Adventure and Photography

Great Adventure Bike trip to the Northern Cape around the Orange River in South Africa

2014-03-23T17:33:00.000+02:00

Hennops 4x4 Trail South Africa

2011-07-05T16:20:00.005+02:00

De Wildt 4x4 Trail in South Africa

2011-06-22T15:23:00.004+02:00

One trip, so many awesome moments

2011-04-01T14:56:00.020+02:00

Me and a couple of friends went on an amazing Adventure Mike trip to ride some of South Africa’s well known wonders. The aim was to ride through the Drakensberg mountains in KZN on dirt tracks, to ride the infamous Sani Pass into Lesotho, to ride on dirt roads over the Maluti mountains in Lesotho, to ride the amazing tar road pass to Butha-Buthe, to go through the Golden Gate Highlands National Park in South Africa and lastly to visit Clarens in the Freestate. And we did it!!! It was tough and tiring, but mostly because we did it all in three days. I suggest adding another one or two days. It is worth it! I have so many stories to tell. No picture can capture the true experience. Here are some of my memories…

Here is the video if you like or have a look at the photos...

On the way to KZN

On the road between Nottingham road and Underberg

Fist camp at Sani Backpackers Lodge

On the way to Sani Pass

Sani Pass !!!

Just bellow the Sani Pass

Made it up Sani Pass

Where to find food? Ask a local.

Ice Cold Lesotho River swim

A typical Lesotho Hut

Lesotho

Golden Gate

Lekker braai at the Golden Gate camp

Clarens

The Drakensberg Mountains

2011-01-07T11:30:00.001+02:00

My family and I recently went on holiday, camping in the Central Drakensberg Mountains in South Africa. This year the whole area received exceptionally high rainfall. This limited my photo opportunities, so I had to take what I could get. This is a place of awesome beauty. With a rich history and exceptional fauna and flora. The mountains are a rock and mountain climbers dream. There are hundreds of water falls, mountains streams and rivers.

Champagne Castle 3377m

Cathkin Peak 3149m and Sterkhorn Mount Momory 2979m

Notice the thousands of Cliff-Swallows above the mountain.

Dragon's Back

Pelgrims Rest Explorer Tour

2010-11-29T10:22:00.003+02:00

This is a great Adventure Motorcycling trip through Limpopo and Mpumalanga South Africa. Visiting places like Pelgrims Rest, Graskop, God's Window valley, Kings Highway and so much more...

Unexpected surprises while on an adventure bike trip

2010-11-24T16:20:00.001+02:00

One thing I have learned while exploring in South Africa is, you never know what is around the next corner. It is quite astounding to me how little is known about our beautiful country. And I don’t mean foreigners or tourists. I refer to local South Africans, and I include myself in there. I love the diversity that is available to us in SA. Whether it is nature, adventure, adrenalin or culture that excites you, we have it all. Many of my friends in Europe don’t have the freedom to take the nearest dirt road and just see were it leads. I use every opportunity I get to enjoy and explore the dirt roads or more unknown areas of our country. That said - in most instances we go to the popular places and then explore in those regions.

Four of us did a trip from Johannesburg to Barberton in Mpumalanga a while ago. My wife and I went down on my BMW R1200 GS on the Friday. There we met up with family and got to see the little town and its history in the local museum. My friend and his wife came down on his BMW R1150 GS Adventure on the Saturday. Because they had more time on the Saturday to ride down to Barberton, they took many interesting dirt roads. They arrived the Saturday afternoon at the hotel where we enjoyed the local hospitality. The Sunday we set off on our adventure ride to the Swaziland border, and a little known track that runs along side the boarder with Swaziland.

Riding on these amazing winding roads in the mountains, really makes you appreciate the blessing of SA.

The adrenalin starts to pump when you realize where you need to go down the mountains into the valleys bellow. We traveled on this one particular dirt road in the valley, when suddenly things changed!

Here in the middle of nowhere we came across a beautiful golf course. Then the dirt road changed into a narrow tar road, and then…

There it was, a small ghost town.

There was not one person in this beautiful little town in the middle of nowhere. You can see how beautiful this place was in its heydays. No more than 500 meters on, you drive through a open boom gate and back on to a dirt road.

What an amazing discovery for us. This is an example of what awaits us if we are will to go off the beaten track.

I dare you to go out there and find some of these unexpected surprises, and then share them with me and others. Lets enjoy the blessings we have!!

The Mountains

2010-11-17T15:52:00.002+02:00

Mountains bring back fond memories of my childhood. I used to spend allot of time hiking and exploring in the Magaliesberg mountains where I grew up. I did many hikes in the Mountains in Mpumalanga as well. Well later in life I moved away to the city, which meant that I only got to enjoy the mountains on holidays and the odd weekend trip. Mountains inspire me now more than ever. You can even hear the excitement in my children's voices when they notice the mountains. Some mountains are special because of there cliffs, water falls and clear cold pools,

And some are special because of their grassy coat,

Some are beautiful from afar,

And some from on top,

Others are beautiful to look at,

And others are beautiful to concur.

Fun, Scary and Rewarding Adventure Photos

2010-11-11T15:13:00.002+02:00

One thing I have found taking pictures in the outdoors is that you never know what’s next. Some times it is planning the whole scene and timing it just right, but sometimes it is absolute luck and surprise. Some times it takes patients and sometimes it takes courage. Like this one. We were on holiday, camping at Marakele park in the North West province of South Africa. The camp site is completely open to nature. No fences or walls. I was walking near our campsite when I saw this beast. Make no mistake. A white rhino like this one, is as large as a car and weighs as much.

White Rhino in Marakele park in North West province, South Africa

This one is a great example of a good shot with a great surprise. Now for anyone who knows Klipspringer antelope, you will know how difficult it is to get a good shot of this shy little antelope that weighs between 11kg and 13kg and stands no more that 600mm high. Well when I took this shot, I did not realize that there were another two standing right behind him in a perfect pose. I only saw this when I zoomed in on the main object on my computer. You might have to zoom in to see.

How many do you see?

I also enjoy taking pictures of static landscapes like this dead tree trunk in a watering hole for the animals at Marloth park just on the border of the Kruger National Park in South Africa. Again a great surprise awaited me when I had a look at the picture on my computer. Look at the picture on the bottom right hand corner. You will see a jumping impala in midair.

Impala in midair?

Adventure 4x4 Photos

2010-11-09T12:29:00.007+02:00

There are just so many 4x4 activities. I enjoy most of them like Trail driving, Overlanding and general Camping with my family. I am lucky that my family also enjoy the outdoors and 4x4 activities. This mean that we get to travel and explore this beautiful Country we live in together. Tent camping brings a unique dynamic to vacationing. It forces us to make compromises and to work together as a team. This in it self can cause some friction which in turn brings us closer together after we resolved our differences. My most enjoyable and memorable holidays were Camping holidays. We do much more family activities during these holidays. This brings us closer together, and we need this when we go through the normal busyness of life. I love looking at photos of previous vacations and reminiscing with my wife and children over the fun we had. We camp as much as we can, but sadly this isn't often enough.

Blyde River Canyon

Marloth Park next to the Kruger Park

Hennops 4x4 Trail

Dewildt 4x4 Trail

Adventure Bike Riding

2010-11-08T14:42:00.027+02:00

This weekend a couple of my buddies and I went riding with our adventure bikes. We ride a range of different bikes. This is often the subject of some bantering between us. Especially when something goes wrong with someone’s bike. After a bit of trail riding we got to our coffee and biscuit stop next to a dam and wetland. Here one of our friends got very intense when he talked about some TV program that portrait his bike brand as an incapable bike that breaks down. So if something was going to happen to someone, it had to happen to him, and it did! Immediately after the coffee, we all got on our bikes to continue with the trail, but our friends bike wouldn’t start. One of the guys grabbed his camera to capture us trying to push start our friend. You can imagine the bantering after this incident.

I wanted to findr some new dirt roads in our area that would be fun, technical and have scenery. Going through my maps and Google earth, I found some good trails that would fit these criteria, but they were closed of by selfish land owners. I say selfish because we would have loved to see these areas. There were some great mountain trails. Some went through rivers. These were roads that were open not to long ago, but the land owners have changed or they just decided to close them off. I understand that some of these properties needs to be secured, but then I would like to still have the option to arrange for us to pass through the gates. We would also like to enjoy these beautiful parts of our country. We are very echo friendly bikers. We enjoy and cherish nature and respect other people’s property.

It wasn't all bad. We had a great time, because we still found a new road that took us in another direction. We had a delicious breakfast, which is a requirement after a good offroad trip. And after the breakfast we headed home, but not before finding another fun and very technical trail over some koppies. What another great breakfast trip, with a great group of friends.

Sunset over Barberton

Riding near Verena to Loskop Dam

Riding near Verena to Loskop Dam - HD Video

Adventure photography

2010-11-02T16:06:00.022+02:00

So I decided to share some of my wonderful experiences in South Africa with the photos I take. I know I am no professional photographer, but I enjoy the hobby and especially the scenery and objects in my photos. I take these photos while on motorbike and off-road trips. Some are taken while camping with my family. I realized that I live in one of the most awesome places in the world. We have fantastic weather and the nature is almost unrivaled. I get to enjoy mountains, forests, bushvelt, savannas, alps, desserts and much more. I am blessed to enjoy all of this with my family and friends in its intended natural beauty. The only problem I have is that I have not been able to take even one photo that captures the true emotion and feeling of experiencing these awesome wonders.

Just look at what I get to see and experience. To take this photo, me and a friend of mine had to ride up a difficult pass with our adventure motorcycles through a forest to the top of a mountain. This is a unique site and pass. Vary few people ever see this view from this spot. What a privilege!

Small pool next to the Blyde river Canyon

Three Rondawels in the Blyde river Canyon

My Landy called Yster Vark

Pass in the Yellow Wood forrest near Knysna

View in the beginning of Baviaanskloof

The awesome Baviaanskloof