Virgin Sand In Kaokoland (a post lockdown adventure)

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The night ends with a glutonous dinner and great conversation. I feel truly blessed.

What started as a lonely day without my friends, ended as an evening filled with new friends.

I awkwardly climb into my tent trying not to hurt myself in the process, set my alarm for 5am, and sleep like the dead.
 
I’m awake at 4:30 already. Fuck, my ribs hurt.

I make some coffee, shower and attempt to get dressed and pack away my tent. But because I can hardly move my left side without pain, it takes 90 agonizing minutes. I hit the road at 6am.

My plan is to blast down the shortest route to Windhoek, meet the guys, load the bikes on the trailer and begin the 2-day drive to Cape Town.

The shortest route is a largely dirt route. As I turn off onto the gravel, I last about 5 minutes before my ribs are killing me. This is not going to work.

I stop and recalculate my GPS route to take the much less painful, but longer, tar route.

The morning passes quickly and I cover several hundred kilometers at 140km/h. At this point, I don’t care about conserving my rear tire. I just want to get off this rattling tortue device and into a comfy car seat.

Around 11am, I arrive in Windhoek and meet up wwith Jan Lucas and Marc who already have the trailer loaded and ready to rumble.

We’re all happy to be reunited. They have also had a hard ride yesterday. We exchange stories, load my bike onto the trailer and set off.

But the drama continues...

Along the way, the rear tire of the bike trailer bursts, destroying the rim and ripping the axle out of place.
 

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We spend an hour trying to repair it, and we do. Our repair lasts about 150km until we hit Grunau. In fact, the axle broke loose 100 meters from the Grunau Hotel.

While Jan Lucas inspects the damage, Marc runs over to the hotel and calls the local “Trailer Repair” guy.

Seriously. He exists.

Obviously, a lot of trailers break down here.

While we check into our hotel room and order dinner, the trailer repair guy fixes our trailer for us. Superb luck.
 

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The next day’s drive is long.

We hand around at the border for an hour to get the results of our rapid COVID-19 test that we take in the a little van. We’re all COVID negative and are allowed back into South Africa without issue.

Phew… because I haven’t worn a mask in two weeks.
 

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We arrive in Cape Town at 9:30pm – just in time for my 10pm conference call with 30 of my clients. How I led that 2-hour call, I don’t know. I could barely keep my eyes open.

I sleep like the dead.
 

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This was the best motorcycle trip I have done in my 30 years of riding motorcycles. Nothing compares to Kaokoland. If you haven’t been, go. Go now, while the sand is still virgin (post-lockdown) and the hotels are cheap.

If you’ve read this far, thank you for coming on this journey with me. Thank you for your encouraging comments. Thank you for being part of our amazing motorcycle community that has inspired me so much.

Good night.
 
Hey Bruce

Thanks for sharing, was amazing to join you on this trip!

Couple of questions:
[list type=decimal]
[*]Can you share your tracks for the route you did?
[*]If you are in CPT over December would love to buy you a beer and talk more about your trip.
[/list]

Thanks again, I really enjoyed reading your report :thumleft: :thumleft: :thumleft: :thumleft: :thumleft:
 
Thanks for the time & effort to write the report "boskak". Great entertaining read, well done!
I think everyone should see the Kaokoland by car or bike before us humans fuck it up forever.
 
peter stuyvesant said:
Thanks for the time & effort to write the report "boskak". Great entertaining read, well done!
I think everyone should see the Kaokoland by car or bike before us humans fuck it up forever.

I can change his forum name.....  :biggrin: :biggrin: :biggrin: :biggrin: :biggrin:
 
funacide said:
Hey Bruce

Thanks for sharing, was amazing to join you on this trip!

Couple of questions:
[list type=decimal]
[*]Can you share your tracks for the route you did?
[*]If you are in CPT over December would love to buy you a beer and talk more about your trip.
[/list]

Thanks again, I really enjoyed reading your report :thumleft: :thumleft: :thumleft: :thumleft: :thumleft:

Sure. Here are the tracks.

I'm in Cape Town at the moment, but don't have a ton of time becasue I'm here with family. However, if you're willing to come to Hout Bay, I'm sure I can persuade Jan Lucas and Marc to join us for coffee or a beer.
 

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peter stuyvesant said:
Thanks for the time & effort to write the report "boskak". Great entertaining read, well done!
I think everyone should see the Kaokoland by car or bike before us humans fuck it up forever.

It's my pleasure. Agreed. It's a special place, but how long will it remain so untouched?
 
Overland Bruce said:
peter stuyvesant said:
Thanks for the time & effort to write the report "boskak". Great entertaining read, well done!
I think everyone should see the Kaokoland by car or bike before us humans fuck it up forever.

It's my pleasure. Agreed. It's a special place, but how long will it remain so untouched?

It can unfortunately not remain untouched if we keep on going there.
 
2StrokeDan said:
Overland Bruce said:
peter stuyvesant said:
Thanks for the time & effort to write the report "boskak". Great entertaining read, well done!
I think everyone should see the Kaokoland by car or bike before us humans fuck it up forever.

It's my pleasure. Agreed. It's a special place, but how long will it remain so untouched?

It can unfortunately not remain untouched if we keep on going there.

All it takes is a couple of months of lockdown and most of the trace of us blows away in the wind.......
 
Thank you BB for posting this really great RR!! :thumleft: :drif:
 
Overland Bruce said:
funacide said:
Hey Bruce

Thanks for sharing, was amazing to join you on this trip!

Couple of questions:
[list type=decimal]
[*]Can you share your tracks for the route you did?
[*]If you are in CPT over December would love to buy you a beer and talk more about your trip.
[/list]

Thanks again, I really enjoyed reading your report :thumleft: :thumleft: :thumleft: :thumleft: :thumleft:

Sure. Here are the tracks.

I'm in Cape Town at the moment, but don't have a ton of time becasue I'm here with family. However, if you're willing to come to Hout Bay, I'm sure I can persuade Jan Lucas and Marc to join us for coffee or a beer.

Thanks for the tracks.

No worries understand you are busy with family. Enjoy the time.
 
Thanks for sharing this wonderful trip with us.

I really enjoyed very day.
 
JMOL said:
Thanks for sharing this wonderful trip with us.

I really enjoyed very day.
Makes me happy to read that. Glad you enjoyed it.

Sent from my SM-N950F using Tapatalk

 

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