Baobabs, Bikes and a game drive

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Mapungubwe Heritage Tour and a Bonsai Baobab »

Baobabs, Bikes and a game drive

08/09/2011 by daktarisafaris

For our first morning on the bikes we had decided that we needed a good breakfast for fortification before we tackled the terrain. But before going up to the restaurant, we all walked down to the car park where Lizzie and Chris had already taken the bikes off the rack and checked them through. Everybody checked the height of the saddle and made adjustments.

We had established that none of us really had much experience with cycling the sand, so Chris gave us a few tips on how best to do this while we munched on fruit, cereals and eggs.

And then the big moment arrived. We each grabbed our bikes and off we went into the bush. At first it was easy and plan sailing until we hit the first patch of sand. Some of us sailed through, the rest got stuck at some stage. Obviously there was a difference between having the theory of the sand-cycling in your mind and actually putting it into practice.

But in spite of the frequent stops and the near-tumbles, what a delight it was to be out in the bush an riding in amongst the Mopane and the Baobabs! I was being rather wussy because I had my valuable SLR Camera in my backpack and was afraid for it but it was a very enjoyable morning nevertheless.

There were a few wounds, Katrina was the first to take a tumble when she misjudged a trick bit of donga where part of the path was washed away. Fortunately a scrape and a couple of bruises were the extent of the damage. Lizzie had a first aid kit with her and did a sterling job cleaning and disinfecting. There were a few more scratches from thorn bushes but that is as per normal when moving around in the bush.

Whilst we were out, the wind that had picked up after sunrise brought thick clouds with it that looked rather threatening but did ease the way for us on our first morning by keeping us cool.

We cycled to another of the huge whaleback rocks that we had been looking at from the rock near the lodge. A few boulders were piled onto one end of that rock and we had seen that one of them was completely white on one side. We had hoped to find an eagle’s nest upon it but no such luck. The white stuff was probably from thousands of years of rock hyraxes peeing down the granite.

In total we cycled something like 12 kms before returning to the lodge happy and sweaty.

After a quick shower we piled into the bus and headed for Mapungubwe World Heritage Site. This is a scenically stunning national park with lots of wild animals and an archaeologically very interesting site as well. We were planning to go on the heritage tour but the schedules had been changed, there was no afternoon tour any more. Thus we decided that whilst we were there we might as well go on a game drive and have a look down from the platforms that are positioned to offer a view of the confluence of the Limpopo and the Shashe Rivers.

With Chris at the wheel and Katrina reading the rather rudimentary and not extremely informative map, we started off into the Mopane bush.

Terrapins were sunning themselves on rocks and dead branches in the middle of a little dam. Amazing how many of the little reptiles piled onto a single tiny surface. A grey heron was sitting motionless in a patch of reeds and a small herd of impala came down to drink whilst we watched.

There was no way for Chris to move at anything faster than a snail’s pace because we were all fascinated with the enormous baobabs, the amazing scenery and the wild animals.

Our attempts to reach the large dam that was marked on the map were frustrated several times, once by a chain across the road and once by a sign that said “4×4 only”.

Thus we ended up chugging slowly along a narrow road along what seemed to be part of the Zambezi floodplain. Ilala palms towered over us and huge sycamore figs spread thick branches wide. A group of border jumping elephants climbed carefully over the low fence of thick wire cable and browsed in the bushes on either side of the road. They watched us as we watched them wrap their trunks around branches, rip them off and begin to chew off the bark.

All the time we were aware of the striking scenery of huge, craggy cliffs, gnarled rock figs with whitish roots stretching several metres over rock surfaces before finding purchase and nutrients in tiny cracks.

Ascending back onto the plateau, we ended up at the confluence viewpoints. We were slowly running out of time so we walked to one of the platforms and had a look down at the confluence of the Limpopo and Shashe Rivers. Every time I see this, I am impressed with the gorgeous view of the broad sandy bed of the Limpopo and the smaller, meandering Shashe, still bringing some threaded channels of water into the big River. And knowing that just across the river is Zimbabwe is a definite pull to the heart!

Along the way, a beautiful eland bull browsed on some bushes and did not seem at all perturbed by our presence. We photographed him from all angles and then had to make tracks because we were running very late. We just had time to stop at the lovely hide at the end of tree top walk to watch some birds at the Shashe River. White fronted bee eaters, Pied kingfischers, Egyptian geese, then it was time to whizz back to the lodge for our sundowner drive.

We got back just in time to got to our rooms, fetch fresh camera batteries and a jacket and thengo back to the meeting point. We climbed onto the small game drive vehicle and chugged off into the bush. We reached the same rock that we had visited in the morning and climbed up onto the whaleback to watch the sunset. I had earlier seen in the bar that they had some tins of Stoney ginger beer and had asked for one for my sundowner. It was delicious as always and so amazing to watch the orange then reddish light of the setting sun paint the huge baobabs and the surrounding rocks in soft clours. We sipped and chatted until the sun had disappeared behind the horizon and the lights of Beit Bridge shone across the border to us, then packed up our things and climbed back down to the car.

We were all so exhausted that conversation slowed to a halt near the end of dinner and we all went to our rooms immediately after the meal.