29th Sept. Last blog

29th Sept. Graskop, High Veldt.
Good to get the car serviced and those few niggles sorted out. Buying a bakkie unsighted was always a bit of a risk but the work required was mainly routine with a bit of wear and tear items thrown in. When you consider the types of roads it must have been driven on as a hire car there is no wonder some work had to be done. It goes well now, no rattles, ready for another venture next year.
Leaving Polokwane in the afternoon we headed east to Tzaneen and then on to the bottom of the eastern Drakensburg escarpment. Not that interesting country apart from the knowledge that the events leading up to Breaker Morant’s execution happened in this area. There is a memorial to the event, unfortunately we couldn’t find it.
This morning we climbed out of the low veldt, over the Drakensburg range to the high veldt where we became tourists ogling at truly amazing panoramas and attractions along the escarpment. It is the South African school holidays at the moment and some of the places were quite crowded.
There is a decided difference to the attitude the black Africans show when we wave or greet them compared to that in both Botswana and Namibia. In those countries there is an open acknowledgement to our greeting with perhaps a smile thrown in. Here, often no acknowledgement and if any, very off hand. Yet, when we talk to them and they realize we are from another country they open up, ask questions, and seem to relax somewhat. South Africa is a wonderful country and has so much going for it. But the gap between the haves, both white but more increasingly black, and the have nots is causing so much resentment. It is a problem that is going to take a long time to remedy. They expected so much with Mandela and are disillusioned with what has happened. The result is they are taking it out on the whites especially the land owners of which many have been killed in the last few years. Yet, I can see why people who emigrate become so very home sick for SA. It is a great place.
This could be my last blog. We head to Pretoria over the next few days and will spend the last couple of nights with Len and Ria, the couple we met 2 years ago. A lovely couple who we get on with so well and have kindly offered for us to store the bakkie at their place until we come back. We look forward to catching up with them again
I hope anyone reading has enjoyed what I have written. I enjoy doing it even if as only a written memory for Joan and me. I sometimes look back at the earlier ones, they bring back good memories. Maybe one day we will get too decrepit to travel like we do, we both hope that day is a long way off.
Next year we are looking at heading north from Pretoria, visit the Kruger NP then on into Mozambique where we will relax somewhere on the beach and take in the succulent seafood of which they are famous, then on back into Malawi and then Tanzania where we want to visit Zanzibar. Have tried to get there on two occasions without luck, maybe this time.