So we ended up back in S.A. leaving landlocked Lesotho...
26th May
Lesotho was nice 'n all but the mental mountain passes were getting a bit boring. i took the executive decision to get up at 5:30am and push on back to South Africa and swap a couple of days there for a couple in Swaziland. I forgot we were a couple of k's up in the early days of winter. The mental mountain passes avec ice and a rising sun that was horizontal to the driver's line of sight were the main problems plus a 1500m descent cooking the brakes. Not much fun. We made it back to South Africa and stopped in a town called Clarins which was how Franschoek probably was 20 years ago. Loads of independent restaurants and traders in an old Boer war town - really nice. We randomly bought a jar of homemade Rhubarb jam. We pushed on to Ladysmith a famous Boer war town and looked for a restaurant.
It proved a problem. There wasn't a single one listed on dining-out.co.za or eatout.co.za so we checked the GPS. There were six. KFC, Chicken Licken, Nando's, Got Chicken, Chicken Fantastic and Robin Hood Restaurant. Not in the mood for poultry we drove to the Robin Hood Restaurant. We refueled the car there as it was a Caltex garage and skipped the food. Went back to our lodge and slept.
FROM JO: Ladysmith may well be the biggest toilet I have ever had the misfortune to visit. When we did the GPS search I looked for "all entertainment" which covers anything from bars, to cinemas, to bowling alleys. The nearest it found was 31.4 kms away. Now, I am the first to admit that our Garmin is crap but I think in this case it may have been correct.
On that subject. If anyone is planning a trip in Southern Africa - sell the Garmin and buy a Tom Tom. Garmin gets lost everywhere - when we were driving to Cape Aghulas it said we were in the sea. It cannot even get big tourist spots right. The Tom Tom we had on the last trip knew every little track even in the middle of the Kalahari Central Reserve.
27th May
Having decided to leave South Africa for months and being terminally disorganised we both had loads of paperwork and stuff to do before we left so we headed off to a Postnet office centre for a couple of hours to do applications and cancelations and obviously instruct attorneys to issue letters of demand for monies outstanding having lived in Cape Town for more than ten minutes. This done I finally found a Tilly/Colman style pressure lamp that I'd been hunting for in every camping/antiques store for the 3500km of the trip so far. Jo was overwhelmed with joy - no more random stopping at stores - we could ditch the large electric lantern she hates - until I told her there was now a search for fuel and parts and much tinkering to be had. We drove on to Ermelo, close to the Swazi border and tried to stay awake for the Champions League Final which we managed. I got a bit stroppy when the nutty manager tried to tell us he was closing the bar at 10pm - at about half time. He intimated to Jo that if I asked him very nicely he would demure and keep it open 'til the game finished. So I had a big argument with him instead and he kept it open but didn't serve me a drink. Ah well, the row was fun.
28th May
We bought a new battery and charger for the camera because I'd left it in the lodge in Ladysmith - we were never going back there so better for all concerned we got a new one and headed off for Swazi...