Ceres - Northern Cape - North West Province - Gauteng - Kruger National Park - July 2010
You can download the zipped Garmin gdb file here
Garmin Route: "18 Bergsig Street to 1065 Homestead
Avenue"
Day 1
Ceres
Sutherland - Still snow on top of
Verlatekloof Pass
Fraserburg
The place was abuzz
The Speedo Ice Swim to take place next day.
6 veterans will swim 1 mile in the local dam.
22 swimmers will swim 600m.
Brrrrr!
Town clean and attractive - looks like they are trying to make something
of the town.
Loxton
Stayed over at the Jakhalsdans Guest House (053 381 3005 / 082 875 3339
- Linda van der Westhuizen).
They have tame zebras, kudus and donkeys.
Had the whole house to ourselves.
Met up with Liesel Lund from Beaufort West and stayed the weekend.
Great stay - highly recommended.
Loxton DR Church
Loxton is quaint and clean.
No petrol / diesel after 12h00 on Saturday.
All shops also close 12h00.
We met no cars on the road all the way from Ceres to Loxton.
All roads from Ceres in good to reasonable condition.
Be careful after rains, though.
Day 2
Loxton
Vosburg via Linger Longer & Pampoenpoort -
again no vehicles on the road.
There are some lovely dolerite koppies before Linger Longer (see Garmin
File).
Good gravel all they way.
Prieska
Destroyed my first tyre on this section. The road did not look too bad.
Tried to fix with 5 plugs, but there were just too many holes.
Since this was a Sunday we managed to contact Hi-Q Tyres in Prieska
(082 823 9950).
They put in a tube, but no gator as I discovered later, when I saw the
tube creating a bump in the surface of the tyre.
There was also a small leak in the tube, which I only found out later.
The last 15km section up to Lemoenpoort could be a problem after rains.
Douglas
The people at Hi-Q told us not to take the gravel road following the
northern bank of the Orange River, since punctures would be guaranteed
and we decided to use the tar road to Douglas, where we met the first
car since leaving Ceres.
Stayed over at Rene's Guest House - also recommended.
There are no places to eat on a Sunday, but Rene let us use her kitchen.
Drove to the confluence of the Vaal and Orange Rivers (see the track and
waypoint on the Garmin file).
Douglas is not a very clean place and there are signs of decay.
Bought some nice wine at the local cellar (Landzicht).
Day 3
Douglas
Schmidtsdrif - road works and shacks - not
nice - half on poor gravel road - puncture a distinct possibility.
Popped in at Delportshoop - not a pretty
sight - dirty Africa town.
Good tar starts again at Spitskop.
Jan Kempdorp - only claim to fame - the
border between the Northern Cape and the North West Province runs right
through it.
Schweizer Reneke
The only highlight from Jan Kempdorp was the very deserted D166 gravel
road. We met no traffic.
The Wentzel Dam Holiday Resort is completely destroyed - stay away from
it.
Glaudina
For some reason
I had great hopes for this place whilst planning the trip.
Also to be avoided, although the traffic-less gravel roads to get there
are appealing.
Ottosdal
The D1141 between Glaudina and Ottosdal is in a bad condition.
Again we had no traffic, but punctures are a distinct possiblity again.
Ottosdal was a bit of a surprise - there were people cleaning up the roads
and sidewalks.
We stayed at the excellent Ouplaas Guest House (www.wheretostay.co.za/ouplaas).
They have a house in town and accommodation on the farm Ouplaas, 15km
from Ottosdal, where we stayed.
On arrival we were shown to our room by George, who wore white gloves.
Very grand and stylish, all in all. Highly recommended. (see Garmin file
for location).
Geluk - there is a church and a shop (closed when we were there)
Coligny
Derby
Magaliesberg (see Waypoints Aa, Ab, Turn South... & Ad)
Without warning, we found ourselves on a very poor wide gravel road
going high up into the Magaliesberg. I had to use 4x4 later to get over
the top and down the other side.
Do not attempt this road in a sedan or a bakkie without diff-lock.
Melanie's house in Alen's Neck, Johannesburg. This finishes the first
part of our trip.
Total distance travelled ±1500km of which ±900km was gravel.
The next section was Johannesburg to the Kruger National Park via
national roads.
We stayed at the Oribi Mountain Lodge in
Schoemanskloof.
The map which we were supplied with confused us and the GPS co-ordinates
we were given confused our 3 GPS's.
In the end we got there (see the relevant Garmin tracks).
The longer route goes through forest area. I do not know whether we
travelled this route illegally or not, but it was quite exciting since I
wrote off another tyre on this section.
I can really recommend this place. Although close to the N4 (±3km), one
does not have direct access to it.
There is accommodation in a main house (sleeps 6) plus some other wooden
buildings. All in all 30 people can stay there.
Put aside 2 or 3 days to take it all in.
The place has to be pre-booked - the owners live in Pretoria.
In Nelspruit I replaced two of my Cooper Discoverer ATR's with 2
BFGoodrich All-Terrain A/T's.
The Coopers have been the worst tyres, as far as punctures are
concerned, in the ±1 million km's I have driven over the last 40 years.
This is the first time I have used BFGoodrich's and my next few trips
into the Tanqua Karoo will determine whether they are any better.
In the Kruger National Park we stayed at the Maroela, Balule & Malelane
Satellite camps.
Maroela & Balule are very nice.
We were lucky too see some of the following during the 800km we
travelled in the Park:
The
Malelane camp is too close to the town, although an elephant came right up to
our fence.
One can hear traffic along the N4.
Also, there is lots of smoke and noise from the nearby sugar cane factories.
This was our first real introduction to the KNP and we have decided to
come back in 2012 for 3 - 4 weeks and do the whole park South to North.
The route to get there will hopefully be "Ceres to Malelane - the long
way" - see Garmin route - probably 70% gravel.
South Africa can be proud of the park.
We found the general conditions of facilities good.
We decided to take the quickest way home from Malelane but I did not
want to go home via stinking Gauteng and decided to go via the Free
State, in particular via the small town of Memel, my son-in-law's
birthplace.
The road from Memel to the S67 (see the relevant Garmin track) is probably one of the
worst roads in South Africa and the roads in Mozambique came to mind.
Certain stretches are downright dangerous and the road builders seem to
be idiots.
I would not want to drive there if it rains.
Funny thing though was that the first 3 vehicles I encountered on this
road were Land Cruiser bakkies. Obviously needed for this very sh..ty
road.
Lots of road works up to Bethlehem. Wasted probably ±1,5 hours waiting.
At Bethlehem we stayed at The Royal Terrace Lodge (058 303 9335). Great place
with 22 rooms.
Had to let down my tyres to get into their garage. Vehicles with roof
racks will have problems. Enquire about availability of secure parking
before paying.
Had a good meal at Nix B & B & Pub - this place was really humming.
Wonderful atmosphere.
Bethlehem to Beaufort West to Ceres - more road works held us up.
Total trip 4520km, of which ±1100km gravel, in 2 weeks.