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| outside our cave home! |
we can’t believe it’s been a week since the
last update, and although our week was slightly less full than the time we
spent in Uganda time continues to fly past.
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| coffee break from the dusty roads |
the onward journey from the cave accommodation we stayed in in the Drakensberg mountains down to Kenton on sea took us through some
breath taking and also challenging scenery, we were so glad to have our
faithful Jeep Wrangler which performed a sterling job in navigating the dirt
and sand roads along the beautiful Drakensberg mountain range with the tiny
country of Lesotho atop of the great peaks.
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| dusty maz and dusty luggage |
our first overnight stop of the week was at a beef
farm just out side of Kokstad, still in Kwazulu Natal I think, and we arrived
after a hot and dusty day, the top of the Jeep had been down for all of the journey
through the twisting and turning 4x4 roads so we had to dust everything off
before unpacking into the self catering house overlooking a stunning lake.
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| our view from kokstad beef farmhouse |
leaving the mountains and the dirt roads
behind we soon connected back up to the N2 (the national highway between Durban
and Cape Town) and encountering some busy road works which are transforming the
single carriageways which traverse the long undulating landscape which resulted
in long hold ups behind large trucks and the over 600km journey seemed to take
an age to really get going.
our journey was made even the more
challenging when we were stopped at a routine police road block, knowing that
the Jeep’s road tax was up to date and that I had my driving licence in my
wallet gave me a sense of security when we drew to a stop and the Xhosa police lady
came ambling over to chat to me, however to our great despair she had a very
antagonistic attitude and upon seeing my UK driving licence she immediately
told me that I was committing a criminal offence as the licence wasn't valid in
South Africa (of which we knew it was as we had double checked over the last
six years of living and working here without any issue with the traffic police
in the Western Cape) and that we had to pay an on the spot fine of R1500,
around £80 or $150, which we didn't have.
she had already taken my driving licence
and requested me to drive to the next town, leaving Maz by the side of the
road, to get the money before she would give me the licence back, she then walked
off towards her colleagues and waited for me. I’m now gonna cut a long story
short and as we were keen to get out of that very tense situation I got out of
my car and approached her with the only money we had which equated to quite a
large sum of Rand in my hand, she gladly took this and only gave my licence
back after asking me to apologise for committing this offence!
with over seven hours of driving ahead the
rest of the day was a little tense as the police were really out in force and
with no further funds in hand we were worried that a similar event might happen
at each check point, thank God we weren't stopped and in hindsight we should have been more brash with her, perhaps taking her name and maybe even a ‘selfie’
with her as she was really out of order.
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| kenton where two rivers meet the sea |
the rest of the week was spent at the
beautiful seaside town of Kenton on Sea, a town surrounded by water, the
kariega river to the east, bushmans river to the west and the sea to the south,
the beaches are truly stunning and it was great to spend some time chilling,
reading and recuperating after the long drives.
over the weekend we joined Anthony Geard,
our good friend and Thembalitsha board member, in Adelaide in the Eastern Cape,
where he was completing the purchase of a new property that will be used to
start a new project in that area. It was fantastic to be with him as he signed
the deal and looking at the town which sits between Fort Beaufort and Bedford
there seems to be a need for the types of projects that Thembalitsha have
developed over the last fifteen to twenty years, maybe to include a day care
centre and to work with the youth via a sports outreach programme similar to
that which we have used and developed at the Village of Hope.
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| singing group girls in adelaide |
within minutes of our arriving some lovely
local girls who were attending a sing practice next door were busy sharing
their stories with us, they told us of their schooling, their sporting
abilities and gave us a rousing rendition of a local xhosa song of which we
were well acquainted so joined in with my laughter from the girls who couldn't believe that we knew it.
we spent the night with some friends of
Anthony’s (Gary and Kate) on their farm in the middle of the bush in what was
built as a British barracks in the 1830’s as the British pushed into the xhosa
homelands, the barracks were huge and to think that they had been built there
to secure the British positions in the frontier war was humbling and
overwhelming from both stand points…..I trust that that xhosa police lady that
we had encountered early in the week wasn't taking some revenge on us!
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| maz feeding the orphaned sheep! |
after attending the local Baptist church
service on Sunday morning, which was an eye opening event with the vicar’s
family arriving from all around the world to celebrate the 90th
birthday of his mother, the family were quite musical so it wasn't a traditional
service by any means, we returned to kenton but the trip to church was great as it was so good to meet some local people and chat
with them about the challenges they see in their tiny community.
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| the british barracks in the middle of xhosa lands! |
we now enter our last week in South Africa
for at least six months and with a few things to tidy up before we leave we can
hardly believe that this time next week we will be visiting family in England
and sorting the next stage of our trip, however we do hope to provide one more
update before we leave South Africa on Thursday so watch this space for more
info on what we will have been up to.
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