What a day!

So the new addition to our family was the “Mongoose” - what you don’t know is that we also acquired a “Schwinn” – my entry level mountain bike complete with entry level components. What I learnt from G about the purchase of any bike is that it’s not about the paintwork or how attractive the bike looks (which, being a woman I thought that was very important) it’s all about the components!! So I am pleased to say that I now own a Schwinn mountain bike with Shimano components.

Now you can’t have a mountain bike without the mountain bike rack and you can’t have a mountain bike rack without a tow-bar. So my little A class was chosen as the vehicle which will be used to transport these two new additions. We have fitted the tow-bar and the mountain bike rack and my car looks quite snazzy now.

Our first mountain biking expedition into Africa was last Friday at the Ezemvelo Nature Reserve. After a long hike with G and his dad, we set off in the mid day heat to try and find the mysterious White Rhino which we were not able to spot from the car. G’s advice to me just before the ride was that should I be charged by a white rhino and her baby or any other wild animal for that matter I was under no circumstance to try and ride away from them but should rather discard by bicycle and run. I was really impressed that he believed I could out run a rhino ;-) thank love.

The dirt road/sand/rocks/incline of the hill seemed a lot harder to ride through than what I had originally expected. The first km was hard, the second even harder and by the fourth km I was finished. Having gearing down from 6 to 5 to 4 to 3 to 2 gear, G seemed to disappear into the horizon and as fast as my legs rotated I could not keep up. It was at this point that I turned my bike around waved goodbye to G and happily free wheeled down the road I had ridden up, heading back to the camping spot. I must admit that there was something quite tranquil about being on my own in the wild, I passed one Wildebeest and a family of warthogs who seemed a lot more scared of me than I was of them. Once safely back at camp I was quite proud of the fact that I had a) found my way home on my own (my sense of direction must be improving), b) not been charged or mauled by any wild animal, c) had ridden 7.9kms according to my odometer.

I loved the day out and will definitely be trying another mountain bike trail in the New Year. My first New Years resolution will be to get my mountain biking body into shape!