2010 cycling tours

2009 is almost over! We're welcoming in 2010 with more cycling trips than ever before!
Here's what's on the menu-contact us via our website if you would like to join these tours.


5 Day Mountain bike trip
Date:11 January 2010 - 15 January 2010

10 Day Mountain biking tour
Date: 18 February 2010 -27 February 2010

7 Day Road cycle trip (incorporating the Cape Argus Cycle tour)
Date: 8 March 2010 - 14 march 2010

7 Day Singletrack MTB Holiday
Date: 25 April 2010 1 May 2010

Happy cycling! Happy Friday!

It's been a long time since I posted a Friday photo, but this one is just too good to pass up! This photo got sent to me from Louise from IT46 who joined us in our November mountain bike tour.

It is a photo of a nasty bruise on her "derriere"-we couldn't figure out where it came from but it was probably on the technical trails either in Wellington/Delvera!

I reckon it's by far the best non-permanent tattoo I've ever seen!

Thanks Louise!

I like to think that we play safe but we will definitely keep you improving your skills on our trails in South Africa- come and join us for some fun in the sun!

2010 Football / Soccer World Cup Final Draw announced

Cape Town hosted a massive party on Friday night when the FIFA Football World Cup draw was announced. Best you come to Cape Town with your bike if you want to be able to get around easily!

The fixtures are now set so it's time to start planning your holiday! Check them out at FIFA's website or for an alternative site click here

Of course, we'll still be hosting road cycling tours and mountain bike trips during the Soccer World Cup so best you enquire right away because we know for a fact that all accomodation in Cape Town is in real short supply!

We'll be juggling between watching the games and doing short trips around the fairest Cape so check out our website, see what we're about and come and ride the best!

Busy month for cycle holidays!

It's the last day of November and it's been a great month of cycling around Cape Town with some great new guests.We started off the month with a few short mountain biking trips near Greyton. The first days of summer were felt by all and the riding was pretty fantastic as well, especially on the new full suspension bikes we were using! Steve and Kitt noted how similar the region looked to the Pyrenees (except that we get the luxury of riding in these mountains all year round!). We cruised through some great sections of singletrack that will soon be extended and linked up during the next year to include even more trails. I must apologise to the group about that last big climb though- 7km with some 18% grade sections! Well done for surviving!

2010 Single track tour

We're busy planning a big 10 day singletrack mountain bike trip for February/March.

If you want to ride trails like this contact us now so we can customise your trip for you!

Featured rider: Roan Exelby

Roan has been riding and racing bikes for a very long time. I remember that back in the early 90's he had a weird looking Pacific bike. It was purple and rigid yet had a Y frame for some reason. Then I think he had the first 'dual susser' I had ever seen-a Proflex with flex stem and an elastomer on the rear seatstay.

Anyway, since those days he has been riding and racing and earning his due as one of THE characters of the sport, as well as earning repsect as one of the hardest blokes on the planet. He has so many accolades I wouldn't know where to start (How about 3rd place World MTB marathon champs, and 3rd overall place 24Hours of Moab? PRIVATEER!). With these results and much more, Roan still just gets on with it making sure he's having fun on his bike. Shouldn't we all be following his example?

He answered a few questions for us:-

Upcoming trips-Join in!

Do you want to ride?
Well you have no excuses now!

We have the following trips coming up, why don't you join us, even if it's not for the whole trip?

Singletrack tour:
18th-21st November- 4 days of the best trail riding in the Cape

Burger road tour:
27th Nov-6 Dec- 10 days of beautiful road rides incorporating the famous Burger Cycle Tour

Summer is here!

Jennie Stenerhag wins the Amashova in Durban!

iRide Africa's lead road guide is on top form at the moment-19 race wins this year and counting!.

Last weekend, she traveled up to Durban to take part in one of South Africa's biggest races, the Amashova- a race from Pietermaritzburg to Durban, through the valley of a thousand hills.

The womens bunch consisted of 300 riders
with all the top teams representing, so Jennie had to work super hard to close down the breakaways as well as contending with miserable weather and a wheel change after she punctured!

Jennie was instrumental in whittling down the lead group to 9 riders by the time they reached Durban and had enough 'oomph' in her legs to take the sprint to victory.

Ceres is where it's at!

Yet another weekend away, yet another action packed few days of good laughs, great company and terrific riding. Life is tough!

I took the 'easy' option and scouted for new rides on my MX bike whilst the others partook in racing around this mountain bike paradise on trails varying from 15km to the monster 70km option. Good on you all and I hope you'll all be back next year!

Here are some photos to convince you to come on one of our singletrack tours...

Some days are just too good

OK, so no photos to prove it because we were just too busy riding on the first real day of summer.

• Long hot slog up a mountain followed by kilometers of finger aching singletrack.

• Then a gigantic burger with potato wedges and onion rings and a ice cold beer for the measly some of R50 (under £4!!!)

D.

Spring Clean Tour

A fantastic 4 days of riding in the Overberg area, an hour away from Cape Town.
Here is a small collage but you can see more photos on our Facebook page

Highlights include-

• Casey's donga faceplant
• Graham riding every ride on a rigid singlespeed jump bike
• New black trails at Oak Valley
• Riding in the rain-this doesn't happen very often down here!
• Not one puncture!
• Marcus' face after realising that 'Singletrack is the answer'
  

Bike Fight '09

The inaugural Cape Town Bike Fight took place last weekend on a perfect Spring day. What a blast! I'm building up a fixie as I type just because it all looked so fun.

There was the Fixie race around the parking lot-nice and dangerous with cars everywhere and a couple of tight corners. No idea who won, it was all a bit of a blur really.

There was the skid comp, which came down to the wire between a skinny racer and a not so skinny local bike shop owner-the winner eventually went to Gav, who had a more spectacular 'dismount' into the bushes where the tar ran out.


There were quite a few blow outs but the best one was totally unexpected as the bike wasn't even being ridden at the time.

The bike joust was a bit of a let down but the photo below sums up it quite nicely. Things to note:
Olaf going for Toby's head
Toby's concentration levels
The joy on the spectators faces - "We want blood!"

There was also a trackstand competiton where some serious skills were shown after 2 minutes of standard trackstanding.

And then there was the highly entertaining fixie shark pool (I made that name up because I don't know what i was really called. Anyone know?) Everyone circles in one direction and tries to take anybody else off their bike until they are the last person riding. Here's a photo of one of the last stand-offs.


All in all a great day out, let's make it happen again!

Proudly South African- Burry's first Elite World Cup win!

I'm proudly South African on most days but at the moment I'm bursting at the seams for this kid!

Burry Stander has just had the best week of his cycling career-2 weeks ago a win in the U23 World Champs and last weekend he put the hurt onto the (seemingly unbeatable) Julien Absalon on the final climb of the final lap to take his first elite win in a World Cup hosted in Switzerland.

I don't think this will be the last time there'll be a post on this kind of topic!

South Africa 1,2 & 3 at 2009 UCI MTB World Champs!

Talk about a misleading headline, but I'm so proud I'm not going to change it!

So this is how it all rolled out at the World Championships in Canberra, Australia:
1st Place - Burry Stander crowned world under-23 cross-country champion- Last in the hairstyle stakes tho...

2nd Place - Greg Minnaar missed out on winning the elite downhill title by a mere 0.05 seconds! But Peaty got a well deserved 1st and kept the pesky Aussies away which is always good!

3rd Place - Candice Neethling did us all proud in the junior cross country. I hope she continues with this kind of form!

You've got to wonder how good the riding must be in South Africa to produce such World class talent. Why don't you find out and come on one of our cycling holidays?

Cape Town Critical Mass

Join us every last Friday of the month for a cruise through the streets of Cape Town to highlight alternative travel in this awesome (and small!) city

When last did you experience adventure?

Here's an interesting definition of adventure by Colin Mortlock- apologies to the girls for all the "he's"-it applies to every human out there!

"This is the stage beyond, and often just beyond, the skills learning stage. The person has sudden fear of physical harm and no longer feels complete master of the situation. He feels, however, that he can, with considerable effort on his part, and given luck, overcome the situation without accident.

He accepts that his skills are about to be tested. He is conscious of a definite degree of uncertainty as to the outcome, and feels, as it were, poised on a knife edge between success and failure. I he succeeds, he has experienced adventure.

He has found himself in a situation which becomes firmly etched upon his mind -perhaps forever. He has feelings of satisfaction, if not elation, about the result. The degree of satisfaction and pride is proportional to the scale and intensity of the adventure."

Join us on one of our adventures at iRide Africa. It's not all fear and adrenalin but it'll certainly get you elated and satisfied!

Great products and brilliant events

Want unique, local and well made clothes?
Check out Broken15 for their latest range in hoodies and T-shirts.

Want to explore Cape Town on foot and get a work out in the process?
Check out MyCity running tours. A great new way to experience Cape Town if your time here is too short to go on one of iRide Africa's tours.

Looking for a brilliant event?
Look no further than BikeFight '09. Crazy antics, crazy people and crazy bikes

The perfect winter

Not too much to say really, amazing weather, amazing people, amazing amounts of laziness!
We didn't get out for nearly enough riding but here are some photos of what we did. The potential for perfect trails here is massive!


There are some more photos on our facebook page. Become a fan to keep up with our latest news.

New Morewood XC prototype

Drooooool!
Here are some spy photos of the new Morewood cross country racing machine which is being tested on South African race courses at the moment. Roan Exelby says it goes like stink and has really given his battered body a rest on the new, more technical courses popping up around the country.

Big up to Roan for getting accepted to race at World Champs in Canberra, Australia later this year. Make us proud man!

Whether you're a XC racer or laid back free rider in search of new rides, we have the holiday for you! Check out our website for our set itineraries, or email us and enquire about planning a custom trip in South Africa.

We're ready for the FIFA world cup (with cycling in between of course!)

Ok, so I'm a few weeks late in celebrating Nelson Mandela's 91st birthday but here's a great photo, courtesy of http://www.capetowndailyphoto.com.

I saw this great artwork the other day and what you can't quite see from the photo, is that it made from a collection of children's painted hands.

As if that's not cool enough, this isn't even an advert or billboard-it's a barrier for a building site! If only other building contractors would do the same, I'm sure we wouldn't mind all the mess and noise they make whilst making our city a better place to live.

FIFA Football World Cup and cycling holiday

Our new Cape Town Stadium is looking very impressive! It's hard to
imagine what the World Cup is going to bring to South Africa but we can
assure you that our 3 day singletrack tours between World Cup matches
will get your heart pumping!
Check out our 'Specials' Page on our website
(http://www.irideafrica.com) for more information.
-D

Special Events

Check our website for more details. Don't miss these events!

The Burger Road race tour takes place from 27th November to 6th December 2009
The FIFA World Cup Tours take place in June and July 2010

Observations and thoughts

Lately, I have been thinking. Most would suggest that this was not a wise move in the first place, but I was never famous for taking sensible advice, and I had little else to do after contracting the now infamous Swine Flu (it didn't live up to the hype by any means, by the way), so there you have it!
As well as thinking, mind you, I have also been observing.

Firstly, I observed Dan's stories and pics (below) of the trails he's finding and riding.

Then, I observed South Africa's Greg Minnaar (current leader) have an absolutely dismal weekend at Mont-Sainte-Anne, Canada World Cup DH round number 5. He punctured in the qualification, and then crashed in the final (hard enough to lose a glove!) and ended up 22nd. With Sam Hill successfully managing to close the gap by taking 1st, and Peaty taking 2nd, the World Cup is wide open with two rounds to go and just over 200 points seperating the top four riders! All-in-all, not great for Greg, but definitely great for the sport. I'm not a nail-biter, but if I was I'd be shopping for prosthetics already.

Most often over-looked because of Greg's successess, let's not forget Andrew Neethling who is currently ranked 11th overall!

I also observed the fact that South Africa's Burry Stander is currently coming a more-than-respectable 3rd in the World Cup XC competition - I shall be removing my blinkers and following this more closely from now on!

So that's where I started thinking. It goes without saying that South African's are well on the map when it comes to the racing scene, but isn't it time that you - the people that really make the sport of mounatin biking what it is - experience the land and the trails where the pedegrees of our world-class riders were born? Of course it is!

The great thing now, is that it really is as easy as booking the flight and sticking your bike in a bag and arriving in beautifull Cape Town, as we can take care of the rest for you!

Okay, that's it, smoke coming out the ears has activated the fire alarm, enough thinking for one day, I'm going to go back to my Tom Waits and blueberries now. Maybe even do some work, who knows.

Cheers
Harry

New mountain biking trail

There have been whisperings and rumours about a fantastic new mountain bike trail in Wellington. Secret smiles between riders who have ridden there have been noticed and noted by yours truly and finally became too much to ignore.

It was mid-winter in Cape Town and the sun was shining yet again. Is it just me or does it seem that we have had all our good winter weather in the weekend? With the temperatures in the mid 20's we couldn't resist travelling the hour and a half to Wellington and trying out the new mountain bike trails on Welvanpas Farm.

The parking lot was already quite full when we arrived. A good sign considering it's a rather new mountain biking venue and not many Cape Town cyclists know about it yet. That is all about to change though, because these trails are some of the finest in the Cape for sure, with unique views of Table Mountain, perfect single track, testing climbs and scream inducing descents.

We set off on the "easy" route which was a measly 7 kilometers long on the South facing slope of the valley. About 3 kilometers into the ride I decided that we had gone the wrong way and must have been riding on the "tough" route. The climbs were viscous! Even the slopes of Plum pudding seemed easier than these and I found it hard to imagine that there was a harder route on the other side of the valley. The saving grace though, was that the climbs were short, interspersed with beautiful bench-cut single track or flatter sections of farm road that allowed you to recover before the next brutal section. I was informed a bit later that we were, in fact, on the easy route and that I'd be tested a lot more on the other side. Oo'er!

On the very first singletrack we knew there was something special about this place- the soil was a solid red colour and ultra sticky from the recent rains. It was a great change from the usual terrain we experience in the Western Cape and it reminded me a lot of the Hilton forests in Natal.

We finally seemed to reach a section of downhill and I freewheeled down it, not knowing what to expect. The pace quickened as the slope dropped away and soon I was grinning ear to ear as the perfectly groomed trail swept bike and rider from side to side between fun little swooping dips.

The next section of downhill was the most fun I've had on a bike in a long time. Perfectly spaced sweeping corners with a little bit of tech every 3rd corner or so -it was like carving on a snowboard! As we dropped towards the river there was even an exciting, steep little gully to ride through(there is an easier alternate line as well).

The ride back towards the farmhouse meanders along a beautiful river with nice easy singletrack flowing as nicely as the river itself. Part of our group ended the ride as we got back to the farmhouse where you can partake in some wine tasting or enjoy a snack and coffee in the shop.







We carried onto the harder five kilometer route on which the uphill broke me on my single speed Voodoo. I hate to admit it but I actually had to walk up a section in fear of my heart busting out of my chest. It's a constant climb up jeep and singletrack but I can honestly tell you that it's worth every drip of sweat. The trail bends back on itself and the fifteen minute climb is reversed into about 5 minutes of exhilarating, fast and exposed singletrack downhill that leads back to the farmhouse.

All in all it is an incredibly beautiful place to ride, the trails are well made with brilliant lines

(you won't find your normal boring straight-line singletrack trails through the orchards here!) and the downhills are massively smile inducing. The only criticisms I have are that the signing needs to be bigger and the hills might be a bit steep for beginners or less fit riders (but that can always be fixed by making more trails and route options, right?!)

As I've said on iRide Africa's Facebook page
"If farmers keep building trails like this, there's no need to go to heaven when we die!"

The Knysna 'almost epic'

I groggily wake up on an air mattress that has slowly, through the quiet hours of the night, become neither a mattress nor 'air' related in any way. A figure stirs below the mezzanine floor on which we are sleeping and throws a few pine cones and some wood onto the dying embers of the fire. The fire is soon crackling loudly and the entire cabin warms up enough to risk getting out of my sleeping bag and watch the sun-rise over a massive expanse of ancient, indigenous forest. There is so much potential for epic rides in this area it makes my mind boggle and crave for some coffee stimulation.

Our generous hosts, Andre' and Wodie prepare coffee and soon their little children are scurrying around, screaming and enjoying life to the full, as I wish I could do so early in the morning.

Raoul and I have been trying to sneak out on a long, fast, epic ride together for days. Word of our secret plans spread and the group grows to a few more. In fact, before we know it we are five people crammed into two cars (Thanks again to Andre and Wodie) with four bikes and are meeting Dave Mckay and Steve Burnett on route to the Homtini Trail, deep in the woods behind Knynsa.

We spot Dave and Steve at the meeting point, but we don't spot their car. It turns out they don't have one. After a few choice swear words from me, we manage to fit an extra two bikes and two people into the cars and drive into an unknown forest, without a map, without directions and without a GPS- all the ingredients that can lead to an epic!

We find the forest station easily enough, build our bikes up and try to make some kind of strategy about the ride and where Louise can pick us up. It turns out that none of us know the trail very well and were all counting on each other to lead the way! Louise pays for the riding permits as a trickle of rain begins- I am miffed about this but not as miffed as Raoul who has taken my bad advice and not brought along any warm layers as "it's never cold once you're riding in the forests". The rest of us don our warmer clothes (it is mid winter after all!) and we set off on a 7km descent through the forest roads.

We enjoy the freedom of scuttling and bouncing down the hairpins after being cramped in the cars for the morning. The pace is nice and slow much to Ruan Erasmus' frustration (the young and the restless), but he is meant to be on a recovery day so I don't feel too bad. I slow down the group even more trying to get some video footage of the ride but everybody is in holiday mode and the forests' sense of calm seems to be spreading to those riding through it.

Eventually the downhill runs out and we pay our dues as we climb upwards for a few kilometers. Suddenly the darkness of the moist forest recedes and we burst out into a sunbathed section of grassland and fynbos, just long enough to heat up our bodies before we plunge downwards once more into the forest on a beautiful forest road with tight, blind corners and some tricky little sections. After doing some more video work, I find myself all alone at the bottom of a valley. I cycle downwards until I reach a river and have to stop at the absolute beauty of the spot.

I feel totally alone in this forest now, with giant ferns fighting for their space between the 800 year old yellow-woods. The Knysna Lourie makes a bold appearance, swooping through the canopy, his blood red wings giving him away. I kneel down for a sip of water from the black stained river water and start on my way up.

And up. And up. It's a 4 kilometer long climb before I meet up with the rest of the group but actually it doesn't feel all that bad considering that we're 16km into the ride by now and have only had to climb properly twice. That said, I notice that Dave has become very quiet- a sure sign that he is starting to feel some pain and my legs are starting to realise that they have not done enough riding lately.

The Homtini trail is all about the scenery, there's not too much to tax your legs and your mind. That is, until you hit the last 5 or so kilometers. The forest road gives way to a beautiful, descending singletrack that flows really nicely and has some interesting rooty bits to keep you on your toes. We exit the trail whooping and hollering and generally behaving like a bunch of yanks before crossing over the N2 highway into the Harkerville forest.

We've written about the Harkerville forest before (see http://irideafrica.com/tour-options/single-track-tour-information/singletrack tours) and it's probably true enough to say that this place is pedal paradise. Our group is quietly happy that we are in known territory once again and have ridden for about two and a half hours now. We find ourselves taking it easy though, as we know we have much singletrack to ride here and still have to have enough sense and energy to navigate through the forests back to Knysna.

By some coincidence, Ruan gets a call from his mother just as we are about to drop out of cell phone coverage. The news isn't good, we need to return one of the cars to her as she needs to get some important shopping done. The problem is we are in the middle of a forest, on bicycles, with no communication and no idea how to get the car back to her. There's nothing for it but to hammer on down the singletrack until we get back into phone coverage. We start speeding things up a bit and before long Ruan comes short (just out of video footage!) and takes what sounds like, a spectacular stumble.

He loses his phone in the process so we walk back and I instantly recognise that it's the same place that I had a huge stack on a few months ago. There's a crafty, faster line right between 2 little trees that grow on either side of the line. I was following my sister down there when I tried to take the faster line. It didn't turn out to be the faster line. Let's just leave comments about my skills out of it and say that my bars were just 1cm too wide and my tuck and roll technique was put to use. So the search for Ruan's phone commences and while we do eventually find it, we also discover that it must be a place that many a mountain biker has had his/her pride broken.

The proof lies in the scattered remains of many an accident. Amongst the findings are water bottles (unfortunately not the one I lost in my accident), torn helmet straps, a pair of broken sunglasses and the tell tale signs of "involuntary bush removal" all around the area. The two trees stand testament to the mini-battles between them and cyclists. The trees have chunks of bark missing from them, all at a constant height above the ground...Handlebar height. It definitely appears as though the trees are winning the war here and so we leave them in peace, with one more battle notch.

One reason Harkerville rides are so great is that you get to experience riding in dark, cool indigenous forest and then suddenly pop out on top of massive cliffs above the Indian Ocean, surrounded by fynbos and covered in sunlight. We followed the route onto the edge of the cliffs where we took a short lunch break and tried to get Dave to be a bit more talkative i.e. feed him. He mumbled a few words, something like, "still gotto run a marathon....get myself into these rides....pecan pie" and then stopped talking again. I took that opportunity to steal myself a few of his jelly babies so that I could avoid the same fate (I at least, still knew that we had a very long way to go!)

The climb back up to the forests are always an arduous affair, and 4 hours into the ride, this one is no different. People are a bit quieter but there's no grumpiness yet. Ruan is the only one with tonnes of energy left. He is racing fit and darting ahead and waiting all the time, much like a hyperactive Jack Russell. We try to avoid the big climb out of the valley by putting our trust in the woefully inaccurate maps given to cyclists and (as always) get back on the incorrect, boring route home. Luckily Steve and I catch our navigation error in time and can make alternative plans to get back on track.

By now communications are back up and Mannie and Ruan decide to leave the group and get picked up by Louise, so that they can grab a lift to the other car and return the car to Wodie, and Louise can then join the rest of us in the pub later and....Well, it's all very complicated and we didn't even know what we were really doing, so that's enough of that ramble.

And then there were four. Raoul, Steve, Dave and myself set off in the direction of Knynsa in the hope of finding more singletrack but really just hoping that we can find Knynsa. We run out of map but are not really worried as both Steve and myself have "built in compasses" in our heads. The only problem was that they both pointed to a different magnetic North! The conversation went some thing like this:
Steve: "Ok so North is errr, that way, so Knysna must be over there"
Daniel: "Well, I would say North is more like there" (pointing in a totally different direction)
Steve: "The tree's don't lie, Dan! North is that way, check the rings"
Daniel: "Hmmm, OK tree whisperer, lets follow your direction for a while then"
Daniel: (whispering to Dave) "The guy's nuts! What are these rings he's talking about?"
Dave: "Hmmm? Hmsphric...ffffck....pecan pie...."

After a while we reach a compromise of alternating between Steve's and my built-in compass'. Whilst definitely not the shortest route home, this zigzagging way of orienteering eventually allows us to spot the famous Knysna heads (waaaay in the background) through a gap in the forest and confirm that this new method was working well for us. In fact, I am so relieved that I point the landmarks out to Dave and upon realising how far away they still are, he actually manages to string a few choice words together. I can't quote them though as his response is not repeatable on this blog.

Five hours into the ride and we eventually start smelling home. On one particularly steep climb we stop at the top, watching Dave climb up and consider mugging him for the rest of his jelly babies and leaving him for dead. As he grinds, hacks and cusses up the climb, the conversation evolves- something about eating squirrels and bait or maybe it was squirrels eating us, my mind and body were also starting to go at this point so I cannot report accurately.

Five and a half hours after we started we find ourselves outside the nearest pub from the trail we've just exited. It's one of Knysna's busiest times of the year and, can you believe it? The pub is closed! Lady Louise comes to the rescue as she turns up in the parking lot with a knowledge of how we must be feeling and turns out beers, chips and chocolate which are devoured at an insane pace. We chat and laugh about the ride and decide that it wasn't really an EPIC ride as none of us got really lost, none of us blew in spectacular fashion (Sorry Dave, you hit the wall with grace) and we didn't have to eat any road kill along the way.
The pub owner sees the rabble outside his establishment and decides to open up, get us inside and feeds us lovely sweet local brew and huge plates of 'slap' chips. Before long, I am cramping, the smiles are back, Dave is talking again and the rest of the rabble have all turned up on some spectacularly neon coloured bikes and we all sit back and relax after another tough day in Africa.

Epic rides- Genesis

South Africa is riding heaven. There's no two ways about it, whether you ride on the road or in the mountains. The catch is that only a tiny percentage of the rides on it's roads, passes and trails have ever been documented and shared with the cycling community.

Herewith starts a diary of some of the best riding offered here. A few of them are tough and some of them are full blown epics but all of them are aimed at getting out there, exploring, sweating and having a story to tell at the end.

We hope that people around South Africa will join us, to share their favourite rides with us so that, eventually, we all have a worthy story to tell.

Look out for our first story soon. Below is a picture taken recently in George, to get you in the mood.

De Hoop nature reserve

It's been a long time since I've been able to stand and turn in a 360-degree circle and not see one hint of human civilization for as far as the eyes could see. That is exactly what De Hoop Nature Reserve offered us, when we visited there last week.

We pitched up, dusty, dirty and without a reservation and the result was in fact, a very pleasing one! We were plopped into a nice couch, in front of a blazing fireplace and were offered free filter coffee and biscuits while they sorted out where we could stay. Nice start!

The day only got better as we walked to our newly organised accommodation to find we were the only ones occupying the quaint and very well appointed 'rondawels', right in front of a sprawling vlei teaming with birdlife and offering the most amazing view of pure wilderness I have yet to see in the Western Cape.

We jumped on our bikes to set off on what we thought would be a boring ride through the fynbos and were pleasantly surprised (or scared shtlss!) as a gigantic Eland bull emerged from the bushes right in front of us and got as much of a fright as us, resulting in it charging down the jeep track towards safety. The great appeal to De Hoop is that cyclists get free roam of all the tracks and paths, otherwise reserved only for the staff. This coupled with the fact that the animals don't fear cyclists (like they do humans on foot or car), means you can really see a lot of wildlife and also get really, really close to it should you be brave enough! We rode at a slow and leisurely pace through the jeep tracks (surprisingly not sandy, being this close to the coast!) for about 15km and managed to see Eland, the rare Bontebok, a huge male Ostrich, Cape Mountain Zebra and some fantastic birdlife (African fish eagle, pelicans, robins, herons, cormorants, shrikes) all from the seat of our saddle. Believe me when I tell you it's a very different experience than viewing game from a car- you feel very vulnerable and exposed!

To top it off, we cycled towards the beach, dumped our bikes and climbed a dune only to be greeted by no less than 10 Southern Right Whales dancing for each other in the ocean below us! We sat on the dunes fascinated by their lobtailing, breaching and spyhopping before cycling back to camp in search of some more challenging trails.


Most of the riding here is on very flat, unchallenging jeep tracks and so I led Louise to the hiking trail on the way home. This was more like it! Nice rocky, technical singletrack allowed us to get home but at a cost! Once you are focussed on the trail, you tend to miss much more wildlife and don't get the same sense of awe and inspiration from the area, so it really is better that most of the riding in the reserve is on easy jeeptrack. The other cost was me going over the handlebars in a tricky section and really battering myself up in the process-rather embarrassing in an area known by cyclists for its un-technical, flat trails!

We got back to our cosy beds and realised we din't have any food with us. Lucilky there is a fantastic pub and restaurant in the reserve and upon arrival, we were told they were having a fancy Christmas in July feast. Talk about getting your timing right! So we joined the other guests under a massive milkwood tree, surrounding a blazing bonfire and devoured an amazing 3 course meal for R100 (less than £10!), whilst meeting new and interesting people from all over the country.

Anyhow, De Hoop will definitely be on our list for future visits . It is a soul-healing place where city dwellers get to experience all of Africa's best- huge space, fire-red sunsets, friendly people and a fish eagle's cry to wake you up in the morning.