There have been no responses for anybody to join me to East London. However my father has been itching to take his first long ride. So I have changed my mind. I do not have many years left with my father. Thus I have decided to take to a shorter trip from Johannesburg to Richards bay via St Lucia Natal South Africa. This will be done at my fathers pace and we plan on doing about 50 to 60 km a day. Thus giving us time to rest and enjoy some time together. He is in his mid 70’s and not a spring chicken anymore.
Anybody who wishes to join us is welcome. This my be in the range of more people. We will be camping wild and stopping at some nature reserves. Then ending with some swimming in the Indian ocean. My father is an avid bird watcher so he will want to stop and look at birds.
Departure from my house will be on 12 December and will meet my father at my sister’s house at Balmoral on the 13 December. From there we will hit the road together and head east. Doing a mix of sand and tar roads. We will be avoiding all major routes to keep out of the traffic. Plan to bus it back to Johannesburg on 27 December. Once I have done more planing I will post it on my Next trip page.
Took a training ride to Vaalwater this past weekend. The aim was to ride hills on tar roads to get fit for the Momentum 94.7 cycle challenge. On top of it was to do a two stage ride. To make sure I am getting fit enough for my December adventure to East London. I covered a distance of 209 km for the weekend.
Left at 09H45 on Saturday and stopped for lunch at Nylstroom (Modimolle). From my house to Nylstroom there are no hills.
From Nylstroom to Vaalwater is in the Waterburg hills. Must admit they are big for me but will be small for those of you that are riding in Europe or in Natal. Must be getting fit as the hills did not seem as big as I remember from the previous time I did this route.
The road climbs up out of Nylstroom in steps leaving the Springbok flats behind in the distance. The hills are fenced with game fencing. From time to time you can catch a glimpse of Impala, Kudu, Nyala, Vervet monkey, Baboon,Wildebeest or a cow. The scenery then opens out to grasslands and crop lands. As you start to descend again into the next valley the peach orchards begin. Peaches are now in season and can be bought along the road at small stalls. Not to mention all the Sekelbos wood been sold for camp fires or braai (barbecue). After this there is a goat farm that has a restaurant and makes goat cheese. This would be a nice little outing for the family.
To climb out of this valley is the steepest part of the ride. After passing some game farms comes the monster climb. On the way back home I had to make some noises to chase the Baboons off the road, as I was freewheeling and reached a speed of 65 km/h. It would have caused a terrible accident if I had hit one of them. My heart rate monitor started to beep as I was not peddling down the hill. To the mother baboons in the trees this was terrifying. They just dropped out of the trees baby and all. Their feet were running in the air, so when they hit the ground they hit it running. Fortunately the up hill is not to long in the direction of Vaalwater and then you are rewarded with a nice long down hill to Vaalwater.
First time I went to Vaalwater I had all these romantic ideas of a town surrounded by game farms and pumping with tourists. Well it has some game farms around it. It has a grain silo and a rundown town centre. This town centre could have come out of some middle African town. The buildings are in need of paint the roads are very fill of potholes. There are street vendors selling vegetables. Must say some of the nicest tomatoes I have seen in a long time. Signs everywhere to sell biltong (beef jerky). There are any type of biltong, starting at beef all the way to Eland.
I camped at a small lodge come camp site tucked away behind the sports bar. The sports bar is a nice neat restaurant come bar that serves very nice pizzas or steaks. Their salads are nice and crisp. They say there are two other places to eat in town. I have not tried them. The local farmers sometime come with their wives and children to eat out. Open people if you start to talk to them. They will enjoy a chat with you. Note big topics are the weather, rugby, crop farming and game farming.
Word of warning there is a night club where the local blacks like to hang out. This place has the music up loud and goes all night. Almost until the sun comes up on Sunday. Then there is the busy road that runs through the centre of town. This is one of the main routes to the mining and game farming towns to the west of Vaalwater. So any place you choose to stay at in town will have the back ground noise of the road and night club. The town’s name is also Vaalwater which means unclear water. This means the water source is caring a high particle load and the local municipality can not clean it up so good. Do not think it will harm you but bottled water tastes much better.
Left Sunday at 7H00 and was home by 11H30. Much more down hills on the way back. Early riding is best as it is cooler. For example on Saturday it went to 35 degrees on my cycle computer just before getting into Vaalwater.
I am registered to ride the Momentum 94.7 cycle challenge in a few weeks. Using it as a motivation to get fit before my next trip from Johannesburg to East London South Africa.The Momentum 94.7 cycle challenge is a very popular race in Johannesburg. It draws the serious riders and those just out for a day’s outing. This is one way to see Johannesburg and get the right of way at the traffic lights.
Planning on riding with my mountain bike. So do not expecting a very good time. Time should be better than the Cape Argus earlier this year. See they have renamed it for this coming year, it is now Cape Town Cycle Tour.
If any body wants to link up with me to chat about my cycling adventures. I am riding in group K and my number is 9743. Will probably ride with my pannier rake on without panniers. My bike is a titan. Most likely will be riding in different kit to what I am in on the photo. Other wise drop me a tweet on @kennyfagan.
Not many sons can say that their Dad is their best friend. When I was a teenager we used to do training runs together. In those years he and I built a house from scratch. We stood shoulder by shoulder and laid bricks. This gave us time to talk about all sorts of things.
At the age of 40 he started running to keep fit. He went on to complete three Comrades marathons. This is a world renowned ultra marathon. He got three medals: one silver and two bronze. He kept running to keep himself fit until the age of 70. Where upon his circulation prohibited him from running. This forcing him to start walking. Last November (7 months back) I gave him my bicycle that I rode in Zimbabwe and Mozambique with. Then he could just ride 2.5 km. This week he came to visit and rode a 21 km gravel road with an average of 13 km/h at the age of 75. So nice to be sharing a sport with my Dad again.
Have started a new page on my blog for next trip in December 2014. I am looking for companions to ride with me from Johannesburg to East London (Settlers country). I will be adding more details of the tour from time to time. So keep an eye on this page and send me comments if you are interested in joining me.
Thought to do a few long day rides this long weekend. So off I cycled to Nylstroom and purchased some slime, knowing my back wheel was dry. Using some insulation tap strapped it to my carrier. Next stop was the biltong shop (beef jerky shop) to make sure the stomach had something to work on. Planning to ride for a full day with no stop for lunch. Then a little extra water just to fill up the water used to ride to Nylstroom.
I love the signs I find along the road. Take a look at this. Every winter there is run away fires that are very difficult to stop in these mountains. They sometimes burn for days. Normally fanned by a strong wind. They often burn down game lodges and farm houses. Not easy to get into the hills with fire fighting vehicles so they have to fight on foot. Due to the trees and wind these types of fires are best put out by fire fighting vehicles and helicopters. However cost of helicopters is prohibitive.
There were some nice climbs with some good solid gravel. I can see in the rainy season the road gets washed away in places. May get a little slippery. So if you want to try the Nyl zen oog road winter would probably be better.
Interesting to watch the farms and lodges along this road. Most farms were small and can be seen that their economic viability has been pushed to the limit. Most turning to a mix of guest farms and agricultural practices. Others going all the way over to game farming. These tending to be up on the hills where irrigation water is limiting.
Coming near the top of the mountains my water started to get low. I thought to get some water from the streams. As water is seeping straight from the mountains. At every stream I thought no let’s get at the next. To bad as at the top of the hill there was no nice clean streams to drink from. The top of the hills opened up to open cattle country. The road became very sandy with big corrugations making going very slow. Just had to ration water and eat some biltong to get the mouth wet.
Came across the main water supply dam for the town of Nylstroom. What a nice deep body of water between the hills. Having steep cliffs coming up to wall it in.
Name of dam is Donkerpoort.
Round about here the bicycle wheel bearing started to give the same feeling as two weeks back. That time one ball bearing had worn flat on one side and had to be replaced. Put wheels back together after greasing them and all looked good until now. Estimated to be about 60 km from home so had a look and decided that I could not do much. Wind had come up and fortunately turning to ward home it helped. Knowing the condition of the bearing I set out on the tar road home from Nylstroom. Making it 132 km for the day with average speed 19.6 km/h.
Stripping wheel down at home found the axil cone has developed some rough spots. Will have to make a trip to town, to get some spares. Looks like Jimmy cycles is seen a lot of me lately.
This weekend rode bicycle into Nylstroom and did some business. After which I took the Vaalwater road. Just out of town I found this new sign.
This touches my heart as I am a farmer and people do not know what goes into putting a plate of food on the table. Some way down the road I took a right turn at this sign.
Not more than 2 km a right at the next sign.
Now at this corner stood a herd of cattle that were crossed with an indigenous breed called Inguni. I see the owner has chosen not to burn the horns. There was a study done which found animals with horns could handle more heat than those with out. As the horn acts as a type of radiator for the blood. That is also why they stopped cutting off Rhino horns to prevent poaching. However due to the number been poached they had to resort to removing them again.
This road had a good surface but after some way it became very sandy and corrugated. At one point there was a steep down hill which I used to my advantage but due to the rough surface it felt like I damaged my front wheel bearings. The down hill in the distance is what damaged the bearings.
Passed some dams up in the mountains. Here is one of them.
Rattled my way to the end of this road and decided could go no more until I had taken a closer look.
Could not see or feel what was making the strange feeling so had to carry on home as there was another 50 km to go.
Pity the impala ran away from in front of this dam before I got my camera out.
This just looks like a dirt road but was trying to show the straight road. The road on the horizon can be clearly seen with the eye but not by my camera. From this point it is about 20 km home. This road also gave me a puncture forcing me to stop and pump wheel up once. Tried to make it home with out pumping again but could not ride any more when I got 200 m from my gate.
Did 125km for the day. The sand roads and hills had pushed my heart rate quite high for most of the day. By the time I got home it felt like I had just run the Comrades marathon. I had also tried to use Energade for the second time. It gave me the same problem as the first time. It gives me a head ache when I first drink it, then once it gets to the muscle it burns. I then have to drink extra water to try to get the extra energy out of the muscle to stop the burn. Looks like I will have to stick to Game. What is nice about Game it is a powder. So can pack extra with me on the long cross border trips. I use one packet per 100 km. I also mix it weaker than recommended taking into account the day temperature. The hotter it is the more I dilute it.
Well as always when pushing yourself to the limits. You make a decision to never do it again. Now a day later I am planning my next route into the hills.
There was a new mountain bike race launched this week. 1000 km from Bloemfontein to Stellenbosch, all in one stage. You must take a look at http:// themunga.com. I would like to take on this challenge so if there is anybody out there that can help with $10000 entry fee for a team of two. I would also be needing a partner. There is enough time to get some training in as it starts on 3 December 2014.
If you looking to do something to set yourself apart from the thousands of cyclists, this is the race. I think it will be making more of a splash than the Cape epic is doing at the moment. It promises to have a lot of international entrance as it has some good prize money.
Is there anybody willing to sponsor and /or team up with me to take on this challenge?
This weekend I rode the Sondela Bela Bela challenge which is a road race. Did 102 km in 4 hour 10 min on my mountain bike. This is my personal best for a tar road surface. This was my second race that I have ever done. To busy riding to take photos on the road. Here is a after photo.
Then did the Sondela Bela Bella mountain bike experience of 40 km. This was my first mountain bike race. The course was flat snaking around in the African bush of the Nature reserve. Passing many wild animals on the way but was to busy negotiating the turns and sandy sections that I did not see any. This is a very well known reserve where you are allowed to do walking trails and cycling on your own. So I would recommend to come back and do the cycle routes at a much slower pace. They only have lions in a rehabilitation center.Well here is a photo of people gearing up and getting bikes ready outside the venue.
Note the save the rhino shirt. Here is a photo of the start.
Again was to busy negotiating the trail to take photos but here are some after photos. Must say the mountain bike riders are more friendly and laid back than the road riders.
Finished the race in 2 hours and 10 minute time.This is unofficial at this time but is close enough for me. Here are the two medals to prove it.
Is there anybody that has done this race and what do you think of it?
Took a ride up to Nylsvlei Nature reserve this weekend. I left my bicycle at the restaurant and my stepson left his motor bike there also. We took a walk in the reserve to do some birding.
Long day safaris 