good weekend, with a wasted sunday. the jacket provided some relaxed on the couch entertainment for friday evening. excellent destonian type movie. one of those borderline movies which is either magnificent or really a waste of time, greatly depending on your mood and paradigm. even if you find the movie grossly confusing there is still the nude scenes with keira knightly to look forward too ;)

saturday brought great winding, high speed single track fun. thereafter it was off to the downhill provincials to go shoot some biiiig wipeouts. got quite a few nice pics and was happy with the extra goodies that came on friday, all the way from NY to my door.

sunday was a waste due to sunburn constraints acquired the day before. watched MiB and Startrek: First Contact

the next challenge has been decided upon, and shall be something totally different. the weakness lies in mind power. mind power to stay the night after the adventure, mind power to keep focussed when its so easy to quit, and mind power to be patient.

thus it has been decided to stay on a ledge somewhere on a cliff and not move from that ledge for 3 consecutive days. date to be confirmed.

vertical grip and that wolverine portable storage device is on its way from durban to johannesburg. hopefully it makes it here before saturday. really want to go and shoot the gauteng provincial downhill race, and would be a perfect place to try out the new gear.

bike been giving problems, hopefully it lasts through tonights dark-n-dirty ride.

with little to no planning, yet more than the first failed attempt, the unofficial "team-sponsor-this-space" crew set off into fading light and pouring rain just before seven friday afternoon. the rain stopped when hartbeespoort was reached, at 60km, 10km from the halfway mark. it was just before 22:00 and as good a time as any to eat. the trip progress was discussed, and things were going good with an extra hour and a half already gained on the planned time.

set off 22:45 to face the music and the last 80km. we knew this was the worst section. the rain had stopped, and temperature was perfect. turning left at the stop sign, i could feel i lost some strength while sitting down earlier. legs burning slowly, i was suddenly not so proud on the good speed and time we made thus far.

the bounces started in the southern shadow of the magaliesberg range, one of the oldest mountain ranges in the world. up and down past the last few hotels and guest lodges. it was silent all around. earlier we decided to take a few mp3's along for the trip, it came in usefull.

the endless road was made longer by the mist that covered the whole mountain. it was hard to figure out where we were and this soon left us feeling rather lost. the km's came by slowly and i got worried that we missed the turn off. finally i lost confidence in my night-nav abilities, and felt lost for a while. i was driven to stop and confirm our position when i saw a guy and his wife pull into their farm.

the lady was quite startled, which was no surprise being suddenly confronted by two riders with shining lights all around at 2:30 in the morning. even at her home, she seemed quite lost too, but assured us that we still have quite a way to go. things did not really add up in my mind until we got to the t-junction. a t-junction i completely forgot about.

confident we continued, for about an hour, when i got shaky again. we found the road that turned off to the mountain, but it was not he way we remembered it. not at all. after having a short discussion about how lost we thought we were, i convinced my team mate that we had to continue another 23km at least. things did not add up, but i knew this way we would be sure at least. he himself lost confidence in where we were after a few dissapointing surprises in turning directions. "yes, i know, the road goes left after that hill" did not always turn out that way. by now we had stopped the music playing in the headphones as it started to hamper concentration.

as we turned around another boer came around, we switched on our lights that we decided to ride without for the last few hours, in order to avoid any early warnings to oppertunistic locals. just as well that we stopped him, as we were perfectly on route thus far, and was about to make the wrong decision. thankful we turned around and continue to the base of the mountain to take a nice rest.

this ws the second time the evening, or morning we found ourselves lying in the middle of the road, taking a rest, and concentrating to stay awake. sleeping right there felt so good after being awake for 24 hours, and dead tired from the day at the office, the race to get our trip going and then the peddal to get where we were.

we started riding up the mountain, it was steep, muddy, and in poor condition, as we entered the mist, the headlamps was rendered useless, and we had to rely on the handlebar mounted light, of which we only had one.

reachng the summit, pushing our bikes in order to get some rest, we were as relieved as we could be. all went perfectly well thus far, and we were doing way better time than anticipated. going down the other side was slowed down tremendously, and quite dissapoint due to the thick mist. it was a criss cross zig zag manouvre from one side of the road to the otherside, taking a beating from the eroded road.

the disaster struck, i felt my rear wheel going into a lock, managed to stop thinking it was just a break block that came loose and got jammed in under the rim. it was not. the rear deraileur had lost its screw and got caught up in the spokes. we broke the chain, removed the deraileur and i freed to the base of the mountain. had to push some uphills, and got towed using a spare tube on some other, but there was only 10km's left between us and our destination. as 6am arrived, so did we.

we started pushing the bikes to the campsite we decided upon, when we realised the grass veld, had become quite a forest in the last few weeks due to the extreme rains. we turned around and decided to lock the bike to a tree in the hotel's parking lot. it started raining again, so we decided to go sit it out, and get some rest, while waiting forthe support crew, who left and hour earlier from pretoria.

total trip time 11 hours, total riding time just under 8. about as much fun as you can have on a mountain bike.

visited the nanhua temple today. sadly my first experience in a holy place of any religion other than christianity. expecting hundreds of monks in perfect rows beating each other with sticks, i was quite surprised at what i saw.

arriving at the temple i was amazed at the size of the place, being much larger than the glimpses i caught from the highway before. taking photos for most of the morning until i shared lunch with some monks at noon. lunch was... well, not what i expected it to be, and to be quite honest, i still have no idea what it was i ate.

found the buddihsts to be really really friendly people, and even from my adapted christian point of view, having something that everyone one could strive to. it seems these people can never get angry, or even cheat anyone out of anything. they seemed really honest and open. i admire that.

more photos in the Nan Hue Temple album.

The Valley of Death night expedition

Primary Objective: Locate the Valley of Death, and survive it (A mission on its own)

Secondary Objective: Find some quality dirt on adrenaline pumping topography

The team:
Clinton Hardenberg as “Hardy”
Pierre Oosthuizen as “Dirt Rider”
Werner Gillmer as “Daemon”
Gordon Kienbaum as “Flash”
Craig von Joburger as “Himself”
Wessel du Plooy as “Myself”

The extensive planning and pinpoint of the meeting point was an easy task that took most of the day, confused millions, left people scattered and still left 98% of the night to chance. A perfect setting for adventure loving masochist.

At 19:00 we had the pre-expedition briefing that was to prepare everyone for the dangers and hurdles the night would bring. The briefing included Hardy saying “Howzit guys”, and Daemon saying “Hi, I think we should go in that direction and see what happens”, it was unanimous and the fellowship was on its way.

A rather fast pace lead us quickly away from the warm city lights and comforting noises of passing trucks blowing that nice fresh breath of diesel into your lungs. Past the last traffic light, and arguably the last piece of civilization we traded the well rolled out dirt road for a mean looking single track. Light was fading.

The single track provided some entertainment and left Daemon gracefully leaving his bike. As we reached the summit where the clear difference between the city behind and the unknown darkness ahead could be felt, Hardy noticed that Dirt Riders pipe was leaking…. not as bad as it sounds, it was fixed quickly and we left the last lights behind us as we charged down a long downhill much like the cavalry of the barbarians in those roman movies. I even heard some wolves’ cries from some of the riders. In all the excitement the turnoff speed by us without it even being noticed, and the thrill of the downhill left us without caring too much about it either.

Down through the dip up the next climb that was over before we knew it we turned left. I noticed it suddenly became dead quiet around us, and the headlamps came on. We were high up on the hill, just on the south west side of Lynnwood road. Between these hills we were cut of from any lights, apart from the starry filled sky with the mere first quarter moon. The valley was lying before us like Mordor.

Traversing south on what seems like it was a tar road around the time Andries Pretorius first decided to settle here, we came to another nice downhill. Adrenaline was on again as the road disappeared below the white rays of the handlebar lights. We bounced and bunny-hopped involuntarily towards the stream that could be heard at the bottom, passed the stream and up the other side, as fast as possible, trying to maintain speed and get the uphill behind you. Daemon, flash and dirt rider climbed the hill like mountain goats and was already waiting at the top when the rest of us came steaming in. It was decision time, the valley of death was close by and this was the last turn around point. We made it this far.

Slowly we head up the tar (Tar?? I did not say that!! This never happened!) road that joined in from the left, and climbed up the next section of the Bronberge. Not to far ahead I saw Flash, Craig, Daemon and Dirt Rider stop, me and Hardy realized that this is it. They were standing looking down a narrow little road heading towards a gate. Arriving at the gate, the entrance to the Valley of Death was visible. We starred down the dark abyss, as Hardy was reminded of the german philosopher that once said “If you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you” and thus he was volunteered to go down first, and without hesitation, he went. In a mere 4 or 5 seconds his rear wheel disappear even from Flashes bike light, and only heard chain whips, and loose rocks departing us. Then suddenly a big thump and footsteps next to bike… The rest of us soon followed suit in a rather semi hike-a-bike-want-to-ride-but-cant fashion.

A few puddles and a little mud further we got to a dirt road that we followed back north. The next T-Junction did not stop us as we headed down an overgrown single track where a water crossing was inevitable, I don’t recall anyone making it through dry. The uphill was a really technical single track with some really good attempts. We rode back up to Atterbury road (Atterbury road is a dirt road there), talked a bit nonsense and jumped speedily onto the single track we came up with. What an incredible single this makes going down, with sudden hills and bumps, some banked corners, other off-cambered corners, eroded surprises and nice slippery rock sections. It was around the time I realised we have had no serious wipe-outs when Dirt Riders bike lights suddenly and violently disappeared into a thorny bush. The advantage of falling into a thorn bush is that the thorns grab tight hold of your skin, tearing and holding as to prevent you from rolling into any further injuries. With a bleeding lip, bruised shoulder and flat front wheel Dirt Rider unhooked himself, just as the second bail happened jut out of sight about 50m down the road.

All fixed up, and re-hydrated we completed the single track, and hopped onto some urban free riding on the way to the Mug and Bean called News Café. Checking the odometer in shock, Myself, Hardy and Himself (Craig) decided to hit a last 2km up Hans Strijdom while Flash and Dirt Rider gets few cold ones, and Daemon checked out the wild life.

A return would be planned soon.

Thanx again to the cast, for making another Thursday night worth living, and also to Chris, Penny and Craig that came from far.