Skinny Legs a.k.a Sickboy came very close to turning back to Brosterlea today, his stomach issues were particularly bad in the early hours before sunrise. But fortunately he didn't.
The roads were quite muddy and rutted which made the riding harder than it should have been. We both got covered in mud and were stopping to rinse off in streams along the way.
After a quick snack stop at Romansfontein, we scuttled up the back of Aasvoelberg and then held on tight for the wild ride down the other side. He complained of needing new arms after that, I was glad we made it down in one piece.
We pedalled on to Hofmeyr, with a fresh breeze from the front making a it a challenge to get to the pie shop before closing time. The wind switched off suddenly and we arrived with time to spare. The pies looked good but Skinny's stomach pulled rank and he settled for milk.
Onwards to Elandsberg... Got to the start in good time but things went south from there. He couldn't find the first track so started walking along a fence line. This worked well but was slow. The second track is the crux but here he got it wrong - he did find a track but it turned out to be the wrong one which dropped into a valley. So we walked back out to try and find the right track but after stumbling around in the darkness for over an hour, I was informed that we would be camping out!
He cleared an area under a small tree and put some grass down for warmth. On went the extra clothing layers and waterproofs and out came the space blanket. Everthing was great until the wind picked up in the early hours - it grabbed at the space blanket and pretty soon it was getting ripped to shreds on the surrounding thorns. The last few hours before sunrise were cold.
Amazingly, we were camped less than 100m from the right track, so once packed up, we strolled down to said track and rolled off to Elandsberg for breakfast.
Tell Skinnylegs that you'd like to stop off and greet a long lost member of your extended Niner tribe in Prince Albert.
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