SA Road Trip 2008 – The Final Days

Thursday 27 November 2008, up at 07:00 and it was hot already. All our gear was packed back into my trusty little car and then we took a drive into Port St. Johns to take photo and video footage of this absolute hole of a town. From there we took a slow drive to the capital city of the Eastern Cape, Umtata. We were stopped at a road block and my license was taken away and the friendly officer took a walk around the car once to make sure we were transporting cannabis. It was returned and we went merrily on our way, no problems. Umtata was extreme, to say the least. I rate it way worse than the capital of Zambia, Lusaka. It really is horrible and it’s best to avoid it like the plague! As we left we saw a huge head on car accident where a bakkie (pick up truck) had crashed into a Toyota Condor, complete with trailer. The people in the Condor were obviously on holiday and I’m sure their vacation time ended right there and then. Amazingly, everyone seemed to be alive. With that we hurried out of the little cesspool know was Umtata and headed for the hills.

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Mzimvubu – Day 3 – Class 6 Flat Water

Wednesday 26 November 2008. The morning arrived slowly as a low cloud hung over us and light rain was came down. My body was stiff and both Luke and I knew we were in for some flat water paddling, so motivation wasn’t running incredibly high. Still, we had a long way to go and weren’t one hundred percent sure if we could crack out the rest of the distance in time. The first photo I took was at 08:20 from the warmth of the tent with Luke collecting water from the river. I guess we must have left camp at about 09:00 or so.

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Mzimvubu – Day 2 – 11 Hours of Pleasure!

Tuesday 25 November 2008 and we were up earlier than usual. We knew it was going to be a very intense day and we knew we would have to paddle from virtually sunrise to sunset. I looked up at the blue sky that was forming overhead and stretched out my muscles that were feeling a little stiff from the consecutives days’ of paddling. It felt good to be next to the river once again, away from the hustle and bustle of ‘normal’ life.

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Mzimvubu – Day 1 – The Adventure Begins

Monday, 24 November 2008 had arrived. It had been a slightly disturbed night with somebody’s house alarm going off several times and of course, the three big dogs made sure they voiced their opinion on the matter too, but once morning came we were greeted with thick mist and peace and quiet. The camp site was deserted except for us. Once the mist cleared our surroundings were revealed to us for the first time as we had arrived in darkness the previous night. It was quite beautiful! I knew it was going to be an interesting day and was looking forward to seeing more.

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Deepdale Gorge – Day 2 – On and On

Sunday, 23 November 2008 and the sun shone bright and hot as I clambered out of the tent. Everyone else was awake already and it felt good to have rested again. It was a glorious day and the only thing that could make it better would be a higher water level. It had dropped in the night but that was just the way things would be. Long time pioneer kayaker Doug Ammons said something in the AW Journal last year, it read as follows: “It just is, and it can't be anything different. If you find yourself wishing it was something different, then that just means you have more to learn.” Quite profound. Hopefully I’ll get to meet him at some stage in my life. His writing and accomplishment are something to be admired.  

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