Day 12: Big milestone today. ... We left Beitbridge revived and refreshed, tails up and excited about the day ahead. The night in a hotel was such a luxury. By the time we left this morning I had showered 5 times! We have been absolutely astounded by the Limpopo Province. Having the pre conceived idea that BB is a plastic bag town apology of a southern gateway has been proved terribly wrong. After the first 100m hill sprint which Bots won hands down we settled into our pace and headed out of town. Within 2km we came across the most beautiful dam complete with Kariba-type submerged trees and glowing in the early morning light. We wound along a single track next to the Limpopo river for an hour and were awed as each new scene unfolded, all along the beautiful border. The first 3 hours was such an adventure. We had sent the vehicles around and didnt really have a track but we had a river to follow and werent going to get closer to the boundary than that! Bots established that we had coined a new term. When you ride mountain bike trails you always ask what kind of trail it is? Jeep track or single track? Now we have something called no track!! But it was stunning and we loved it. The acacia xanthphloea with bright green trunks flanking the rich blue of the second biggest river in our country. What a privilege. ...There was some portage on our no-track which we also enjoyed and 3 hours later we met up with the vehicles and had a lovely breakfast to celebrate reaching our 1000km mark..... Saddled up again we cycled past the rich ripe oranges of Nottingham Estate and the towering rock pinnacles of Sentinel Ranch. We saw a herd of 6 Eland and passed a straight row of 17 Baobab trees under a cliff face. Gareth had settled into back-up routine remarkably well and as we arrived at the lunch stop he whipped the bikes away for maintenance while Astri re supplied us with human fuel. A land rover pulled up with young Adam Bristow from Sentinel Ranch at the wheel and he gave us directions to get to the Mapungubwe Camp Site, a newly erected facility being prepared for the Tour de Tuli happening in a month. It was still 20km away so we headed out. Not 10 minutes later and minus the cars we were zooming through a deeply shaded tunnel of trees, when we picked up movement to our left and were shocked to realise it was a huge heard of elephant cows and calves. They ran alongside us for a few hundred metres and by the time we had slammed on brakes and thought of an evasion plan they had melted into the bush like grey ghosts. Hearts pounding we laughed at each other (a bit hysterically) and carried on. Mapungubwe has to be one of our countrys greatest secrets. ...We are currently camped on the banks of the mighty Limpopo River under the spreading branches of a nyala berry tree. We washed in the river (sorry Mom, there was someone on Croc watch!), and thanks to Botton had an ice cold beer to watch the sun go down. We covered 91km today and cant believe it can get better but Tuli tomorrow is calling and we have convinced Adam Bristow to ride with us so we have someone who knows animals! Bodies are tired and today in one of my energy lows I was trying to work out why I am so tired but after a bit of brain gym realised we cycled 52 hours last week and are on 42hours so far this week......A reasonable reason to have the odd energy crash! Sleep tight everyone we will send you an update from Tuli Love Linda
Posted on: Sun, 20 Jul 2014 07:37:20 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015