De Wildt – 03 March 2007

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Friday, March 2nd, 2007. Just after 8:30pm. I sit here at my PC reflecting on the week gone bye and the day tomorrow. It’s easy to reflect like this with my second Johnny Walker Black Label on the rocks in my hand…. But I digress. The week started not unlike the start of most weeks in my life. Log onto e-dirt, post a message in a new topic about where I’ll be riding on Saturday, send the same message to my very popular e-mail list, and sit back and see if I’ll be joined by 6 or 16 riders come Saturday. I must admit, from the heart, that most, if not all, the guys that have responded, and still do respond after 8 years, are more than riding companions, but are actually friends. But more than that, and here’s the honest bit, my e-dirt post and e-mail go out for the prime reason that I know at least 4 or 5 guys will respond positively and I won’t have to ride my chosen venue alone. That may sound a little selfish, but I’ve grown to understand over the last few years that there are a lot of people out there that actually wait for my post and e-mail because they know that they’ll get a pretty good ride in with good company as well. So it actually works out for everybody.

So back to tonight…. It’s been a great reflection. My post went out not very dissimilar to most weeks except that I expanded quite radically on the proposed route for the weekend out at De Wildt. No expansion on the great fun we’ll have, that happens every week. But I expanded on the distance and milestones we plan to cover. The result has been quite amazing. In less than twelve hours time, I will be meeting approximately 20 great buddies and riders at the Morula Sun hotel for breakfast which will be followed by what promises to be an epic outride in this territory. I have gone so far as to arrange with the hotel that a braai and portable bar will be waiting for us back in the hotel parking lot on our return at the estimated time of 16:00. This promises to be a great one!!!

For those that know De Wildt, the planned route is as follows: Morula Sun Hotel – Long Rocks – River Bed for +/- 3km - “Tombstone’s” newest Shebeen (there are quite a few of those) – River Bed (opposite direction) – Big Tree – MX Section – New Trail to 3-Fences – Twisties – 3-Fences Shop – Chicken Run to Jericho – Jericho River Bed – Trail to the Rock – Greetings to JJ (Tribal Elder) – The Rock – Bafana Bafana Shebeen – Jericho River Bed – 3-Fences Shop – River – Bra Eric’s (Shebeen across the road) – River Bed – Coconuts/Big Tree (depending on decision at that point) – Hotel. Estimated distance without any of the usual bundu bashing that comes into play is 140km round trip. B R I N G I T O N!!!

I have to pause now because it is almost 9:00pm and I think I have done enough to set the tone for a fairly decent ride report for this edition of E-dirt Magazine. So I’m going to save this document, shut down my tech stuff, and you can all catch the results in the rest of the article. What I will share with you at this point is that I’m very skeptical about how much sleep I’m going to have tonight…….

No, the ride hasn’t finished yet! It’s 4:00am! What am I doing here you may well ask yourself? I’m not actually sure if it’s a mixture of excitement, half a bottle of Johnny Walker Black last night, or my 6 month old son letting me know that he feels like an early breakfast this morning. Be that as it may, its only an hour before my alarm is due to go off anyway, and the little tyke does need to eat, so I’m going to sort all my stuff out and haul my backside over to the Morula Sun. Catch y’all later.

What a trip!!! What and absolutely fantastic day out on our bikes!!!

Guys were trickling into the hotel parking lot at 6:45 already. The first surprise of the day was Bradbronx (Bradley Bronkhorst) who rolled in with his bright and shiny brand new KTM 300 XC-W on the back of his bakkie. The so-and-so was keeping it a secret from us. The guys very quickly got busy fitting a sump and exhaust guard to the new scoot while we waited for the rest to arrive for breakfast. At 7:15 we all made our way into the hotel dining room and sat down for a prefect start to the day. By the time we had completed breakfast, the rest of the riders had arrived. It was going to be a big group.

Next surprise of the day…. And we still hadn’t geared up yet, let alone started riding. Briang was doing the rounds trying to find out who would break into his car for him. Seems he didn’t have the heart to break a window on his own BMW X5 which he had locked his keys inside of!! Mielie (Sean Meisel) was only too happy to help with that, sadistic bastard!

The role of the day was as follows, including some new hardware to break-in:

Armpump (Deon Gouverneur) – KTM

BlankieMan (Carl Eler) – Yamaha

BradBronx (Bradley Bronkhorst) – brand new KTM

Briang (Brian) – KTM

Green Monster (Wouter Germishuys) – brand new Kawasaki

Mielie (Sean Meisel) – Yamaha

Mr. Bapsfontein (Jaffie Jansen) – Kawasaki

Nacnac (Erwin Minnie) – brand new Yamaha

Nick – Kawasaki

Orsm (Bradley Snaith) – Yamaha

RedAnt (Anthony Dyboll) – KTM

Shark_za (Ronald Doyle) – Kawasaki

Shill (Stuart Hill) – KTM

Spanky (Henk) – KTM

Tomcat (Tom Saether) – KTM

UFUDO (Garth) – Husqvarna

Vatso (Mark Erasmus) – Honda

VooDoo (Tiaan Broodryk) – KTM

Yours truly – KTM

We left the hotel and headed directly for Long Rocks. By the time we got to the T-junction for Coconuts and Long Rocks, we’d spread out quite nicely and I waited for the back markers to catch up while the rest started their attack on Long Rocks. I was wondering why their faces all looked so dusty already (add nasty little grin here). My nasty thoughts were soon to be handed back to me in kind….. Long Rocks is best achieved with some momentum. Going too slowly only makes the job that much tougher. Me, being “Mr. Nice Guy” and waiting for the back markers to catch up was now headed down Long Rocks behind said back markers! Sweaty job to get to the bottom to say the least. I did manage to pass some of the guys which gave me a bit of extra time at the bottom with the rest of the guys to talk nonsense, catch our breath, and greet other riders who were going up or down. I must apologise to the bunny-huggers out there for the first tree destroyed on our suarez, it was a small tree and not as strong as I thought it was to lean my bike against. Uhhh…..bike and tree lay down!

From there it was a nice, solid burn down some shale-covered single track with some nice whoops, into sandy twin track with some nice whoops and down to the river. Again, just before the river, I hung back to wait for the back markers to catch up. Unfortunately a couple of lads hooked up accidentally with another large group and carried on past the re-group point which was as we entered the river bed. We had a short break there while I called Tomcat on his cell, left a voice message telling him that he was with guys he didn’t know and to start heading back when he gets the message. Luckily he called back as we were about to head out again and I told him where he should go to meet up with us.

Our route took us about 4km down the river bed. Not very technical (that stuff was behind us in the opposite direction – towards the Big Tree), but certainly a lot of fun. We left the river bed and were heading to one of my newly found “secret” shebeens for our first proper break. I call it my “secret” shebeen because it is one of those little spots that isn’t in the middle of a lot of noise and action and is not known by many dirt bikers (in fact I’ve never seen any others than the crew I’m with at the place). En route, we found Tomcat who rejoined the pack without anybody even noticing except me…… since I was the one that would have had a head-on with him had I not been alert to the fact that he would be coming that way. I waited once again as the path exited from the heavy brush on the sides of the river bed for the pack to regroup. Alas, nobody was behind me. I took off my helmet and couldn’t hear any bikes. Hmmmmm, nobody would have missed my turn out of the thick stuff, somebody must have an issue. Unfortunately it was Shill. Apparently trying to keep up with Mr. Bapsfontein over the whoops. Trying being the operative word here ‘cause he wasn’t doing it. Shill 0 - whoops 1. Fortunately, nothing more than a bit of dazed-and-confused for a few minutes and a damaged ego, oh and apparently he also has a roost protector pattern imprint on his back now. Anyway, all present and accounted for, we headed on to the “secret” shebeen. Luckily my “nose” for these places is still so trustworthy as Orsm was trying to show me how his GPS was pointing in a different direction. Never mess with the TZT (Tombstone’s Zamalek Tracer) – I was right! (For those unfamiliar with some of the Gauteng dialect, “Zamalek” is rural speak for a Black Label beer).

A solid quart each of Zamalek for Orsm, Mr. Bapsfontein and myself. Some soft drinks for the rest of the soft…, uhmmm, blokes, and a milk………… yes a milk for Vatso. Some dirt biker banter. Some peace-making with the locals (I usually hand out sweets to all the children in the area, makes for good relations when we come back). And some voting. It seems that the masses wanted to get to The Rock as soon as possible. This piece of stone was to be the far end of our loop the day and a milestone that most of us (in fact all bar 2) had never seen. So we decided democratically to alter the planned route and continue down the river in the direction we were going instead of doubling back to go via the Big Tree and the MX Section.

We managed to keep the group together all the way down the river but we did stop long enough anyway to watch Nick take a line from the other side of one of the wider sections and make his KDX look like some sort of troop landing craft at Normandy beach. Very, very chuckle-worthy. We had one more brief stop along the river to say hi to four buddies who were coming towards us from their loop: Buffalo, Crooz, KingP and Splitpinn, and then we finally got to the tar road.

Our choice of route here was to go left up the road and then right which would take us to the beginning of the Twisties instead of all along the river to the gravel road that takes us to the 3-Fences Shop. It was on this tar that Bradbronx was showing me his ever improving talent for lifting his front wheel on his new KTM. Hmmmm, methinks the fellow was getting a bit ahead of himself on this new machine of his. I own a similar machine and the beast should first be tamed!

I hit the Twisties hard and fast and by the time I got to the gate at the end, only Orsm was with me (he later told me that his GPS had tracked us at speeds in excess of 80km/h through there – that’s quick in the dirt in anyone’s language). We removed our helmets, bumped fists in recognition of an awesome little burn, and wondered why there was no one else behind us…. There weren’t even the sounds of other bikes. Disconcerting, very disconcerting. What was weird to me was the fact that if someone had had an issue then at least the guys immediately behind Orsm should have been with us….. Unless it was the guy immediately behind Orsm…… Bradbronx was third into the Twisties!!! We rode back to see what had happened and unfortunately our premonition was right. Bradbronx had grabbed more throttle than he wanted to/should have over the whoops and had taken out a tree in the process of redesigning some skin patterns for himself and trashing his hydraulic clutch reservoir on his new scoot. Talk about “christening” a scoot – this KTM was the Pope! Shame, poor tree. Sorry bunny-huggers. Bradbronx 0 – whoops 2!

We waited until Brad had caught his breath and everybody had had their turn in assessing the damage to both rider and bike. After all the “ooohs” and “aaahs” we figured Brad could crash-change his gears on a gentle ride to the 3-Fences Shop which was on our itinerary and not too far away. The plan was to chill there for a bit before we headed to Jericho, home of The Rock.

Bradbronx got going first with me on his tail. I very quickly had to get alongside him to tell him to start his chill session immediately. Don’t these kids ever learn??? Back at the gate, I took the sweeper position again to make sure that the whole crew had got through without any more hassles. From there it was down to the 3-Fences shop. Mr. Bapsfontein started alluding to his new nickname on that new KDX 200 of his, but more of that later.

The 3-Fences Shop was like a meeting place for the who’s who of Gauteng recreational riders. There were four other crews there, all with one or two riders that at least one or two of us knew. So our 19-strong group grew into a 35-strong tea party… ok, ok, beer party. After a couple of Heinekens (yeah, 3-Fences has definitely become far more cosmopolitan in recent times) and some good banter it was time to resume our trail. We bade farewell to Bradbronx and Orsm who were going to take a slow and safe ride back. Orsm always likes to make an early departure, I think he’s scared of his kids, but this time I was pleased that someone was available to make sure that Bronxy got home safely after his MLOT (for those not totally in tune with dirt bike speak, MLOT = Momentary Lapse Of Talent).

Our planned route was to get to the BP garage at Jericho via the chicken-run (gravel roads) so that we could get there quickly, refuel, and get to The Rock. UFUDO took point as trail leader as he knew this route. I am pleased to say, that in true dirt biker spirit, the thought of roads of any nature were not on his mind and he led us instead through an awesome, tight, twisty, single track through the bush to Jericho. This bit of trail also took its victims. Shark_za left his decision to brake or bunny-hop or rail a corner too late and ended up in a ditch. Luckily he has a problem deciding and accelerating at the same time so he didn’t hit the ditch to hard and neither him nor his scoot were any worse for wear. The trail also took us through three tricky river crossings, the last of which claimed Tomcat’s scoot in a little drowning episode. Mr. Bapsfontein was the show-boat of the moment and, while everybody negotiated the +/-1 meter drop down into the river, he showed us how to ramp off the edge, front wheel slightly raised and cruise across in a fraction of the time it was taking everyone else. I was then amazed by his repeat jump, sans bike, off aforementioned river bank into the river. Don’t you test the waters before you take your bike in? I was later informed that he was showing Mielie how it’s done.

At the Jericho BP garage, everybody fuelled up and had some refreshments as we waited for Tomcat to patch his front tube that had gone flat. About 45 minutes later him, Nick and Vatso bade us farewell as they took the chicken run back to the hotel. Tomcat’s tyre was ripped at the valve, his ride was over. Nick and Tomcat were travel mates so it was just fair that Nick go with him. And Vatso chickened out!!! (place 2nd evil snigger here).

From the garage it was off to the Jericho river bed. For those that have never heard of or ridden it, let me try explain. This river bed is about 4 or 5 km (perhaps more) long. It is dry, thick river sand. It is about 10m wide at it’s narrowest point and easily in excess of 50m at its widest. Because of the consistency of the sand, you are able to ride flat-out all the way. Brakes are unnecessary because you automatically cut and rail your own berms as you corner. And should you need to slow down, you just tap off a bit, the sand does the rest. For me, it is absolutely awesome riding. Two noteworthy events took place in the Jericho river bed. First, Nacnac got to “christen” his scoot. Luckily it was in the soft sand river bed and not ala Bradbronx’s rites. Second, Mr. Bapsfontein earned himself a new nickname. I was in 4th and pinned going round a bend when Mr. Baps came past me so fast I thought I wasn’t moving. At that moment I called him and his KDX, and I will continue to call him…….. “the Lamborgreenie”.

At a point in the river bed, there is a right turn into a smaller tributary bed which eventually becomes hard pack single and double track sand. Some interesting and challenging slippery climbs up the banks on both sides of this bed as you go along the trail. Challenging enough to certainly catch a couple of our crew out. By the time we got to the Bafana Bafana shebeen just before The Rock, we decided we should stop there and chill for a bit. We were all extremely hot and the ride up the tributary had taken its toll on the stamina of a few of the guys. So we made camp there for a bit, had some Zamalek and cold drinks, depending on personal preference, passed around a 5 litre bottle of refrigerated water that was poured over heads as it went round a couple of times until it was finished, and discussed The Rock. Shark_za, who had been there before was explaining how it is this huge mound of stone that has a very steep section with a short run-up and a “chicken-run” option which, for most, is actually the clever option. I went on to tell of stories I had heard from friends of mine who are more than capable riders and hill climbers who had said that you hit it in second and you’ll have to gear down to first at some stage, but whatever you do you must not hit neutral or a false neutral – you will be toast! I continued to tell the guys that it would be chicken-run for me as I don’t want to do anything silly, what with a family at home and everything….

We left Bafana Bafana and in less than 5 minutes found ourselves at the rock. There were 13 guys shoulder to shoulder looking in awe up the steep face of this behemoth. I was 20 metres behind them shouting at them to make way. Mountains out of molehills!!! Huh!!! I was going to do this sucker!!! A path was cleared and I hit the base in 2nd. At about 5 meters up the angle reduces a bit but by this time you’re running out of steam and with the reduction in angle and the traction on the rock your front wheel is lifting. A brief pucker moment as I pulled in the clutch, dropped the front wheel and a gear, and continued in 1st. Lots of grunt, still a huge angle, and plenty of traction. The front wheel came up again. Another brief pucker as I brought the scoot under control again and rode to the top. Truly an awesome experience. Next to try was the Lamborgreenie. He hit the base in 2nd, and just before the change in angle after the first 5 meters it sounded like his scoot was going to die on him… which it did as he cleared the lip of the angle change. He managed to get it started again and found a criss-cross route to the top. What totally blew my mind then was when he turned his bike 180 degrees facing down this thing and rode it back to the bottom. Armpump was next. He too hit the base in second and as he cleared the lip of the angle change, geared down and………. Hit neutral! Everybody held their breath. There he was teetering a quarter of the way up the side of The Rock trying to hold both himself and his bike steady without dropping either back down again. Luckily he was riding with this new special trails tyre from Michelin which seemed to be acting like glue against the rock face! To everybody’s relief, he somehow managed to get both himself and his scoot down again unscathed. The next man up was Mielie. He came up The Rock from bottom to top so smoothly he could have been riding on the M1 and so straight you could have manufactured rulers against his line. The last one up the steep face was UFUDO who was battling with a couple of thoughts himself. So far everybody that had given it a shot had been on 2-strokes and he had no reference for gear selection on his 4-stroke Husky. Nevertheless, he gave it a shot and also made it all the way with ease. The rest of the guys all started going around to the “clever-run” and joined us at the top. Did I say the rest? I meant to say the rest bar one. By the time we were all gathered at the top looking down, we noticed the Lamborgreenie was psyching himself up for another run. He hit the base, started up the initial very steep section, the bike sounded like it was going to die again. But he managed to maintain the revs and drop a gear. He gave a handful of throttle just as he was coming past us and his front wheel took off like the Challenger. It was legs, and arms, and scoot. We watched in amazement as he magically saved what appeared to be the making of a big off. As we started to find our smiles, 2 seconds later, just before the top, he did it again. But bigger. And still held it together! We were stunned.

After some banter and some photos at the top of The Rock we decided that since it was 15:30 and our braai back at the hotel was scheduled for 16:00 and that we were hot and had ridden long and hard, that we should take as direct a route as possible back. Luckily most of the roads back from Jericho to the Morula Sun were gravel road. Although definitely not challenging, we still had a great ride back. Cruising and wheeling and just chilling as a group on our bikes back to the hotel. When we arrived I found I had a voice mail on my cell, it seemed we had left RedAnt and the Lamborgreenie behind. The Lamborgreenie had picked up some hardware in his rear tyre and was limping back slowly. Luckily they both rolled in about 15 minutes later and no harm was done. We wrapped up the afternoon with some delicious boerie rolls, beer, brandy and coke (thanks Lamborgreenie) and a whole heap of war stories from the day.

Another lousy day in Africa!

Steve “Tombstone” Lauter