Day 3. Hopefully I would make the finish today.
The camp faeries woke me up at close to 4. Something must be said about them. They were a team of guys from Zulu Overland who were always smiling and did their thing really well. They worked really long days and I hope to see them again next year.
I have carpal tunnel syndrome and my hands deteriorate over multi day rides, especially if I am hoofing along. I think with all the stretching and MTB’ing, my hands were not that bad this morning and I could ride. Before, I have had to struggle for most of the morning before my hands would work.
I have a thing about minimal effort. Time and effort are luxuries on rallies. I try to maximise the return on both. Take breakfast for example; it takes time to wander over to the restaurant, get a meal and eat it, then pay, and wander back to the action. I like to take Future life cereal. Straight over to the Zulu Overland coffee table, mug of the stuff mixed with some long life, stir and drink it down, wash mug out. I’ve eaten before I’d even have made it to the restaurant. It helps that I really like Future Life. I was raised on Pronutro and this is like Pronutro on steroids. No need for sugar and adding water doesn’t detract from the taste either.
I’ve mentioned my dress routine. Maintenance on the big beast is simple too. I suppose the only time waster is ablution and everyone knows that shouldn't be rushed.
I went and found Kevin as soon as I could. I really didn’t like riding with a part of his bike on mine especially if he didn’t know about it. Karma and all that. He was extremely happy to know that a part of his bike was joining me on the stage and wouldn’t hear of any apologies. Really nice guy, him and is son. I am sorry they were out.
Speaking of out, there were a few guys who really battled during the evening to put their bikes back together. Some with success others not. I really felt for the guys who either through medical or mechanical weren’t in it anymore. Next year chaps!
My start time was 5.45, I was really looking forward to the day.
I have spent a lot of time in the Richtersveld and the Orange river. I think it has some of the most beautiful scenery and riding. There would be two special stages today. One that went into the richterveld and the other along the Namakwa Eco Trail. Joining them together would be 3 liaison sections. Between the two would be the option of filling up again but that entails a border crossing as there is only petrol on the Namibian side in that part of the world.
First there was a little 60k’s to Steinkopf to deal with to fuel up. It was bitterly cold. This is an on-board in the cold shot. Suns just coming up
Cockpit
My favourite photo from the whole trip. Hennie Smit.
Cold as!
Jacques with his modified tower
I missed a small detour into the petrol station at Steinkpopf and lost some waypoint time from that. I was in two minds about fuel; I could put 40 litres in and do both special sections on one fill, or do the passport thing and admin and schlep over into Namibia.
After hearing about the roughness through others of the 1st section I chickened out of doing the Exxon Valdez thing and had about 25 litres in for the stage.
The start was a few kilometres west towards Port Nolloth
Charl at the start.
Peter and Hennie
Hennie on his way. We were all very clever with the chirps when he found a box of neutrals.
Peter shot off and too soon my time was nearing. I really didn’t know where I stood in the race as the results had been posted in the restaurant and I hadn’t been there that morning. Andy informed me that I was lying 10th and 10 minutes behind Rudi. Hmmm maybe I shouldn’t have let him sleep! The bugger!
This is the stage North is to the left
Anyway, time was up an off I went. The first 70k’s was really quick. I have a thing about going too fast in the early morning or late afternoon. Big meaty things with 4 legs are more active then. But, I could see relatively far and there was not a lot of big vegetation so I went for it. These big bikes are made for this. I think a 690 is still the fastest overall, but just have some open corners and longer straights and the big bikes more than hold their own.
Soon enough we started climbing and unusually the track only gradually got more hectic over about 10k’s. I was doing alright and making good navigation choices. The path was not always apparent even though 7 or 8 bikes were in front of me.
Climbing up into the hills the track started to really get rough, it was square shale type stuff that makes metallic bell noises when ridden on.
I was catching Peters dust when out of the Blue I met with Kurt and Deon. They were taking it easy and had stopped for a smoke. I think it was one of them who had asked me the night before if the Richtersveld was worth it? Alex had put the fear into them and were contemplating not riding the section. They said the path was to the left. I thought it was to the right and I had seen dust going that way. They did confirm that riders had gone that way but more had gone to the left. I thanked them and wished them fun and went left. It was soon apparent that it was the wrong way but the GPS waypoint seemed just behind the little hill to my right. I was on the wrong side of a hill and couldn't just ride over it so worked my way around and rode back along what was the right track but in the wrong direction. Once I got to the Waypoint it took me a little while to finally work out what I had done wrong. This is a wonderful part of rallying, the trick is to keep your head and slow down and try not to guess. I think I lost about 20 minutes here.
The yellow line is the correct route. Where it parts from the red line is where I met the two of them
It wasn’t long once I’d found the waypoint that Jacques and Charl caught me. From there we rode together. It got really technical with steep switchbacks to get off the mountains then beautiful vistas looking down into the Orang river valleys. The navigation was pretty hard and I believe that some spent quite some time undoing that little puzzle.
At one point I had to stop as my idle revs were too high. It makes the slow going pushy and engine braking is less. As I got off, I tripped and fell into Charls’ font wheel. He must be a jinx around me, I can’t seem to not fall over when he’s near! We had a laugh and good chat about how much fun it was out here.
A little further on.
All too soon we were in riverbeds and having a ball when the end came up. I was having so much fun I missed the finish line in the roadbook. I had gotten used to seeing people at the finish line. Here there wasn’t one. The boffins back at HQ would interrogate our GPS’ to get out times. Just after the finish line it was a 40 zone, I got pinged doing 65.
I don’t think the riding was particularly difficult, just the remoteness of the area made it both stunning and a big problem if something went wrong. I had elected to ride safely and not do anything stupid. Of all the stages this one had the least competitive feel for me to it.
One down, one to go. I could smell the beer in Kakamas!
But there was the little issue of a very slow ride to the border post. Dust is a huge issue for the farmers here so the posted limits are 40 for long periods of time.
Border crossing are, well, there’s very little to love about them. I did the paper work and fuelled up, grabbed a coke and a roll and headed back. I barely made it in front of a bus load of French overlanders on the Namibian side. That would have taken a ball of time.
On the road out of the valley – 5 myle poort I stopped in the silence and had a really good lunch
Right-ho. On to Stage 4
atch:
