Sunday 03 Nov 2013

L: I was up and off on my walk to see the birds and stopped back at the camp site when Steve called me for coffee and cereal. We were just finished when I heard an African Fish Eagle and went to the river hoping to see it. Imagine my surprise when I realised that there were two flying in the sky, but quite far apart....I waited for quite a while in order to get them into the same shot and then managed to get a shot of both of them with a jet in the sky too.

We packed up the rooftop tent and went for our last swim in the hot and cold pools of Calitzdorp.

S: We headed out and followed the GPS route to Calitzdorp town which was the more direct route through the valley. Half way along the road we had to pass through the Gamka River. This particular crossing was a long concrete causeway which curved so you could not see the end of it. The water was running over the causeway, but initially we could see that the water was not very deep so we carried on. After we had gone through most of the curve, we could not see the bottom any more. At this point I thought it prudent to stop and walk the river to work out the depth so I stopped the bakkie, left the engine running, and jumped out and left Lesley to be entertained watching fish swim “upriver”. L: And wondering why you left me and your car in the rushing water....?? (What not to do, in a flooded river). S: It was not flooded. L: I took a video of Steve slipping his way along the bridge.

S: The causeway was so slippery that I nearly slipped and fell right there. Then I slipped my way along in a shuffle trying not to fall. I was halfway across and the depth was knee high so it did not look so bad. Near the end the water was halfway up my thigh and then I did not feel so confident. Anyway I made my way slowly back to the bakkie, still debating about whether we should give it a go. I compared my mid thigh measurement against the vehicle. It came to about 15cm above the bottom of the door and to the top of the wheel. I decided to give it a go. For a few reasons. We had crossed water before with no troubles but not quite as deep as this and you do not know if you can do it until you try. Also we were close to a town so if something went wrong it was only 10km to walk. I'm kidding. In theory this depth is possible if you take it slowly and create a bow wave in front of the vehicle.

Most of the theory worked. Except I took it a little faster than I should have and ended up with water over the bonnet and hitting the windscreen. L: Not just hitting the windscreen Steve, rushing up to the windscreen wipers!!
S: I also now have two spot lights on the front acting as fish bowls. L: And no, I did not take a photo of the water over the bonnet while I was trying to hang on and stay dry.......
S: After all that excitement we got through Calitzdorp and headed over the Huis River Pass for Ladismith. The pass is easy to drive and you can see parts of the old pass still hugging the hills in some places. About 15 km from Ladismith there is a turn off with a sign saying that this was a far more scenic drive to Ladismith. So we turned off. It was called the Hoeko Valley and we really enjoyed the scenery, everything so green and lush with grape-vines and fruit trees.

Along the road was a police van which “slid off the road” according to the policeman warning traffic to slow down. How things slide in dry conditions - we are yet to find out. The police were apparently chasing a criminal who ran off the road.

We stopped in Ladismith at a restaurant called Andri's for lunch where we were able to finish our blog and had enough signal to publish. We stopped to photograph a rather strange little house with bicycles in the trees and other funny little gizmos like farm implements and water wheels.

From Ladismith we took the road to Laingsburg – along the way the GPS showed that there were some Anglo Boer War Graves so we took the road to go and see. We only found one Boer War grave which had 3 soldiers buried in it from the 1901 war. Sounds morbid....The rest of the graves were of locals. There was a grave of one family which held about 4 children none of whom had survived longer than a year or two. Life was so tough in those days.

A little bit further down the road, we turned off at a gate into Anysberg Reserve. It was a further 22 kms to the office and camping ground along a bumpy track. We saw a lone Gemsbok on the way in.

There is only one shower and toilet operating for the whole camp site as the others are in the process of being built, for the last year. We took a walk up to the swimming dam and had a rather cool dip. It was very refreshing.

We put up the ground tent as we were using the bakkie the following day and built a fire for our supper braai.

Sleep........