Plan B consisted of us extending the hire of the 4x4 by a week and deciding to visit Lesotho on an extended trip back to Cape Town. When we had been planning our travels we'd been sorry we didn't have time to get there together, so this was a good opportunity to grab.
On our way south we stopped at the Golden Gate National Park. Arriving, fortuitously, at dusk we found the reason for the name; huge red rock cliffs glowing brilliantly in the setting sun.
Lesotho is completely surrounded by South Africa. It is a sort of kingdom in the clouds, a high plateau region above the plains of South Africa and lots of mountains on top of this. It's, we discovered, very poor and extremely friendly; full of those traditonal farming scenes (oxen drawn ploughs, boys on donkeys, hand tended fields) that look so beautiful but you know that mean a really tough life for the inhabitants. It is also full of some very, very bad roads, we took the main road across the country and whilst much was fine one 45km section took nearly 3 hours, much of it in low range 4 wheel drive as we clamored up what seemed never ending boulders rises.
It also featured some bizarre EU sponsored signs. I presume money was also being spent on better thinngo but to be honest there wasn't much sign of it.
For more 4 wheel drive fun we left Lesotho by the Sani Pass (which has some fame after featuring on Top Gear ), a dirtroad that starts at 2870m and then plunges by a series of alarmingly steep, full lock, hairpins, back down to the plains of South Africa.
After that it was a quick dash the 1500km back to Cape Town - meeting some incredible hospitality on the way when, as we passed through the small town of Butterworth and discovering there was no caravan park, some locals, Annan, Loretto and family, insisted we stay the night with them.
All to soon we were back in Cape Town, a couple of days R and R for both us including a trip on the cable car up Table Mountain and the sunset over Cape Town and suddenly after five and a half weeks and 11,500km of travel over.
Its been a great experience. Megans now off to Zanzibar and various other adventurous places whilst I collect my bike and start to ride north.
(And why did I write "except the gearbox" in the title, we'll it decided it didn't like the last week and that last 1500 km was done virtually stuck in fifth (of six) gear with any other selection sounding as it was about to explode - it added to the interest of the drive but we made it.
A final postscript, I've just heard back from Avis the cost of our extra hire is waived in turn for us bringing the camper back as it was - a wonderful example of customer service)
On our way south we stopped at the Golden Gate National Park. Arriving, fortuitously, at dusk we found the reason for the name; huge red rock cliffs glowing brilliantly in the setting sun.
Lesotho is completely surrounded by South Africa. It is a sort of kingdom in the clouds, a high plateau region above the plains of South Africa and lots of mountains on top of this. It's, we discovered, very poor and extremely friendly; full of those traditonal farming scenes (oxen drawn ploughs, boys on donkeys, hand tended fields) that look so beautiful but you know that mean a really tough life for the inhabitants. It is also full of some very, very bad roads, we took the main road across the country and whilst much was fine one 45km section took nearly 3 hours, much of it in low range 4 wheel drive as we clamored up what seemed never ending boulders rises.
It also featured some bizarre EU sponsored signs. I presume money was also being spent on better thinngo but to be honest there wasn't much sign of it.
For more 4 wheel drive fun we left Lesotho by the Sani Pass (which has some fame after featuring on Top Gear ), a dirtroad that starts at 2870m and then plunges by a series of alarmingly steep, full lock, hairpins, back down to the plains of South Africa.
After that it was a quick dash the 1500km back to Cape Town - meeting some incredible hospitality on the way when, as we passed through the small town of Butterworth and discovering there was no caravan park, some locals, Annan, Loretto and family, insisted we stay the night with them.
All to soon we were back in Cape Town, a couple of days R and R for both us including a trip on the cable car up Table Mountain and the sunset over Cape Town and suddenly after five and a half weeks and 11,500km of travel over.
Its been a great experience. Megans now off to Zanzibar and various other adventurous places whilst I collect my bike and start to ride north.
(And why did I write "except the gearbox" in the title, we'll it decided it didn't like the last week and that last 1500 km was done virtually stuck in fifth (of six) gear with any other selection sounding as it was about to explode - it added to the interest of the drive but we made it.
A final postscript, I've just heard back from Avis the cost of our extra hire is waived in turn for us bringing the camper back as it was - a wonderful example of customer service)
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