The day started as normal... warfare, yes the sun rose and an intense mental battle was fought to get me out of the tent and into the cold morning air... it was 6:22am when I finally emerged from my cocoon a fully fledged cyclist, complete with Lycra and a sunhat that, according to one observer makes me look "like a cross between Laurence of Arabia, and a complete twit".
I was headed over Tradouw pass and into the Little Karroo a beautiful semi desert region and the day promised to be a scorcher. Not quite 'Joan of Arc was just a wuss' hot, but enough to get me moving early. I slowly trundeled up the pass with waves of encouragement and looks of bewilderment from local drivers. Eventually I reached the town of Barrydale where I sampled the local gelato and waited out the worst of the heat. The proprietor of the gelateria Wendy told me that I simply must stop at Ronnies Sex Shop a local landmark just a few km shy of my destination for the night.
Twenty five kilometers down the road I came across a little building with Ronnies Sex Shop scrawled in big red letters across the side. This must be the place I said to myself as I went in and asked the barmaid for sex... she said they were out.. but they did have something better! it makes women look better and men look pregnant, and if the waistlines around the room were anything to go by, a spate of twins were expected soon. I made do with the cold shoulder and an icy beer.
Ronnies was quite an industry with over 1000 unsatisfied customers every day during the holiday period, and its certainly the only sex shop I've heard of selling souvenir aprons. Inside Ronnies the decor consisted of hundreds of autographed pairs of women's panties, bras and men's baseball caps suspended from the ceiling... which struck me as rather odd, and could only lead me to the conclusion that there are a lot of d**kheads in South Africa (although to be fair most of them were probably European tourists).
Anyway I had to get moving, 4km uphill along a gravel road lay my destination for the night, the Warmwatersberg campsite and hot springs. When I got there I was informed that the price for camping on the long weekend holiday was an astronomical R235 or $23.5USD. The receptionist kindly suggested I go back to Ronnies and ask about camping there, she was also kind enough to offer me a free swim in the hot springs... I refrained from pointing out the salient point, that it was over 32 degrees Celsius (about 90F) why on earth would I want to sit in a dirty* pool of tepid water in this heat?!
Back to Ronnies, I asked to spend the night; "Not a problem" they said "Camp on the lawn, it's not every night you get to sleep as a sex shop is it?!", which got me thinking... in truth half the hotels and motels in... no half the hotels and all of the motels in Latin America were used for little else, some with decor to match and filth on the tele**. It's usually a clue when they try to charge for the room by the hour, and while most were impeccably clean, others made you wonder if it wasn't safer sleeping outside on the streets. Often they only had double beds and either Matt or I would 'camp' on the floor.
In this case I was very comfortable camping out on the lawn behind Ronnies and spent a quiet night watching the new series of Topgear with the bar staff. Topgear is very popular here in South Africa... and it shows as South African drivers just love to take their reasonably priced cars around at 200kmph on the race course that is the South African highway system, predictably the country has a road toll to match.
*it would be dirty by the time i got in it.
**Yes
'The Bill' is especially popular among horny Latinos.
(My brother Harry had the camera at the ready!)
