The frogs had begun making their
nightly racket, so Jane and I retired
to bed but were promptly wakened
again by Liz, who had managed to
lock herself out on her balcony. She
bravely climbed over the balcony
onto some snake and lizard infested
rocks, then had to climb back onto
the balcony with the hotel owner like
some modern-day Romeo and Juliet
with a screwdriver to release the
door.
The next morning, Alex just shook
his head in despair when we told him
about Liz’s mishap. He was begin-
ning to understand that looking after
three Curvy Riders was going to be
more fun than he imagined.
Alex sprayed the bike chains to
clean off the dust, but he was losing
the battle. The bikes and we were
gradually turning into a dull beige
colour and my lovely pale grey Rev’it
jacket turned muddy brown. Not to
worry, it was all part of the adven-
ture.
We carried on along more dirt
roads sometimes with very poor vis-
ibility. The local trucks sped along,
stirring up clouds of swirling dust
which blanked my vision. I rode
blindly through, trusting to the god
of motorcycling that I would come
safely out the other side. Emerging
onto a tarmac road, we stopped for a
minute to clean visors, to drink away
the dust and to change the bikes back
to ‘road’ mode.
Alex informed us of the day’s ride
that would take us into Swaziland
along a disputed road. He explained
that the locals wanted a new road so
in order to protest about the exist-
ing carriageway, they would block
the way with trees and dig it up into
potholes. To affect repairs, the pot-
holes were uselessly filled with sand
which then blew and spread across
the road. We spent an enjoyable (not)
hour playing ‘dodge the pot-hole’.
The Swaziland border was a short
checkpoint where we had to present
TRAVERSE 53
our passports and pay a small ‘road
tax’ fee in order to ride our bikes in
Swaziland. Crossing the border took
us into some beautiful green moun-
tain scenery and the difference was
immediately noticeable between the
two countries. Swaziland seemed
better cared for and more prosper-
ous but shortly afterwards we were
stopped by the police for a roadside
check. They simply looked over our
documents and we were soon on our
way again.
That evening, we rode into Mlil-
wane, the first of the big safari parks
on our itinerary. This was so exciting!
Maybe we would see the big five! Dat-
ing to the time of the big game hunt-
ers, ‘the big five’ nowadays refers to
the sighting (not shooting thankfully)
of lions, buffalo, elephants, rhinocer-
os and leopards.
The accommodation at Mlilwane
consisted of little compounds of
thatched grass huts. They were fas-
cinating in their construction and as-