The N3 to Durban

After getting a shower and little breakfast to ease some of the pain from the Rustenburg car-sleeping debacle, we hit the road again for the 580-km drive from Pretoria to Durban. We had tickets to the Germany-Australia match at 8:30 that evening, and it would take us a full six hours to reach Durban (and another 45 minutes once we got there). Bill won "Man of the Match" that day for taking us the whole way despite his fatigure. I was (a) incredibly tired, and (b) as yet a novice at left-hand-side driving, so Bill got the nod.

The drive was surprisingly beautiful. Surprising because we just thought it would be a straight shot through the country. We didn't count on going through the foothills of the Drakensburg Mountains and encountering winding roads and breathtaking views. The landscape was not unlike Texas, but with mountains popping up here and there.

Owing to his fatigue, Bill needed to stop often. Some of the rest stops were mom-and-pop affairs, like this one in the middle of nowhere with the funny architecture and exotic house pets walking around.

The proprietor is a very nice Afrikaner who took an interest in our trip and asked us where we planned to stay in Durban. He was able to dispel the rumor we heard in Rustenburg that our destination, the Blue Waters Hotel, is a brothel. He also introduced us to his home made biltong, a type beef jerky that is not quite as dry as we are used to but quite delicious. At another rest stop down the highway, we picked up a second bag of biltong after finishing the first. Yum!

We discovered soccer on the radio for the first time on this leg, catching the end of Slovenia-Algeria and the whole Serbia-Ghana game. I've always enjoyed sports on the radio; it gives your imagination a workout. And the English-speaking South African announcers, particularly Michael Abrahamson, were top-notch. The Zulus may have been great too, and we could make out some of what they were saying, but we really can't opine on their play-by-play skills.

Our Hyundai Tucson served us well and never gave us any problems even though we extracted our pound of flesh from that poor car. Later, in Durban, this local guy tried to convince us that the correct pronunciation of the car is "Tuk-sun." Despite our protests that it is named after a city in Arizona that is pronounced very differently, he stuck to his view. Here it is stopped for gas and a blustery and cold rest stop. Check out our South African flag fully extended.

The Blue Waters Hotel is located at the end of the Marine Parade on the Durban oceanfront, within walking distance of the stadium. Because of its proximity to that night's Germany-Australia game, the police closed all the streets approaching the hotel. We drove around getting lost and misdirected until we figured out that we had to show our printed out hotel reservation to the right cop. Hungry and extremely tired, we almost ran out of patience, but fortunately they let us through. Fist pumps and cheers all around. The day's journey had come to an end at long last.