Day 12: Fishing on the Sabie River

Friday 7th August 2009

This was our last full day in South Africa, and I was allowed to spend it fishing while Harriet and Izzi pottered around the town. Fly fishing is very popular in that part of the world, and there was an excellent shop in the town where I spent a long time (and many Rands) finding out about it. There was no problem in hiring the necessary tackle, as I hadn't brought anything with me.

I became a temporary member of the Sabie Fly Fishing Club, which owned the rights to a 5km stretch of the Sabie "River". Not much of a river - more of a small stream - mostly overgrown, and overlooked by a huge plantation and saw mill.



Not the most attractive of locations, but it was fun to relax a bit and have a day on my own. The fishing was slow - I managed a couple of small rainbows - but that didn't matter. What was more of a problem was the mud, which had to be traversed in less than ideal footwear.



Given that we had a longish drive to Nelspruit ahead of us, Harriet phoned me about 2:45 to say that my time was up. Reluctantly I headed back to the tackle shop to drop off the items I'd borrowed, and then we drove south towards our final destination for the holiday: the Hawkshead Holiday Camp, about 15km out of Nelspruit. The cottage there was fine, except the whole area was incredibly noisy due to its proximity to a motorway, the N14.

We attempted to get some food at the local shops, but gave up very quickly since they turned out to be a petrol station and a rather seedy looking liquor store. We then did what seemed a good idea at the time: namely to drive into Nelspruit to find a Nandos, or equivalent. Big mistake! The driving was incredibly hairy as there is no central reservation on South African motorways and the local inhabitants seemed ambivalent as to which side of the road they should drive on. In the end we gave up looking for a restaurant, opting instead for a Super-Spar where we bought food to cook back at the cottage. The last braai of the holiday was a bit hit and miss, owing to the fact that the outside light was broken. Come to think of it, the bedroom light was broken too, along with several other things in the cottage. All in all, fairly typical of South African accommodation!

Day 11: Sabie, Blyde River Canyon and Pilgrim's Rest

Thursday 6th August 2009

After driving the whole of the previous day, we decided to take things relatively easy and just potter around the local tourist attractions. As always I was up early, so I wandered around the Jock Sabie Lodge grounds until the others woke up. Like many residential areas in South Africa, the Lodge was pretty well fortified, being surrounded by tall railings and an electrified fence. There was also a single entrance with a motorised gate which was guarded 24 hours a day.



First stop on our sightseeing tour was God's Window (the South Africans are not known for their modesty when it comes to naming interesting locations). The "Window" was actually a lookout at the top of a hill which had spectacular views into the Blyde River Canyon below. Given the altitude and topology, the top of the hill is shrouded in cloud for some of each day, so supports what amounts to a tropical rainforest vegetation. On the day we visited the view was rather hazy, but it was impressive nevertheless. It's difficult to get a sense of scale, even with Harriet in the picture.



Once we'd finished looking through God's Windows, we moved on to another place with an understated name: Wonder View. Again it was very hazy, but the rolling hills receding into the distance were very impressive. It's lucky we were there in the middle of the day, as apparently the view disappears at 17:00...



Our third and final natural wonder of the day was the rather more subtly named Berlin Falls, which were less impressive than they could have been owing to the lack of water (it was the middle of the dry season, after all). Much more interesting was the market which was set up in the car park.





There's only so many natural wonders it's possible to take in, and by this point we were all getting tired and hungry. We decided to go to a place not far away called Pilgrim's Rest, which was an old mining town. It's been restored as a tourist attraction, and unsuprisingly had lots of items available for sale. One of the most interesting was a chap making life-sized sheep out of wire and beads. On closer inspection it was clear he was in a world of his own, listening to whatever was playing on his iPod.



Hopefully nobody will want to use the Post Office in Pilgrim's Rest, however, as it didn't seem to be terribly up-to-date...



Other highlights were a dancing boiler suit (which turned out to contain a boy aged about 10) and a couple of Zulu women who were sitting under an awning making bead work. The invited Harriet to have her picture taken with them, and then charged 5 Rand for the privilege.



By this time we were touristed out, and decided to go back to Sabie. Unfortunately we had to pay a "ransom" to get our car back, as apparently we'd parked in an area which guaranteed it would get washed. We had to do some surreptitious research to find out what the going rate for a car wash...

Back at Jock Sabie Lodge, Izzi went in search of an internet cafe while Harriet and I did some shopping. Back at the Lodge, Harriet read a book, Izzi plonked herself in front of the television and I wander around taking photographs as the sun set. Then it was another braai (fillet steak and Boerwors) followed by an early night.

Day 10: Punda Maria to Sabie

Wednesday 5th August 2009

Having tried (and failed) to get a good sighting of lion, and knowing that a pride had been spotted in the area the previous day, Harriet and I decided that it was worth one last shot before leaving the park. We set off as soon as the gates opened, just as the sun was coming up, and drove around the loop close to the camp. Despite going very slowly in both directions, there was still no sign of the elusive lions. Quite a lot of other game, though, including: a lilac-breasted roller on its roost, kudu, mongoose and a herd of impala, some of whom were rutting.





Resigned to the fact that we'd need to return to the park another year in order to see any big cats, we packed up our stuff from the bungalow and went to the restaurant for a hearty breakfast. Since we were sitting virtually under a "sausage fruit" tree (only this time without any warning signs) it seemed like a good idea to take a picture of them for future reference. We then filled up the car with fuel and headed slowly for the Punda Maria gate.




Once outside the park it soon became clear that life was very different: exclusively black, as far as we could see, and obviously very poor. Domestic cattle wandered across the equivalent of a trunk road, and the rondavel dwellings were built out of necessity rather than as a quaint attraction for the (predominantly white) visitors.




The road then turned South through a flat, dusty and featureless landscape. This went on for mile after mile, so luckily Izzi had brought a very long Harry Potter book to keep her occupied: a good job, as there was very little to see out of the window.

In the early afternoon the landscape began to change into one which was obviously more prosperous and heavily farmed (i.e. white). The majority of the plantations were citrus fruit - mainly oranges, which were being carried around by the lorry-load. There were also lots of small, private game reserves which bordered onto Kruger Park. One of the local road signs indicated the kind of hazards to expect in this neck of the woods...



Gradually, out of the haze, a range of hills appeared in the distance - insignificant at first, but more and more impressive the closer we got to them.




The ascent was steep and spectacular, with impressive drops at the sides of the road. Half way up there were a set of stalls where the local women were selling cloth, bowls, carvings and the like, so we stopped to buy a few items. It was extremely hot with lots of flies, so we made our purchases and got back into the air conditioned car! When we reached the "summit", there was a natural expectation that we would, somehow, go down the other side. Well, there wasn't another side: just a huge plateau covered in patches of bright emerald green, which looked a bit like astroturf compared to the dry and dusty surroundings! We had arrived at the start of the Mpumalanga Panorama Route.



The landscape became more wooded with pine plantations as we got further South, and significantly hillier too. We soon encountered evidence of logging activity, and saw several huge articulated trucks carrying tree trunks. I have no pictures of this part of the journey as I was busy driving the whole time and there was nowhere to stop.

Eventually we arrived in the town of Sabie, and checked into the Jock Sabie Lodge - the South African equivalent of a motel. There were a set of bungalows in an enclosure (protected by barbed wire and an electric fence) around a garden and communal braai. Our bungalow was well equipped, but - in true South African style - only some of the items worked, and then only sporadically.



Being tired and hungry, we then went in search of food (and, in Izzi's case, an internet cafe). Harriet also found a fly fishing shop for me, and we arranged for me to hire some equipment in a couple of days' time so that I could try the local river. The food and drink was purchased from a large, modern SPAR, including beef steak and "Boerwors", the local spicy sausage. After our day-long drive, we simply collapsed in the evening and had a relatively early night.