-go-who-needs-a-beverage tradition was born.

 

 

 

The Namibian roads were AMAZING. Straight, wonderful to drive on and no potholes to speak of.

 

 

 

The Hilux really came into its own in Namibia – it loved those dirt roads and we flew along even overtaking a LANDROVER full of MEN (Hi Dixie) in our 2.7l HILUX. *cough*

Team "Dixie Normous"  photo (c) Che Overmeyer

 

Unfortunately we took a wrong turn and they took back the lead, but that’s just details. That wrong turn cost us dearly and we went from crossing the border first to arriving at base camp almost last!

 

Many thanks to Mr Shibbly at NALEDI MOTORS FRANCISTOWN for sponsoring this leg of the trip! Your sizeable contribution and kindness are humbling. Thank you.

Echos, abandoned petrol stations and our first night of camping…. NEXT

Yours, in adventure

Rox