Training Log Archive: Stijn

The last day was a fast one - along the tar road all the way back to Lady Grey. Many hills kept the legs honest though and some good drinks were deserved in bottle stores along the way :-)

All in all, an awesome trip with some great company - will definitely be back to do some more exploring.

Day 5 was a monster day over Lundean's Nek and towards the Orange River at Mayaputi Reserve, our accommodation for the night. The -7 degree temp in the morning didn't help either! Starting out with 4 layers, we were actually over-heating a little though... The descent down the Northern side of Lundean's Nek is a mountain-bikers dream with flowing switchbacks and no need to pedal for a good 20km :-) The rest of the day was spent cruising through rural areas along the Lesotho border on a very rough road. Many changes of scenery and a very memorable day!

On day 4, we backtracked 25km along the road towards Barkly East and then headed up the Wartrail Valley from Mosheshford. Wow what an awesome ride the scenery is mindblowing at this time of the year... We stayed at Burnbrae Cottage for the night, about 8km from the Wartrail Sports Club, and very close to Balloch Caves of Skyrun and Wartrail fame.

Day 3 was a rest day in Rhodes for most, but Kev and I tackled Carlilseshoek Pass up to Tiffindell Ski Resort. I am convinced this must be the steepest car pass in SA (any challengers?) - there was a sustained concrete section of about 2km which I had to walk my bike up all the way. Must have been close to 30% gradient! Once we got out of the steep bit we were hit by an icy head-wind and were cycling with all our thermal and windproof gear on to stay warm.

We left our bikes at the 2km to go sign as we would have been pushing them up all the way anyway. As expected, the resort was deserted so we had a quick lunch on a balcony with a thermometer which read -2 degrees!

Once back at our bikes, we blasted back down the icy descent into Rhodes... a tad bit faster than the way up :-)

Day 2 was significantly easier without the 15kg panniers but I took some strain from a sore knee and tender butt (I really need to get a more comfy saddle for these trips!). Gravel all day in and out of some quaint valleys filled with autumn poplars all the way to Rhodes village where we had a cottage for the night.

We met up in Lady Grey with Oli & Sals from Cape Town and Irene & Kev from Joburg for a 6-day MTB tour.

Day 1 started with Joubert's Pass which was steep but really scenic. The rest of the gravel road seemed like an infinite number of steep undulations. From lunchtime onwards we kept having to take shelter from the intermittent rain, hail and lightning storms... After 47km we hit the tar road and as Irene had been struggling, Kev and her caught a lift back to Lady Grey to fetch a car. Hence the rest of the trip became a supported one. The remaining 40km flew by on the tar road with us rolling into Barkly East just after dark.