Road Trip Day 2: Colesberg - Bela-Bela

When Anton woke me up at 4h45 this morning and asked me if I wanted to get up, I didn't realise the question was rhetorical.  And so, we had another early morning, hitting the road at 5h15 and heading straight for Bloemfontein.  Unfortunately it was too dark to stop at Gariep Dam, but atleast today I got to see the sunrise.  It was beautiful, at one point the sun was actually red (unfortunately you can't see it on the pictures). I took about 80 pictures as the sun rose, the early morning light made everything seem to beautiful.  After the sun was up though - everything was flat and dusty.

After breakfast and a visit with some of Anton's friends in Bloemfontein, we headed to Riebeeckstad - Anton's hometown.  After he showed me his old home and old school, we hit the road again - straight to Bela-Bela, via Gauteng.

Having never driven through Johannesburg, I am not really sure what I was expecting.  In some ways it was exactly what I thought it would be: a big city with lots of cars.  But I think I was also expecting something more.

After we got through Johannesburg and our last few toll roads, the next stop was finally Bela-Bela.  The road was boring again, but the sun provided some nice shots as it started to set.

Finally, after 12 hours on the road, we made it to Bela-Bela and the guest farm where we are spending the night.  They upgraded us from a double room to a 2 bedroom self catering cottage, which is really nice and comfortable, and such a nice treat.  We even saw some buck from out porch. Bela-Bela itself (from what we have seen) is a small, quaint town and we are looking forward to hitting the hot springs tomorrow morning before we make the final part of our trek to Kruger National Park.

Yesterday my pet peeve was stop/go roadworks. Today it was tollroads.  Everytime I saw that yellow circle with "T" ...sigh. We must have gone through about 8 today. And I understand there will be even more tomorrow.  The tolls have generally been between R30 and R40 - except for 2 which were under R15.

So far I have been through 4 provinces which I have never visited before: Northern Cape, Free State, Gauteng and Limpopo.  And tomorrow I will add Mpumalanga to that list.