NIPPLES 4

The stargazing town of Sutherland recedes in the mirrors as the technology customers with their navigation devices lead us luddites to the next landmark.
 
Matjiesfontein (“MY-kiss-fontane”; literally, “Little Friends’ Fountain”) is a magic show that materialises out of the Karoo like a rabbit from a conjurer’s hat. The quintessentially British-Colonial Lord Miler Hotel is the high point of the village. 


British colonialism in the Karoo: The Lord Milner, Matjiesfontein. The penguin suit is an opportunistic, but colourful, tour guide. 






Nice place to stop for some hot refreshment in on a winter Karoo ride.




Divvy by ten and you get the AU$ price.

Tea and scones in a very quaint tea shop, followed by a hotel visit with a very colourful guide. His mother, he claims in his harsh regional accent (“exxent”), was the tea girl (verbatim) when one Mrs Elizabeth Windsor, accompanied by husband Phillip, visited the hotel in 1948.

The guide knows how to spin a yarn. After telling the tale of each room open to the public, he produces a grainy colour photo of a posing guest. Behind the guest, in the photo, is the semi-translucent form of, supposedly, Lady Milner. It seems ghost stories are grist to the tourism mill. Again, it could be genuine; you be the judge.

The guide ushers us to the bar, where he takes a seat behind the honky-tonk and begins turning out tunes, accompanied by gravelly singing. His hat is perched strategically atop the honky-tonk. We’re too impressed by his act to say no. For a few minutes’ work he earns the per-hour rate of an attorney as the hat fills up. Each blue banknote, equating to AU$ 10, earns a gravelly “Thenks, Six-Peck” from the host. Good job, mate.
 
Touws’ (rhyming with “dose”) River is accessed via a pass that will have any red-blooded rider in combat mode. Tighter than a duck’s orifice, many a bend in this pass is best entered in either second, or even a fast-revving first, before clicking up a gear and blasting forward to the next hairpin. The adventure bikes with their 21 inch front wheels are tackling this with the same aplomb as the road bikes with their 17-inch fronts. I am impressed.
 
As the road reaches a T junction, trip leader Clive’s Tiger 800 comes to an abrupt halt, gushing petrol. A fuel line pulled loose. Being injected, the system is pressurised by an electric pump. When the ignition is on, fuel is being pumped onto the road.
 
I’m about to open my soft pannier and fish around in my technical goodies bag to see what I have that might be useful. Clive, who has travelled far and wide, isn’t fazed. A multi tool and a few zip ties (cable ties) later, he is ready to roll. I am becoming more and more impressed with this group.
 
The Tiger, running normally once again, leads the pack to the touristy R62.
 
Per my Jan 2020 Plettenberg Bay solitaire icebreaker posts, Ronnie’s Sex Shop is a must.


 Ronnie's Sex Shop, the bikers' roadside pub in the Karoo

Ronnie’s Sex Shop isn’t a sex shop. It’s a roadside pub. Such is the culture in South Africa a rider will pull into a roadside pub, down one or more alcoholic drinks, and then remount and ride. No biker worth his salt will admit he hasn’t stopped at Ronnie’s Sex Shop for a drink. The menu includes milkshakes with a shot of rum or whisky. I go for banana and rum. There are eats on the menu too, to justify the hydraulic offerings.

I do try resisting politics (You do? – Ed), but it’s important to know something if you’re visiting, or reading about, this country. SA was formed by uniting four territories – the Cape Colony, the Orange Free State (after the Dutch province of Orange, and free of Britain), the Transvaal (“Across the Bleak River”) and Natal, into a union, and subsequently, a republic. These were the four provinces – Transvaal, Cape Province, Natal and Orange Free State – and each had its own discernible culture. The current misgovernment split this lot into none smaller provinces, for gerrymandering purposes only. Eight of the nine provinces are (mis)governed by the current Parliamentary circus. One alone, the Western Cape, is governed by the opposition, and the Western Cape is like a country apart. It is well run, it is clean, and things work. No Johannesburger visiting the Western Cape can escape the feeling s/he has been living in the wrong part of the country.
 
Barrydale, like Worcester and Wellington, is a jewel. These Western Cape towns nestle in the Little Karoo among wine and fruit farms. We ride through them with envy. It’s getting cold, though, and we roll into our destination for the night: Cape Agulhas. You and I say “Agullis”. Before the Dutch, however, the Portuguese were the firs to map this coastline, and the southernmost Cape’s name is correctly pronounced “a-GULL-yus”. Cape Agulhas is the southernmost point of the African continent. If you’re gazing out to sea, on your right is the Atlantic Ocean; on your left is the Indian. (No curried fish jokes – Ed.) Cape Agulhas is where the two oceans meet. (Local winery Bergkelder [Mountain Cellar] took advantage of this to name its cabernet-merlot blend Two Oceans. If anyone from Bergkelder is reading this, I could do with a complimentary supply for giving your product a plug.)
 
At Cape Agulhas we are joined by two new-to-me, old-to-all-others acquaintances who, upon retirement, quit ghastly Johannesburg and semigrated to the gorgeous Garden Route. Alan rides a BMW F900 GS. Chris rides a Honda Africa Twin 1100.

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AFRICA TWIN MUSINGS – Skip if you’re not interested in adventure bikes
 
I eye adventure bikes the way a teenager eyes tight skirts, and find Chris’ Africa Twin a particularly appealing specimen.
 
The original 650 and 750 V-Twin Africa Twins of the nineties were capable on the soft stuff, but glacially slow on tar. My recently-deceased friend Dirk, whose funeral I was returning from when I got hit-and-runned a few weeks ago, had the Africa Twin 1000, and it looked awesome. Dirk said the new one would be an improvement over his. Me, I’d be quite happy with one like his.
 
Some of the lads on this trip seem not too concerned about cost, but as a recovering bankruptaholic I am cost conscious. When I read the write-ups it’s not to soak up the marketing gaff about next year’s model being 12,5% better than last year’s, but to see if there’s anything I can afford that will do the job. If an 1100 buyer unloads his 1000 cheaply, that’s my hunting ground.
 
Question: Where does that leave the Bandit?
 
Answer: I hope to add a budget-priced adventure bike to my garage. If an adventure bike deal meant sacrificing the Bandit, however, I don’t see it happening. As little as I ride, I don’t see myself parting with the Bandit.  
 
Instead, I’ve got ideas about old-generation adventure bikes. My aim is to brag how great I am on tar on Bandit forums, and how great I am on dirt in Adventure forums.

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Cape Agulhas marks the culinary highlight of the trip, but what will interest you more is the southernmost point of the southernmost point of Africa.
 
A pebbly gravel road, not exactly the Bandit’s cuppa, leads to a clearing where a zanily twisting duckwalk takes you to a 20-metre-long relief map of Africa on the ground, and a plinth with a plaque and a line. This plinth marks the southernmost point of Africa. Stand with one foot on each side of the line, and you have one foot on the shore of the Atlantic Ocean, and the other on the shore of the Indian.


The southernmost, and coldest, Bandit rider in Africa.





One foot on the shore of the Atlantic; the other on the shore of the Indian.


 Crossing Africa on foot.


Departing the Cape Agulhas clearing up the pebbly gravel road, the group, now consisting of 9, stops for a breakfast I should tell you about just to make you envious, then sets course for Mossel Bay.
 
Mossel Bay is a very historic port in SA. The Post Office Tree in Mossel Bay (Mossel being Dutch, and therefore Afrikaans, for Mussel) is exactly what its name says; it is the oldest post office in the four states that became South Africa. Of the state of the SA Post Office today, the less said the better. I ordered a trim part for the Bandit on E-Bay and it seemed never to arrive. I claimed, and received, a refund. A month after, the item arrived. The SA Post Office had been on strike. It’s hard to tell when they’re not. (You and your #### politics – Ed.)
 
To get from Cape Agulhas to Mossel Bay you ride the Outeniqua Pass. The Outeniqua is one of those passes that make riding a motorcycle the next best thing to being a stunt pilot.
 
But a small problem arises. Thanks to Tall Paul on his BMW, it remains a small one. We stop for gas. Tall Paul’s analytical eye scans the Bandit, and spots a nail in the rear tyre.
 
A generation ago, this would have spelt a major problem, if not disaster. Tubes are balloons. Prick a balloon and it pops. Ditto a tube. Technology advances, and the tube is dispensed with. Both, tyre and rim, evolve to do what a tube hitherto did. The nail no longer pops the tyre. In fact, it almost – almost – serves as its own repair plug.
 
Knowing from experience there will be a gradual pressure loss, I stop at every garage to ram the tyre pressure up to 3,5 bar. At each stop the pressure shows a drop to the early twos. Thus, by a series of pump-and-ride relays, I manage without difficulty.
 
Every now and then on the road, Tall Paul closes the gap between us, visually checks my tyre, gives me a thumbs-up, and again allows daylight to open up between Bandit and BMW.   
 
The line of bikes arrives in Mossel Bay and parks on the lot outside a neat little hotel. On the lot, a once-good-looking chick with a smoker’s voice approaches us, asking for money. Drugs pervade society at all levels, as this unfortunate evidences.  
 
We cart our stuff into the hotel. No road trip write up would be complete without expounding on the gastronomic, drink-onomic and scenery-nomic wonders of the trip, so have your envy glands on battle alert.
 
Next, I’ll tell you about a full day of riding passes and Garden Route sightseeing.
 
Regards
Stan L
South Africa