The Back Garden Tour (Southern Africa)

So as we’re moving overseas, down under & what feels like half way round the world, we decided it was appropriate to see as much of the back garden as possible while we’re still here. Thus in amongst the packing & moving was a wee bit of planning towards a grand adventure around Southern Africa! So much was the planning that we only figured out where we’d be staying on the first night the day before we left and it’s been pretty much the same since.

But to back up a little, and to throw some light on the broader picture.. Both chronically ill to the travel bug and always open to any form of travel or working overseas, and with potential to get a visa and work somewhere where it doesn’t rain 11 months of the year, Australia seemed like a natural choice to go live and work for a while. The prompt was a change in the visa application rules and in the matter of a few weeks we had appointed an agent and paid the deposit. The ball kept rolling and some months later we were awarded visas.

So, presented with a gap in work, countries and continents, what better time than to take a few months off and do some travelling! But, what vehicle would convey us around the Southern end of the continent? Gumtree was scanned and Hilux’s were considered amongst Land Cruiser’s, Land Drovers and other budget breaking old wagons before we figured a good ol’ Volksie was going to be kinder on the pocket, younger and softer on the saddle. We drove out to Bredarsdorp to check out a van on an odd Sunday afternoon and it was smooooth. Having not really looked at routes or road conditions in too much detail we figured we’ll have to wing it anyway and “the internet” promised the wheel clearance was better than a Golfie, and those go anywhere, so we said why not and got it.

Next was travel gear. We had a bunch of camping stuff which would do the trick so we put off looking at any other kit until the last few days before we left. We ended up getting a few nice plastic boxes which would do for a good bed base as well as provide decent storage compartments, a cooler box, 25L water container and 20L jerry can for diesel.

Thrown in the mix of setting off on this adventure was packing up, selling up and shipping off a 2 bedroom flat full of furniture, clothes, luggage, non-camping gear, sentimental items and a range of other bits and bobs. Naturally it would have been less stressful if we didn’t have a deadline looming or probably if we had just started a bit earlier. Either way it all came together into 14 boxes, a caddy full of stuff, a mattress, some bags for the plane and a happy charity shop.

Part of the mix not mentioned above was a 2 week blitz trip of Australia, required to activate the visa, do a bit of a recon and conveniently also drop off some valuables we weren’t so keen on shipping. We packed in 3 cities, 7 or so wineries, 11 family and friends and probably about 40 km of walking before hopping across back to SA.

Back to the The Back Garden Tour route, which had been mustering in the background and occupying the idle moments of the day from time to time, leading up to the trip, probably for a couple of years in fact, had always been in rough a round trip from Cape Town via Southern Africa.

This was never really defined but was to include all the right spots of all the countries neighbouring South Africa to make the most of it in the best way possible. Without really considering the distance between the places I had mapped out a route on Google Maps from Cape Town to Namibia, across to Mozambique and down via Sodwana and the Transkei back to Cape Town. The plan originally was to charter an overland truck, get a bunch of mates on board and bumble around for 4-6 weeks. As this never really materialised and the weeks and months flew by, when the time started counting down to when we were thinking of making the move overseas it was a bit too late to organise. So I rethought the route and with the way things were timed we decided to hit South Africa first, then move up Mozambique and Malawi, then make our way down Zambia and Zimbabwe for a big family gathering before heading back up to Victoria Falls, across to Namibia and back to Cape Town. This was refined en-route and will be explained along the way.

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Trip Length: 5 months
Blog Entries: 5
Photos: 137
Words: 3174

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Blog Entries

Date	Blog Title	Location
June 8th 2013	Cape Town, Robertson Wacky Wine and Montgu	Africa » South Africa » Western Cape
June 10th 2013	Sutherland, Karoo & Camdeboo National Park	Africa » South Africa » Eastern Cape
June 13th 2013	Cradock, Addo Eephant Park, Grahamstown and Port Alfred	Africa » South Africa » Eastern Cape
June 19th 2013	Transkei - Cintsa, Bulungula, Mdumbi & Hole in the Wall	Africa » South Africa » Eastern Cape
June 30th 2013	Tsitsa Falls, Royal Natal National Park & Durban	Africa » South Africa » KwaZulu-Natal