From Cape Town to Nairobi on a Land Rover, Part 1: South Africa

BEFORE WE GOT THERE

When we first started planning this trip I said "No, I’m not going, I need to finish my travels by the end of the year 2014 and start looking for a new job." But then I thought about and wondered how could I say no to that. A perfect car, good company and thousands of kilometers on the road.  This could be a trip of a lifetime for me - and a great adventure.   

In the end I agreed. We started working on the schedule - my friend Claudio (The Man with the Land Rover) already had a rough route plan in mind, Between the 16^th of December 2014 and 9^th of March 2015 we should be travelling in my Claudio's Land Rover from Cape Town in South Africa all the way to Nairobi in Kenya. We are going to camp for most of the trip, mostly at designated campsites but at times also out in the wild when there are no campsites nearby. I can’t decide whether I’m more worried or more excited about the prospect of camping out in the African wilderness. 

Claudio has done similar trips before, once on a motorbike as part of his around the world tour when he and his friend drove up from Cape Town to Switzerland (having already been around the rest of the world). But me? Oh well, I’ve camped in Finland, although probably most of it with the Finnish army during my voluntary national service year. I’ve camped out in the English countryside with an awesomely laid back group of outdoor loving people. For travels, I think I’ve only camped in Vietnam and in Peru, where on both trips we had a guide and a cook with us. This is not the kind of trip where you have a guide to tell you where to go and a cook who prepares your meal!

Needless to say, he will be doing most, or perhaps all of the driving. With  my driving skills and not having gained any driving experience in the past 11 years, driving on a right hand drive on dirt roads is not a good idea. Anyway, the offer was valid even if I can’t drive (I offered to cook instead). When writing this first chapter I’m already in Namibia, at Sossusvlei campsite.

Our updated route map can be found at: https://share.delorme.com/ClaudioAngelini
This page will update from Claudio's satellite tracker - more or less on real time.

INTO CAPETOWN AND UP NORTH

The plan was to fly to Cape Town from Finland (from Switzerland for my friend). We met at Heathrow airport and flew down to Cape Town, collected Claudio’s car, checked in at the hostel and spent the next few days mostly gearing up for the trip. Although we had both planned this well ahead of time, due to our other travels (I was in China learning Chinese and Claudio was working in Congo) we still ended up with having to do some equipment shopping and gearing up both ourselves and the the car still in our first week. It all went relatively smoothly and we even had time to go see the Table Mountain and Cape of Good Hope, which I was delighted about since it was my first time in South Africa.

On top of the Table Mountain in Cape Town

Penguins, penguins, penguins. They are so funny and cute.
These guys live in Betty's Bay where we stopped on the same trip
when we went to meet a Finnish couple in Somerset West,
just outside Cape Town.

View of the cape of Good Hope.

We are planning to camp out all the way, so Claudio has equipped this car so well it now looks like a masterpiece. We have a rooftop tent that fits two people easily (even when one is as tall as Claudio), an awning that provides shade and rain protection on two sides of the car (very much necessary in this climate) four camping chairs (we of course need them in two different styles, one for eating and one for chilling), a 40-litre water tank with a pump and a shower hose (the water system also comes with a tap on each side of the car for washing hands), an 18-litre plastic jerry can with a water filtering system for drinking water (it has a carbon filter and a chemical cleaning system – pour any water in and take clean drinking water out, it’s awesome), a fridge (there are two batteries in the car so that we can keep the fridge running), an electrical outlet system with a European plug that connects to the same battery that runs the fridge (so that we can use computers and charge electrical items), sandboards, two gas bottles, a gas cooker, a camping stove (the last one expected to be mostly in use when we do hiking in Malawi and if we climb Kilimanjaro), lots of tools for repairs (Claudio is a mechanic so he can fix most issues with the car, as long as we can find the parts), two spare tyres, and most importantly a Finnish axe (which I bought with me in my luggage when I arrived). Amongst the sillier things that we have with us we have a fondue set (how could a Swiss person go ANYWHERE without a fondue pot?), Finnish ginger bread cookies  and a bottle of glogg (drinking hot spiced wine in this climate feels a little silly but – it is Christmas!)

The Landy.
On the road from Cape Town to the North, some time on our first day on the road.

Equipped this well we set off towards our first stop, towards the Augrabies Falls on the 22^nd of December – not without first stopping at one of the supermarkets to pack the car full of food. Unfortunately we also had to make an extra stop at the dentist, as I had been suffering of toothache and headache for two days. Luckily it seemed the issue was minor. I can have it fixed properly once I come back home - a wisdom tooth biting into my cheek causing an infection.  I was prescribed 7 days of antibiotics and we could continue the journey.

The drive up to Augrabies  Falls is too long to make in one day, so after we had driven for hundreds of kilometers of roads which at some point in time changed into rather monotonous and arid dirt tracks with not much to see, we stopped for the night somewhere near Calvinia just before nightfall, set up the tent, cooked a nice dinner and went to bed (not without me wondering whether camping right at a roadside in South Africa is a good idea but since it was a very remote part of the country I didn’t really care too much and slept rather well. I woke up in the morning and realized that the hyeenas had not eaten me, nor did the roadside bandits attack us. Oh well, then I’ll have to get out of bed an make some breakfast, pack up and off we go.

We arrived at Augrabies Falls campsite around 3pm which is the hottest time of the day. Setting up the tent and campsite in this wather was rather arduous and it didn’t happen without quarrels. I was a little disheartened that it was days 2 on the road and we were already fighting. I tried to put up with what I considered to be barking from the Camping Nazi and hoped that maybe we can work things out as the trip goes along. To Claudio’s defense, he had done all the driving and must have been much more tired than I was, and we were both quite hungry only having had a snack for lunch. We stayed two nights at Augrabies and mostly continued quarreling (I felt like he was interrupting everything I was trying to get done with shouting me over to help him, getting upset if I wasn’t there in a second, and accusing me of things that made no sense. I guess he  in turn felt like I was utterly useless and didn’t’ do anything and wasn’t there to help him when he needed me). Claudio had also spotted the first issue with a car: The auxiliary battery that runs the fridge wasn’t charging properly and we had to use an electric outlet to plug directly into to charge it on our second night in Augrabies. It was strange as we shouldn’t have that many devices plugged into it that it should be overloaded.  All in all with the bickering and the issues with the batteries, it wasn’t the best start for a road trip. Despite thoughts on both sides of maybe needing to part ways we are trying to work this out and see if we could find a common tune, and head towards Namibia. Hopefuly we can also resolve the issue with the car battery.

Our campsite at Augrabies Falls National Park.
On the left hand side is part of our Christmas work camp - we were
setting up a frame under the mattress in the tent to lift the mat off the ground
and prevent it from absorbing moisture and growing mold. 

Here is one of our "friends" - I didin't manage to capture it in full action
inside the engine but here it is after its mischief, trying to
look innocent. "What? Me? Been where? Done what?"