[Editor’s note: The latest installment in Coach Larry’s series of dispatches from South Africa]
Now it’s Saturday the 19th and we finally get in the rental around 9:30 am. A friend has assured us the highways have European motorway quality. Not the route we used on the N17 and N2. Multiple sections over 100 km either have severe pothole warnings or are down to one alternating lane due to reconstruction. Our promised 6.5 to 7 hour drive has reached that, but we remain a solid 2 hours away. We switch drivers to handle dusk and dark, and the GPS steadies my uncertain hand at the wheel. We reach our lodge, make one last wrong turn, and finally pull up in front of the main house.
We fill the next four days with hosted game drives, boats, and walks. Ahh, actual warmth, winter here far more pleasant than on the Cape or in the highlands. The new camera with 70-300mm zoom lens proves its worth. Spectacular sights of all the animals,
first in the distance, then closer, until, finally, you practically have a chance to ride a zebra. Oh, and all for just the two us most of the time. The area soon to become a new Big Five park, once they complete the new roads and roll back the eucalytus forests of the paper producers. The largest area of vegetated sand dunes in the world should recover nicely over the next 10 years, especially if the decade long drought can come to an end.
What about the soccer you ask? Well each day’s activities finish, conveniently, before the afternoon kickoffs of the simultaneous third matches for every team. Our hosts join us in the lounge as we all root on the Bafana Bafana, hoping somehow they will pull of the miracle. The next day they add to our celebration as Donovan slides joyously toward that corner flag. We still see all of the action, enhanced by nightly visits by hippos and a buffalo named Reggie to the lodge’s watering hole.
Finally, we depart, return to the N2 heading south, and arrive in Durban.
Sometimes seats above the roofline are a good thing. But, first, let’s rewind a bit. Winter found its rhythm today, managing sun, wind, rain,and hail, rotated nicely about every hour til the sun went down. The other three left him behind without missing a beat.
Weather is terrible. Bought gloves and a hat, but off we go.
Obviously, there was no way anyone could expect SA to keep up that pace. Needless to say, by morning, the hangover was in full effect, and there was hardly a vuvuzela to be heard before 10. The actual onset of winter weather (for here) has not helped, creating an extremely gray day. At the fanfest for the Arg/Nig first half, the crowd split fairly evenly, Messi v Africa, but far more of black South Africa participated than in the bars in around Long St.