20th June 08

Date: 20th June 08
Location: Port Edward, South Africa
Weather: Clear blue skies and sunshine, 25°c
Status: Ready to move again

Got up at 5am as I couldn’t leep thinking about packing the Colonel and getting back on the road again so headed out quietly onto the driveway to get on with the job in hand.

Checked my emails at 8am and sat in my inbox was a message from a friend Ana, from England. We’d been in touch over the ast few months as shes been travelling herself through Southern Africa and happened to have checked into a backpackers in Durban 24hrs earlier! I rang the hostel and spoke to her briefly and decided to pop in and see her on the way through to PMB.

Said my thankful goodbyes to the Taylor family, oh incidentally Nicolene, Bryan’s wife, shouted over the wall at 8.30am…”I’m pregnant!” so great new for the family.

Left Port Edward and headed up the coast to Port Shepstone straight to Tiger Wheel and Tyres as they would be fitting a new set of 6 BF Goodrich to the Colonel at cost price ready for the trip back up north. Also arranged an interview with the local South Coast Herald newspaper who liked the story of Afritrex and wanted to feature an article in next weeks issue.

Met Norman at TW& Tyre and as they changed and fitted the new shoes, he conducted an interview and took photos for the next edition. Will add it to the website once its out.

With the new tyre in place headed up the coast to Durban and what a pleasant, quiet ride it was on the new rubber, definitely an improvement on the last worn out set. Arrived at Nomads backpackers and had a beer with Ana, it was good to see a friendly face from the UK as it’s the first time since Luke left in March that I’ve had face to face contact with an old friend.

Ana has another 4 weeks left before she returns to the UK and leaves from Cape Town so she decided there and then that she jump on board for the ride down south….excellent, another passenger for the trip!

Headed to PMB to meet Patrick, Sarah and James as we’d arranged a departure braai for the gang who’d managed to make it down from Ghana and had a superb night of beers and stories.

Bed feeling happy….

End of day location: Pietermaritzburg, South Africa
Distance covered: 220kms