Tracks and vehicles

It’s raining gently as I write this but up to today we’ve had a dry spell of several weeks which has allowed us to reach some of the places that have been inaccessible by road for several months.

Last week we went to Bumboosie South to check on the solar pump. The road is terrible when it is wet so nobody has been out there for a while and we found the pump not working (but easily fixed we hope). Most of the journey was bumpy but otherwise not too bad, except at the Bumboosie River where the road had been carried away completely and we had to find an alternative route.  Two other recent journeys have been similar – bumpy but passable except at the rivers. Going out to Tshakabika Hot Spring the Lukosi River was a challenge and near Kwizizi the Kanyoni River has completely destroyed the road.

             

The Lukosi – passable but not good for                    The Kanyoni - not passable however good

 the nerves                                                                  your nerves

  Most of the roads that haven’t been used for a while have fallen trees across them in places. Sometimes only a nuisance and easy to move…….

But sometimes a bit more difficult…….

Many places are damaged by rain…..

And many are overgrown……

   Our Toyota Land Cruiser is old but it’s a great workhorse and with the superb South African off-road tyres we fitted at the start of the rains it goes almost anywhere. If we were to have a problem we always have radio contact with Sinamatella to call for help. Each year however we find intrepid tourists, who have none of these advantages, far off the tourist roads following tracks that they have downloaded onto their GPS from the internet. Often they have ignored both “road closed’ signs and plain common sense and tackled awkward river crossings, rocky slopes and barely visible tracks to get a bit of an adventure. That’s great if they get back to camp safely but not so great if they get two punctures but only have one spare wheel or damage their suspension on a rock or get stuck in a sandy river bed or……..the possibilities are endless and all finish up with Parks having to make expensive, time consuming and annoying search and rescue missions. All GPS units should come with a warning along the lines of “Using a GPS does not allow you to stop using your brain!”

    And now, while I’m writing about roads and vehicles, and having praised our Toyota, here’s another vehicle worthy of praise……

    This is our own car, a 1961, short wheel-base, left-hand drive Land Rover. We’ve owned it for over 30 years and it no doubt has an interesting history prior to us buying it in Bulawayo as it came here from what was then Zaire, now DRC. It has died and been brought back to life so many times we call it Lazarus but the letters in the registration plate say it all. ABV stands for Africa’s Best Vehicle