Distance – 78 km
Climb – 708 m
Time – 5 hr 03 min
Av Heart Rate – 122 bpm
Max Heart Rate – 182 bpm
I am blogging to you from Barrydale, possibly the coolest town in South Africa.
The town is wall-to-wall quirky, full of little boutique hotels, restaurants and artsy gift shops. We didn’’t stay in any of them. Instead, we are staying at the Dungbeetle pub.
Our first floor backpackers room with 6 beds is up a flight of rickety wooden stairs directly above the Dungbeetle bar which is open from from 10.00 a.m. right through to 01.00 a.m. If Bear Grylls were to visit Barrydale, he would stay at the Dungbeetle.
Easily the nicest thing about Barrydale is that Adam was able to leave his fully-packed car outside on the street overnight, despite the fact that his electric windows are stuck in the fully down position after the electronics drowned in Sunday’s hailstorm. I want to live in Barrydale.
In yesterday’s blog I erroneously described the Klein Karoo as being possibly boring in places. Let me fix that right now. The section of the Route 62 that we rode from Ladismith down to Barrydale was absolutely glorious, thankfully with more downhills than up. Our horizons today were cluttered with rugged mountains, some of which we rode around instead of over. The Klein Karoo is properly big sky country. We also stopped at Ronnie’s Sex Shop for a drink and the obligatory team photo. Wallace was less than impressed with Ronnie’s and pissed on it.
3 days into this Tour and the hill detector on my bike is fully functioning, and the last 26 kilometers into Barrydale, packed with almost all the day’s climb, were longer than the first 50 kilometers.
Thankfully I was able to move the pink Dick of the Day wig and tutu on to Gary Prothero after he was captured on camera riding up a steep hill on his back wheel in blatant disregard of the Old Legs’s strict health and safety regulations. I say thankfully because it is bloody hot under that wig and people look at you funny, even in very cool Barrydale.
Andrew Chadwick was the deserved Hero of the Day for completing the longest ride of his career. Andrew is peaking nicely for the Argus. I hope to con him into joining us on our longer Tours in the future.
We are riding from Wilderness to Cape Town to raise money and awareness for Zimbabwe’s pensioners. Please follow the donate prompts on www.oldlegstour.com.
Until my next blog from Bredasdorp, enjoy and pedal if you can, but avoid wearing the pink wig – Eric Chicken Legs de Jong