BMW territory

Wednesday 2nd May 2012

Today I am not going to rave about any meals.  Instead I am going to say that when we come back and bring our bikes, I know where we're going to be riding - or at least a tiny part of where we'll go riding!

But before I go into raptures about all of that, the day started with a glorious cloudscape.

We're driving along Route 62, which is the inland "garden route" and certainly a road worth noting. We stopped at a cafe at Barrydale where the first clue of the day was to be found.   

Barrydale is only a small town, but it had a few cafes and this colourful ice cream shop as well.

Further down the road from Barrydale, we stopped to take this photo of the cloudscape ...  ???

We had to fill up in Calitzdorp, and across the road from the garage was this Drankwinkel.  It's one of the names that is certainly memorable - like its namesake Offy and Bottlo.

At Calitzdorp we turned off Route 62 and took the short cut to the Swartberg pass.  This was a good dirt road, and although we'd already seen heaps of bikers so far this morning riding mostly Harleys and Beemers, we only saw the Beemer riders on this bit. 

Bike country!

The Swartberg pass ran up and over this stunning mountain range.  The pass itself was a dirt road, generally in really good condition. 





Easy in a car, and certainly doable on a bike.  I'd get up and over, but I'd be slow.  A good excuse would be you'd have to stop just to admire the view.  The cloud cover from earlier this morning hadn't really cleared, and by the time we started the climb, the wind had certainly picked up.  At the top, the wind was so strong that it was hard to get the car door open, and the temps had dropped more than a few degrees. 

Jenny was telling me that the last time she was at the top with her friends, they saw a group of cyclists riding up, from the other side.  Yes, pushbikes!  There were apparently quite a few people already at the top - other drivers who had stopped to check out the views.  They all waited for the cyclists to arrive and applauded them as they arrived.  The first guy to arrive was in his 60s - Jen was more than surprised - I think she just wanted to ask him "why?" but he said it was a bit of "hard work".  When we were driving down, I kept thinking of this guy and the others riding up this rougher dirt road on pushbikes, and I take my hat off to them but it must be wonderful to be that fit!

The road down had more switchbacks than the side we'd driven up, and this guy on his BMW 1100 was certainly making the most of it - he passed us standing up, and while we watched him he kept up a really good speed and rarely sat down.

It's a steep incline, and you can just see the BMW in front of the car below

This is how our down side looked

and even the road out at the bottom was spectacular

We stopped at Prince Albert for lunch, and came across this other shop name that we thought sounded almost appropriate!

And another sign for the collection ...

After lunch, we drove through Klaarstroom and then came to another bikers heaven bit of road.  This was through the Meiringspoort and on to de Rust.  Fantastic road - no potholes! (and no pothole signs either ...) - lots of bends ....

and thankfully lots of places to pull over - just in case you wanted to look at the views properly.  The South Africans love their roadside pullovers - there seems to be one every 20 minutes or so, and generally all with at least a table and chairs but this one was amazing.  Large car park area, but have a look at the table & chairs!

and the toilets!  Inside they were spotless with more facilities inside than I've seen in some hotels!

At de Rust, my second letterbox was spotted.  Or should I say my second photo-worthy letterbox was spotted ...  there may well have been other photo-worthy letterboxes of course, but my Official Letterbox Spotter is MIA!

also at de Rust there was a quirky cafe - they had coffees, teas, cakes, scones and some crafty items.  I'm not sure if you can see it in this photo or not (have reduced size and quality of these) but the little bridge into the cafe has a sign hanging from it saying "no bungee jumping off this bridge".  Priceless!

It wasn't far from de Rust to Oudtshoorn, where we had booked 2 nights at the Gumtree Guest House.  We'll be camping soon, so we're enjoying some luxury.  Jen has stayed here before with her parents and I would certainly book to stay here again.  We didn't use the swimming pool - a bit too cool this far south, but in the summer it would be perfect.  We had a welcome drink when we arrived - white port is made in the area as well as the wines.

Relaxing on the balcony outside our rooms, with some Cape Velvet Strawberry Cream ...  there are some things one just must do. 

We walked into town to one of the restaurants for a delicious dinner.  Since I've raved so much about the bike territory today, I'll spare you any raves about the food!