ianhogg
Race Dog
- Joined
- Apr 24, 2010
- Messages
- 1,506
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- Location
- 34 Stanbury Street, Proserpine, QLD
- Bike
- Kawasaki Versys
Rhodes House 1870. Umkomaas Valley. Confirmed Sun 15th Sept
On our honeymoon I took my young bride for an off-road trip through the Umkomaas valley from Umgababa to stay at The Oaks at Byrne Hotel, returning the next day through Dududu and Gary Lindsay’s farm at Stoneyside . A foolish and dangerous thing to do as the area was largely at war at the time and we had to re-route on a couple of occasions when the locals told us there was fighting ahead. (See picture) I had a tired IT175g that I had retired from enduro riding and my wife had her KE175, a mighty atom of adventure biking! The new IT K model had a complete lighting set which I had transferred to the G. I remember meeting Bud Turner in the valley on the day he had driven his new IT175K of the showroom floor at RBS. He had already broken every light except the headlamp! Working off the 1:50 000 survey maps we managed pretty well and one of the things we found was the remains of the house on the cotton farm that Cecil Rhodes stayed in with his brother Herbert when he arrived in this country in 1870. For the record, Rhodes didn’t have it all his own way, a lovely quote when he was thwarted over Swaziland was, “It is humiliating to be utterly beaten by these niggers." 25 years later we went back to retrace our trip, this time in a much more comfortable 4x4. However, we didn’t manage to find the remains of the farmhouse.
The purpose of this day ride is to visit the site and also have a closer look at the North side of the Umkomaas that you can see from the bridge. It is a loop from the Good Hope gas station at Eston. I think we will need to carry our own food for the day. My plan would be to leave the St Johns Pinetown gas station at 7am to meet any others at the Good Hope petrol station at 7.45am (Gunda speed.) A provisional date would be Sunday 15/9/2013 but I’ll check the weather forecast.
Attached: picture of route. GPS file of route
Cecil John Rhodes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cecil_Rhodes
On our honeymoon I took my young bride for an off-road trip through the Umkomaas valley from Umgababa to stay at The Oaks at Byrne Hotel, returning the next day through Dududu and Gary Lindsay’s farm at Stoneyside . A foolish and dangerous thing to do as the area was largely at war at the time and we had to re-route on a couple of occasions when the locals told us there was fighting ahead. (See picture) I had a tired IT175g that I had retired from enduro riding and my wife had her KE175, a mighty atom of adventure biking! The new IT K model had a complete lighting set which I had transferred to the G. I remember meeting Bud Turner in the valley on the day he had driven his new IT175K of the showroom floor at RBS. He had already broken every light except the headlamp! Working off the 1:50 000 survey maps we managed pretty well and one of the things we found was the remains of the house on the cotton farm that Cecil Rhodes stayed in with his brother Herbert when he arrived in this country in 1870. For the record, Rhodes didn’t have it all his own way, a lovely quote when he was thwarted over Swaziland was, “It is humiliating to be utterly beaten by these niggers." 25 years later we went back to retrace our trip, this time in a much more comfortable 4x4. However, we didn’t manage to find the remains of the farmhouse.
The purpose of this day ride is to visit the site and also have a closer look at the North side of the Umkomaas that you can see from the bridge. It is a loop from the Good Hope gas station at Eston. I think we will need to carry our own food for the day. My plan would be to leave the St Johns Pinetown gas station at 7am to meet any others at the Good Hope petrol station at 7.45am (Gunda speed.) A provisional date would be Sunday 15/9/2013 but I’ll check the weather forecast.
Attached: picture of route. GPS file of route
Cecil John Rhodes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cecil_Rhodes
