We managed to get away by 6.00am on the Wednesday morning only half an hour later than the intended start (this is par for the course) with the route taking us through Craddock, Middelburg and Colesburg before we hit the N1 north to Bloemfontein, Kroonstad and Johannesburg. It soon became apparent that the day we had chosen to travel was going to be extremely hot as by the time we got to Craddock at about 9.00am the temperature was already above 30 deg C (and only dropped below thirty at about 7.00pm !).
Whilst travelling past Middelburg we decided to stop and have a look at the Carochalet resort as a possible place to stop on the way back. The resort which is in the middle of town was green and shady and looked perfect as an overnight stop. We then continued on to Colesburg where we stopped at the Ultracity for breakfast/lunch. After lunch we headed north. Somewhere on the other side of Bloemfontein an unknown warning light suddenly came on accompanied by an audible BEEEEEP. Vanessa frantically searched through the manual to find out the meaning of the warning light, eventually finding that it was a tyre pressure warning ! We carried on slowly to the next service station where we found that the pressure on all four tyres was about 3.6 bars, despite the fact that they had only been inflated to about 2.2 bars amazing what the heat can do.
Another stop before hitting the final stretch to Johannesburg was at Aldam Estate which was a potential stopover on the way home. The scenery was magnificent and the place was mentally filed as a possible stop on the return trip.
From there i
s was back onto the N1 and in to Johannesburg. We had decid
ed we would stay at the Formula One (which we had never used before) in Edenvale (to simplify collecting tiny from the factory in the morning). The hotel room was interesting with a double bed, a single bunk above it, rails under the bunk for hanging clothes, one chair (possibly the most uncomfortable chair ever made, a basin and a small toilet/shower. However the price was right and as we only arrived at 7.00pm after a 13 hour drive, all we wanted was a place to sleep.
After a brief rest we popped out for something to eat at a nearby O'Hagans (about a km away). It was still warm so we sat outside for a very pleasant couple of hours before we both very nearly fell asleep at the pub and decided it was time to hit the sack !Here you can see Vanessa trying to decide what to have. She eventually chose bangers and mash and was very disappointed wh
en the sausages turned out to be beef ! The food wasn't great but after the long drive we really wanted somewhere close. After supper it was home and straight to bed. The next morning I woke up at 5.00 am much to Vanessa's disgust. She maintains that I made enough noise to wake up the entire hotel (personally I can't see it !). We had breakfast in the hotel which at R24 a head wasn't bad although it was only tea/coffee, cereals and toast with jam. Breakfast is served in what is the effectively the reception area, so a very simple affair.
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