Bat Walk

Friday night we went to the Pretoria National Botanical Garden to learn a bit about Bats. The event was organized by the Gauteng Northern Regions Bat Interest Group (GnoR BIG). The aim of the meeting was to introduce some information on bats to the public. Strategicly placed mist nets were used to capture free flying bats, dont worry the bats was released afterwards.

Some of us were given bat detectors to identify the free flying bats in the garden. The echolocation sounds from the bat is picked up and transformed to audio frequency that can be herd when the bat flies over. The GnoR BIG website is very informative and if you are a bit squeamish about bats read this and get over it!

The Flikr page with of the photos of one of the demonstration bats.

Robbie Wessels at Firkin

There is a pattern starting to emerge on Thursday nights, happened last week and it happened last night again. The Firkin pub in Centurion has some great entertainment lined up and for a small cover charge it is a great way to spend your evening.





The first band that performed was a bit rough as it was the first time they did a live performance, and as luck would have it they also had to battle technical problems. If you asked me the mic was not plugged in.

We were standing about 10 meters from the stage and my small Minolta G400 can't zoom any more than this. You get the idea, live band, loud music, smoke, sweat...
Robbie Wessels is releasing his new CD soon and I even got him to sign mine, at that stage of the night I don't think he remembered it.
At stages everyone in the pub were singing along to the well known songs. There are great songs on his CD that got me singing along in an instant, today the throat is a bit sore but I'm not complaining.
We had a real good time, as can be seen from the smiles. Our friend at the next table took the photo even offered us some of the snacks. Gert, Rudie, Ursula and Me.

Gert and his friend the knight.

Sun-day Cycling

Sunday was Cape Augus day! No, we did not cycle in Cape Town unfortunately…or maybe fortunately. I've herd that it was raining and can just imagine that it is not a lot of fun on a bicycle in the wet. For everyone that does not know the Cape Augus Cycle Race is a race around the Cape peninsular, depending on the route around 109km. Have a look at the official web site, next year we are there!


So Sunday morning Ursula and I took a leisurely cycle to new stands that are set out close to Artur's Place on the picture. When we arrived at the stands we thought of going a bit further. We went on to a filling station about 25km from home. The "Route 25 Filling Station" is a good place to buy a Coke or a Powerade, neither of us are cycle fit so it is much needed at this stage.
This tuck shop is heavily fortified and you place your order through a bullet proof window, the goods are placed in a steel drawer, quite strange to buy cool drink this way.

We filled up water bottles and pressed on toward Kempton Park on the R25, only to get the wind slightly from the front. Pedaling is not so easy any more and most of the sunblock sweated off already.

We reached the Delmas road crossing and turned back to Pretoria, not fun any more. The wind was really pushing us back at this stage; fortunately there were other things to distract us a bit. A motor club held a meeting and every couple of minutes a classic sports car passed us, looked like a rally of some sort. We passed "Microland" a small airfield for micro light airplanes. A friend of mine has his plain hangered there.

A traffic sign next to the road indicates that Pretoria is 37km further; at this stage I did not want to think about the distance, just keep going. We were both tired but we had to keep peddling, hunger was also settling in. The Delmas road is actually not bad to cycle on thanks to the hard shoulder with the yellow line; the traffic is also very light especially on Sundays.

Suddenly my rear tyre was flat, nearly a disaster cause I left my cycling bag with spare tube and patch kit at home. Don't want to point fingers but someone was chasing me when we left home. Ursula was not feeling well at this stage and rested, while it took a couple of minutes to replace the tube with a spare that was in Ursula's bag.

We set off again trying to encourage each other. My legs were soft and I had no power left. We passed Rietvlei Nature reserve and the wind was still not letting up, water bottles were empty at this stage. The sun was beating down relentlessly and I was just looking forward to the first shop where I could buy something to eat.

At the first garage shop my left calf muscle cramped up as I tried to get off my bike. I unceremoniously fell on the floor with my bike on top of me, should have drunk more water, Ursula was so tired she did not even laugh at me. We stocked up on chocolate and cool drink that barely touched sides, but we immediately felt much better. We were no longer shaky with hunger, just tired….. Well finally we made it home.

We did 70km on Ursula's cycle computer; next time we choose a less windy day, take food and drinks along, but most importantly SUNBLOCK. Three hours in the African sun with only factor 30 sunblock on your legs is not a pretty sight.