Riverside Caravan Park (32 km South of Kimberley, NC, SA)

Saturday, May 10^th, 2014 Prieska – 586 km

Again last night Norma heard rustling over our heads after Doug had gone to sleep. Was she imagining something, was it the birds in the eaves, mice or what? Well. . . evidence was left on the table by the mouse! No sighting but you can’t argue with the droppings!

Doug got some info from our neighbour this morning about the Mokala National park that we plan to visit tomorrow. Sounds like it will be a nice stop on our way back north. Got fuel before leaving the park and Doug gave the station attendant a Canada sticker. He was thrilled and said he was going to put it on his fridge.

Stopped at a bushman’s hut and bought a necklace he had made from porcupine, camel thorn seeds, ostrich bone and wood that is hand painted. Not sure it will be worn but will make a nice hanging. Unfortunately it was early so no little kids hanging around for pictures or a hacky sack.

As we were making our way south we passed the area we saw the four camels and they were in almost the exact same spot. It is a private nature reserve. We also saw our first herd of wildebeests. They were really frisky butting and chasing each other around.

Too bad we didn’t have the camera ready as we were driving as along came a 3 ton truck in the opposite direction holding as many standing children, estimated around 6 years old, as the back could hold. We would guess well over 30 of them all smiling and holding onto each other to stay on their feet.

Pretty barren drive again which seems to be the way it is in much of the Northern Cape. We stopped at Wimpy’s for our first and hopefully last fast food lunch but we chose this as it has Wi-Fi so we were able to post our blog.

As it was still pretty early we decided to continue south before finding a spot for the night. We couldn’t find anything and ended up keeping on going. Asked at a gas station but that was no help. We finally made it to a town called Prieska where we saw a sign for a caravan park, followed the road around through a residential area to what appeared to be a very nice spot. The only thing was no one was there and no one answered the bell. We saw a guest house around the corner so went there for help. They tried phoning the people including calling their cell number but no answer. He did say he knew they played lawn bowling so redirected us there to look for them. We had seen all the cars at the bowling greens when we made our way to the park. Doug got out and talked to people there but the caravan park owners, who are apparently very good lawn bowlers, were at a competition out of town. Their daughter was supposed to be looking after things so a lady got into her truck and tried to track the daughter down –no luck. The nice lady who tried to help us suggested that we perhaps should have booked. By this time we had lost the better part of an hour and were running out of daylight so we were stuck (no motorhome operation at night). The caravan park owners did not even have the decency to hang a closed sign out or even leave a closed message on their phone. No other camping in town. So we went back to the River View Guest House and checked in. We were ushered in to a very minimal room for $80/night soon to find out that neither the heat nor the TV worked.  But at least it had internet access. For about ½ hour. Then it quit. We complained about the internet first – oh, we can’t use it now either and the owner’s away and we don’t know what to do. Doug suggested he would fix their router for them but they did not know where that was either. Then it got chilly in the room so we complained about that next. After phoning the owner (!) their answer was to move us to another room. The guy led us down an outside dark, cobblestoned passageway using the light from his cell phone as a guide (really). Here the bedside lamps were broken and the heater buzzed loudly without putting out much heat – at least we couldn’t get much heat out of it as there were no operation instructions. Our camper, meanwhile, was sitting out on the street (too big to get into the enclosed parking) which worried us both so Doug finally ended a sleepless night at 3 am and went out and sat/dozed in it.

We find the cell phone “flashlight” ludicrous. Even the most tattered black person on the street will be carrying a cell phone. We have told a few people here we don’t have one and they look at us like we have two heads. We have had problems checking into campsites before because we don’t have a phone.

Bushman hut

Wildebeest

Camel thorn sunset

 

Sunday, May 11, 2014 Riverside Caravan Park (32 km South of Kimberley, NC, SA) – 426 km

After a shaky and fairly sleepless night we started our trek north. The first part of the drive was again very barren – in the first 128 km we only saw 3 cars!

Along the road there were many areas where farmers have put in the old fashion windmills to draw water, which is held in corrugated metal containers. Of course that is where we were seeing most of the farm animals. Today there were also signs to watch for horses on the road, which we did see in a few places. Not sure if these are wild or farm animals.

We seem to be seeing a few more motorhomes the past few days and they all are doing the “motorhome wave”. Reminds us of our time in Australia.

Our mission today was to get into the Mokala National Park. We had heard conflicting reports on the condition of the road into the park. Our neighbour from yesterday morning had told Doug the road was good but some people eating dinner next to us last evening told us it was horrid. We did find the 60 km of corrugated dirt road a bit of a shake for the motorhome. Maybe it is easier in a more appropriate vehicle.

We had hoped to stay in the park for the night but were unable to get a camp spot and have since learned there are only 8 spots in the entire park! Lots of chalets and they would have fixed us up with one of them but we decided to just make use of our “Wild Card” and gain entrance to the park for a drive through. When we got to the gate you had to use a two way radio to contact the reception desk and they then opened the electric gate. They were situated 6 dusty rough km into the park. We did manage to see wildebeests, warthogs, gemsbok, ostrich, monkeys (BTW we saw our first monkey as road kill today) and a few other things, but no sign of the giraffe and rhino that supposedly make this their home. We did discuss going back in again tomorrow but really don’t want to put us and the motorhome through that drive again. Boy, someone should get a grader business going here!

Our mission today was to find a spot to camp and set up camp before dark so Doug could cook a nice Mother’s day dinner.  We had seen the Riverside Country Club and Caravan Park in the book so headed for it. It is a very nice campground set on the river and associated with a farm. Norma even found two burrowing dung beetles, one dead and one alive. The dead one posed quite nicely for a photo op. What a great mother’s day present, or so Doug thinks! It is nice to be back in the motorhome after 3 days in rooms. We have visions of the roosters waking us but who cares.

Campground

Mother's Day present