Day 234: Pretoria to Orania

We set a new personal record and were on the road by 05:30. Despite the school holidays, the N1 was still full with traffic, which was luckily flowing, but the sight of it still freaked us out.

From Pretoria to Johannesburg we were flowing with the traffic, but on the Western Bypass, it seemed that we were going in the opposite direction of the main traffic.

At 07:30 we stopped at an Engen some distance before Kroonstad to have the obligatory Wimpy breakfast. In Kroonstad, we followed the suggestion of the road signs and drove via Welkom to Bloemfontein to miss the roadworks on the N1. We’ve never been to Welkom so imagine our surprise when the R34 turned out to be a four-lane highway.

Since we arrived back in South Africa we have just been amazed by the quality and the extent of our road network.

In Bloemfontein, we turned right onto the N8 and then left to Koffiefontein and down to Orania. We had arranged to meet up with Monja, our friend Anton’s girlfriend, at 13:30. She met us at the Pink Zebra where we had delicious milkshakes before going on the free Orania tour. The tour takes you through the town showing the various building styles and expansions and then ends at the Verwoerd museum.

Later we went to set up camp at the River park campsite which also only had one or two spots left due to the school holidays. At 18:00 Monja, her brother, and another friend took us Kayaking on the Orange river. Hugo got his own Kayak and Caro sat in the middle of a larger boat with the two other guys rowing. We paddled all the way to rapids where the guys and Caro tipped over just as it got dark and started to rain.

For dinner, we went to eat at the Oewerpark restaurant where we drank two locally made Craft beers and ate a beef burger.