{"id":14587,"date":"2016-02-20T21:31:18","date_gmt":"2016-02-20T21:31:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.geoffjones.com\/?p=14587"},"modified":"2016-02-20T21:31:18","modified_gmt":"2016-02-20T21:31:18","slug":"14587","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsite.geoffjones.com\/?p=14587","title":{"rendered":"My next bike ride (Africa) begins."},"content":{"rendered":"

After 68 years I’ve finally made it to South Africa and If first impressions count then I like it \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n

Since my last little biking trip to Cuba I’ve enjoyed a week in January snowboarding, \u00a0Total luxury and perfect conditions, staying at the superlative Chalet Du Coin\u00a0a<\/a>t\u00a0the centre of Les Gets, boarding\u00a0with fellow residents\u00a0\u00a0from Jersey & Colchester.<\/p>\n

This was followed in February by two weeks in El Medano, Tenerife with Sally<\/a>. We rented bikes for 6 of the days and managed 8,800 feet of climbing in one go by climbing Teide<\/a>.\u00a0\u00a0During the stay I\u00a0became addicted to apple crumble from Rosmarino<\/a>\u00a0which no doubt contributed to my 2kg weight gain whilst in Tenerife.<\/p>\n

Now to my latest mini adventure which is 56 days in Southern Africa where I’m hoping to bike\u00a0The Garden Route to Cape Town and to visit Victoria Falls a total of 2,500 miles biking this\u00a0is highly unlikely in the 56 days I have, So some hops by faster transport are called for \ud83d\ude41<\/p>\n

The 10 hour overnight flight to Jo’burg was a bit of a nightmare sandwiched between a rugby prop and a family with two crying babies \ud83d\ude41 Immigration was rapidly cleared (visa required line) I then was charmingly ripped of \u00a320 by two porters transferring the bike and checking me in for the flight to Port Elizabeth. Whilst waiting for the flight I bought a Vodacom SIM for about \u00a0\u00a310 per GB.<\/p>\n

Nearly missed the flight after waiting at the airport for 7 hours \ud83d\ude41 I was successfully met at the airport by Angelika from GB’s Guesthouse, after a quick burger by the sea I finally collapsed in bed at 11pm only to be woken by a violent storm at 1.30am \ud83d\ude41<\/p>\n

\"Bike<\/a>
Bike waiting to start its Africa trip<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This room, accommodation\u00a0and the breakfast this morning are\u00a0outstanding, easily deserving its 9.2 reputation. I quickly assembled the bike, not damaged at all even though the wheel nuts had\u00a0broken through\u00a0the cardboard box. I did a little spin in the 30+mph winds around the town with the South African Army and Navy putting on a show of strength ready for The President’s visit tomorrow, unfortunately he won’t see me as I’m of to the Addo game reserve \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n

\"Cape
Cape Recife Lighthouse<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The afternoon was a gorgeous walk along a 2 mile boardwalk and sandy beaches to the lighthouse at Cape Recife after a coffee at the SAMREC cafe (who knew that penguins can catch avian malaria\/) I returned\u00a0in pouring rain \ud83d\ude41 \ud83d\ude41<\/p>\n

\"Roast
Roast Veg Wellington<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Tonight was an awesome meal in the presence of all The President’s Men (he apparently dined in his room). Amazing two courses and two pints for\u00a0\u00a310<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After 68 years I’ve finally made it to South Africa and If first impressions count then I like it \ud83d\ude42 Since my last little biking trip to Cuba I’ve enjoyed a week in January snowboarding, \u00a0Total luxury and perfect conditions, staying at the superlative Chalet Du Coin\u00a0at\u00a0the centre of Les Gets, boarding\u00a0with fellow residents\u00a0\u00a0from Jersey […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14587","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-africa","category-biking"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsite.geoffjones.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14587","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsite.geoffjones.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsite.geoffjones.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsite.geoffjones.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsite.geoffjones.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14587"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newsite.geoffjones.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14587\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsite.geoffjones.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14587"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsite.geoffjones.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14587"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsite.geoffjones.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14587"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}