Cape 2 Cairo 2 Cape Blog

Day 3 Rundu- Katima Mullilo 500km

Sleeping in until 7 definitely has it’s perks and I think after the two previous days- EVERYONE enjoyed it. As we loaded up the trucks we could hear the guys waking up, starting their engines and heading for the dining room. Before the trip Ray kept saying “you’ll never go hungry in Africa” and so far he’s been right. The last 3 places that we stayed in fed us as if we were professional athletes always with coffee, cereal, bread and a hot breakfast waiting to be served to us. Even when we got a packed lunch out of Keetmanshoop hooked us up with some boiled eggs, yogurt, fruit, sandwhiches and a meatball. No complaints here, not until i go hungry at least.

On any other occasion 500 km would have sounded like hell on earth but after establishing that a rough day means 1300 km, 500 sounded like a free day. Usually if we left at 5am, we’d knock out those 500 before the sun got hot, I guess I mean to say that driving during the hot part of the day kinda drags out a bit longer than you’d expect. We stopped about 120 km outside of Katima for a quick lunch break and to refuel all the vehicles and as if the circus came to town people were just sitting on the fences staring all us handsome oke’s (and Jacci of course). But in reality I’m sure it’s not everyday that a villiage gets to see such an impressive sight of vehicles and white folk all at the same time. The bikes are impressive to me, and I’ve seen them for the past 3 days straight, but on this trip spectators are just another good reason to have some fun, especially if there are children around.

Yesterday on the way to Rundu, my dad spotted a snaked on the road which happened to be a green mamba which he coiled onto the front bumper. Besides people being utterly confused by this scenario we also came armed with a very real looking toy snake, and some masks that range from funny looking to scarey. Doc bought them so that when we drive slowly in towns we put them on and watch peoples reactions as we drive by and wave. Having done this on previous trips before it still never gets old. Some people look confused, some scream, some just run, some laugh, it all depends but its always interesting. The fake snake is for the same thing, I guess locals fear snakes like most men fear prostate exams because a snake in the vacinity is chaos time in Africa. This continent is a wild wild place, and a day doesn’t go by when you dont see something intriguing.

After some sausages out of a can and some delicious baked bread we head down the road with only about an hour left to drive. After the refuel stop we pulled into the Safari River Boat Lodge situated right on the Zambezi river for some R&R and some bike maintence. On the way in some of the guys had toppled over in the sand and bent their panniers and cracked some windsheilds. No one hurt, just some good fun in the sand box- like the old days. Ray did some impressive shock fix with a rubber pipe and his shock that had bottemed out a few days ago with some zip ties, and some duct tape.

The Recce- Kobus Fourie, for helping the guys pick up their heavy bikes in the sand

View from the balcony













It’s a rough life.

Day 2 Keetmanshoop- Rundu 1225km

Suited up after 200km for the last 300 of the day

Suited up for the cold

The start of the second day was everything but glorious. Another 5 am head start of what was to be a 1225 km day from Keetmanshoop to Rundu. One thing that all of the guys spoke of was how cold it was. Even Rambo and Piet Riempies (Ray and Alain) said it was the coldest that they had ever been on a bike which stands high in my book due to their level of credibility. At -3 degrees celcius while standing still easily -15 to -20 while cruising at 140 the cold weather was definitely the talk of the day. Regardless of the uncontrollable shaking and the small attempts to warm their hands using the heat from the engine the day finally cleared up and turned into quite and eventful mess once we got into Windhoek.

Fixing bikes on the highway

A few miles out of town Leon Lowe’s KTM broke down. Not too much of a train smash because it was only the chain that needed a new master link so the crew quickly threw his bike on the trailer, Leon in the van, and raced into Windhoek. In order to avoid downtown city traffic we decided to take a highway that makes a semi circle around the city and this is where the problems started because we planned on making it to Rundu by 4pm that day. Some how while waiting for us at the corner (which is a procedure that we follow on the trip to prevent guys from missing a turn) Ray had communicated to Alain to take the guys to refuel their bikes which some how caused the guys to split into 3 differenet groups. This one little miscommunication in directions and teamwork (because no one waited on the corner for us to show us where to turn) cost the entire group at least and hour and a half while trying to sort out how to regroup again while quickly fixing Leon’s bike on the side of the busy highway.

Guys hanging out for a bit at a stop

Once we got into the next town called, Okahandja which split the group once again. I think every body on the crew was getting frusted with the situation because although we have ways to contact each other, if someones gone or didnt tell us where they went, we have no way of getting a hold of them. When we finally headed out it was after noon with probably another 500 more km to go. We finally pulled into the hotel at Rundu called the Ngandu Safari Lodge right on the Kavango river. The lodge lay right on the border of Namibia and Angola which brought back a lot of memories for the guys who spent their army days in the bush of northern Nam and Angola. Fortunately it turned out that we were’t going to have to do another pre dawn exit so regardless of having gotten there in the dark, we were able to catch a few glimpses of the river that floods the Okavango delta on an annual basis.

We had “sosaties”for dinner which the guys took upon themselves to describe as tasting like “tough dog meat” with some actually very deliscious potatoe salad. I guess you can’t expect much from a R 25 re-heated braai meat but if anything the guys defintely enjoyed the bar. After some chow and “kak praat” as the boertijies like to call it, we sat down for the daily meeting. It was a very iportant meeting because for the first time in Cytech/Tours For Africa history, we handed out the yellow and the brown- Recce and Wrecker jersies. Just as in the Tour De France a yellow jersey is handed to the best performed member of the gruop and the wrecker to the most poor. It can be given out for almost anything, and the decision is based off of nominations and then votes. A wrecker move would be when my dad, Doc, thought the truck was broken when all he was really doing was pushing down the brake and the petrol at the same time. That would have been a deserving nomination for the brown jersey! There is one catch about the brown jersey though- and that’s that it can never be washed which would mean if you’re going to screw up at anytime the first week or so would be the time to.

The Recce-The first ever, was Jacci for sitting on the back of Rolfs bike for almost 1300 km.

The Wrecker- The first ever, was Ray Muller for being the Tour Operator and running out of petrol before the re-fuel. Earlier in the day Doc had covered the shirt with some old boiled eggs justttt so that the first guy gettinging it wasn’t going to get rewarded with a brand new, clean shirt.

The next morning like a champ, Ray had it on the next day ready to Rock and Roll. The meeting ended with the decision to have a little sleep in time because there was only about 500 km to do the next day in route to Katima Mulilo and to do the remaining 200 km to Livingston/ Vic falls in Zambia the next day from there