Let the wheels roll . . .

Friday morning departure:












Ride leader LeRoy & Elsabe on the LT and Willie Nel in the background

Peet & Christa and others on their way . . .


Now for the real trip reports . . . !

Well the trip went well with no incident along the route.

It definitely a trip to do again to Katse Dam. Those twisty roads in Lesotho are awesome fun.

My trip ended when I rode into the side of a huge storm at Bapsfontein, where large river riding was the in thing to do on the roads with some small hail to greet you on entering the city from a well relaxing ttrip. At stages the road had little rain, while the road was covered in vapour mist rising from the road surface. A view to behold. As it was still raining, I decided not to take a change getting my camera wet.

Photos will arrive tomorrow for you to see, once I uploaded them.

Yes, it was truly a trip to remember. The scenery was awesome, the twisties great, the Katse Dam was something special and the company exceptional. Thanks to all for a great week-end. The memories will live on for a long time to come. Pictures will be posted soon

As promised, a few pictures
A few faces during lunch at Frankfort:







Notice the matching colours!!

The plate says it all

Finally across the border

Breakfast just before the big climb!

The Wall

The long way down..

On top of the wall...

Wrapping it all up in the beatufull Golden Gate...

looks like a good trip with some beautiful scenery, thanks for sharing

glad everybody is back safely

My first weekend trip with the club and what an experience!!! Thanks LeRoy for all the arrangements. You did an excellent job of planning the trip. The company was great and the route awesome.

Sal maar niks se nie die forum is PG rated... Miskien volgende keer

For those looking for the AirHawk seats that Kobus, Andre and myself were using on this trip, you can get them from Bike Gear via their website www.bikegear.co.za and price would be over R1000 per AirHawk (at the current exchange rate of about R10.00 per USD). He does stock both the Driver (rider) and Passenger (pillion) for various bike sizes.

Pics will be uploaded tomorrow, rather ill today with huge headache to bother uploading pics now.

Happy-go-lucky wrote:For those looking for the AirHawk seats that Kobus, Andre and myself were using on this trip, you can get them from Bike Gear via their website www.bikegear.co.za and price would be over R1000 per AirHawk (at the current exchange rate of about R10.00 per USD). He does stock both the Driver (rider) and Passenger (pillion) for various bike sizes.

Thanks for this info. I still need to add the pillion version, so I will centainly contact them

As with all good things - it comes to those who wait, but afterwards it seems like a fleeting moment in time when one only has your memories and the odd photo to fall back on. It was indeed a memorable ride, with a large number of new members joining this ride and a club organized long trip for the first time.

To all of you who joined the ride, thank you for making this a memorable and enjoyable ride. It was great meeting you and making new friends along the way. For those of you that helped with the directional changes, keeping the group together, thank you.

A special thank you to Dave, who did most of the sweeping. Having an experienced sweeper on the ride is crucially important. I would also like to thank Johan, Andre and Willem who stood in for Dave when necessary.

We were very lucky therein that we had a perfect rainfree day in Lesotho, thus making the hairy hairpins and twisties easier/safer. The scenery, once one had passed through the "built up/developed" areas were very beautiful, but one had to go over 4 montain passes varying between 2200m and 3000m above sea level to get to the damwall.

The road surface between the border post and the bridge across the dam itself was mostly very nice and one could really put the footpegs into the tar, but the road between the bridge and the damwall was mostly covered with a fine "layer" of gravel that is very difficult to see making the road somewhat slippery. I believe this part of the route is not very safe and must be done with caution. Leaving the road is a one-way ticket.

We did not encounter any stone-throwing incidents as we travelled slow when in sight of, or near to the locals. The full trip report will be posted in the next Spoke and Piston.

Thanks for a great trip - good company (mine a lot of the time ) and great riding weather and scenery.

I did not go to Lesotho with the group but instead did a quick recce ride for a trip planned for next year. Here some of the pics of my break-away ride - in essence I did two 'break-away rides'.

Here some pics of the Friday ride - Villiers to Fouriesburg:












After arriving in Fouriesburg and quickly unpacking a ride to Clarens was the thing to do. On the way found an interesting dirt road leading to a valley behind the hills next the main road.



The Lesotho group ready for departure Saturday morning


briefing...


After they had left I started my ride for the day - the route: Ficksburg, Clocolan, Ladybrand, Hobhouse, Wepener, Zastron, Lady Grey, Barkly East where I had lunch and then the same route back.




Crossing the border into Eastern Cape


Kraai River pass on the way to Barkly East


Must have missed this though!!!


On the way back stopped to buy some cherry's and cherry liquor just outside Ficksburg




That evening found everyone unwinding


....then the 'party' threatened to get rough....

(what I find on my camera belongs to me...... )

.....but then things mellowed to the proper proportions




The next morning it was homeward bound through Golden Gate with a visit to the Vulture restaurant..


some of the people making the long climb to see some bones...




....and they even made it to the top.


Then a quick lunch stop in Vrede






A good trip and well organised.

wtf happened between 19:24 and 21:46?

maybe he was just sharing an old "bike accident scar"........die slag toe hy dit middeldeur geval het

MadnohB wrote:what happened between 19:24 and 21:46?

maybe he was just sharing an old "bike accident scar"........die slag toe hy dit middeldeur geval het

...what goes on tour......

Next time someone uses my camera I hope they leave some decent pics - and yes I do know who the 'partners in crime' were

......maybe we can offer a prize at the next club meeting for the correct guess.......

Dave, thanx for the nice pictures you took.

Awesome photos and looks like a good time was had by all.

Look what photobucket did !!!!



never saw that picture but as I understand it the picture was educational??

I sense that there was some pictures removed....what happens on a trip stays on a trip....huuuu????

I certainly did not remove any pictures - and no names have been mentioned to protect the innocent people involved - no response has also been given regarding the time gap mentioned earlier in this thread....

Perske wrote:....what happens on a trip stays on a trip....huuuu????

....well not everything - only things that could be of an incriminiting nature - and the pic in question was portrayal of someone's attitude to having their picture taken....

Perske wrote:I sense that there was some pictures removed....what happens on a trip stays on a trip....huuuu????

A real cracker hey Good to see you back on the forum after some absence

Well here are 34 pictures that I took on the trip.

To help those with bandwidth issues, I just giving the link to the gallery that contains thumbnails of the pictures.

https://i388.photobucket.com/albums/oo324/crazy-happy-go-lucky/biking/2008-12-05/

wtf happened between 19:24 and 21:46?

Well, dinner was served and all were quite chirpy.

It is in fact what happened after 21:46; Most patrons withdrew to their rooms for who knows what, I presume to take a rest after a very streneous day. Those very few souls that stayed behind were engulfing Pinotage, Cabernet, cherry liquer, chivas, Zondebloem, etc etc to the sound of a very very good collection of music, from 1812 Overture to 'Lef Deppard' and everything in between.

That last few sips of somebody's leftover glass of water ( all left to drink at that stage) just broke the camel's back!

No names no pack drill...

Andre wrote:

Perske wrote:I sense that there was some pictures removed....what happens on a trip stays on a trip....huuuu????

A real cracker hey Good to see you back on the forum after some absence

I think he is only back to look at the trip pictures!!

tj wrote:wtf happened between 19:24 and 21:46?

Well, dinner was served and all were quite chirpy.

It is in fact what happened after 21:46; Most patrons withdrew to their rooms for who knows what, I presume to take a rest after a very streneous day. Those very few souls that stayed behind were engulfing Pinotage, Cabernet, cherry liquer, chivas, Zondebloem, etc etc to the sound of a very very good collection of music, from 1812 Overture to 'Lef Deppard' and everything in between.

That last few sips of somebody's leftover glass of water ( all left to drink at that stage) just broke the camel's back!

No names no pack drill...

What camel's back....the one picture that dissapeared didn't look like a camel to me

On that picture I would rather not comment. If I had such a bum I wouldn't flash it to every camera!

A man does have his pride, huh? Or is it a man's bum????