Modern Cyclist Magazine Issue 1, September 2014 | Page 47

would never manage riding the whole
way, or even a small part of this hill, but
we would bring them to this “hill from
Hell” and challenge them. Marie Anne
is the best climber of the three of us and
even she was defeated early on. Even
the baboons couldn’t get Suzie back
onto her bike.
The rest of the trail was a great ride
through forests and on forestry roads
with a couple of hills thrown in, lest we
get too comfortable. Suzie managed
to get cramp a couple of times and
the only way to sort it out was for her
to put her foot onto my thigh and me
to push her toes back while she lay
writhing on the floor. I think the foreign
tourists who we met at the end of the
trail were a bit amused by our antics.
Possibly they thought it was some kind of
ritual performed by women cyclists of a
certain age when they had conquered a
particularly difficult challenge?
We were shattered! If only we had paid
more attention to Rob’s “then there’s
the hill” remark earlier that morning. We
were early to bed that night and slept
like babies.
The following day we thought we’d keep
our legs going by doing a local ride next
to the Swartvlei, up to Cloud Nine, where
we were nearly carried away by mozzies,
a “catch me if you can” downhill into
Sedgefield, then breakfast , a turn

around the island and home. Turned out
to be a quick 20 odd kilometres with a
bit more pushing. I took myself off to the
physio in Knysna that afternoon. I think
the previous day’s exertions had sent my
back and leg muscles into spasm! Suzie
would not hear that it was sorting out her
cramp by pushing against my leg that had
caused the problem and wasn’t inclined
to share in the physio’s bill.
Bright and early next morning we loaded
the bikes (practice makes perfect!) and

bikes to a clean-up at the Cycleworks spa
that afternoon. They were filthy and needed
some love.
The following day of rest, we went to the
wonderful Wild Oats Market in Sedgefield
and had a lovely walk along the beach in
the afternoon. But plans were afoot for a
“biggie” on the Sunday – the Harkerville red
route, graded eight to 10 difficulty and taking
three to five hours. We weren’t scared, a bit
apprehensive perhaps which was borne out
by Suzie forgetting her hydration pack at the

We rode up the district
road and took a left into the
mud along the crazy creek
and the fun began.
set off for Barrington’s, again along the
Karatara road. Rob had assured us that
the blue, Crazy Creek, route was rideable.
Well it was a dairy farm and one of the
by-products of those lovely dairy cows is
copious amounts of POO!! We rode up the
district road and took a left into the mud
along the crazy creek and the fun began.
We had the most wonderful, challenging,
fairly technical ride through the forests
and along the river banks. We assured
Rob when we saw him later that yes, the
cows had been all over the track leaving
parcels all along the way!! We treated our
Suzie Winter and Jean Reynolds
looking over the sea on the
Harkerville trail.

house and only remembering just as we got
to Knysna. It was no excuse, however, as we
bought some water and ice tea and told her
to make a plan. It was going to take more
than that for her to chicken out!! We tied
the water bottle into her bottle holder with
a piece of string we found on the floor and
Marie-Anne carried the other bottle. On the
drive to Harkerville I was not reassured by
Marie Anne’s reply “see you later maybe?”
to my question of “does anybody know how
to deal with snake bites?”
We were all a bit jittery and a bit uneasy by
the man at the permit office’s description
of the route as “hectic” but we made an
escape plan, saved an emergency number
into my most unreliable phone, bought our
permits and set off.
Well what an awesome ride. Technical make
no error! Lots of roots along the forest tracks
climbing over trees fallen in our path and
pushing branches out of the way. We rode
right down to the cliffs overlooking the sea
and enjoyed the most spectacular views
while we had a snack. We had our permits
checked by the fo ɕ