21 December 2023, Middelburg, 37.06km
TnB Guest House R432.00

It was sweat-hot before 0730 when we departed our guest house, the sun blistering in a cloudless sky. Shortly after 1100, our friendly breeze blew in to say hello, bringing with it a little welcome cloud cover for our last 10 of 37km. 
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Puffing slowly up our first incline, I passed a taxi stationary at a traffic light. A male passenger in the back corner seat, his elbow hooked out an open window, yelled "Hey ugogo, ry die vokken ding, man, kom aan" (Hey grandmother, ride the f'ing thing, man, come on). 
Getting out of Emalahleni was easy - a straightforward route on double-carriage roads. Getting into Middelburg was easy - a downhill run on a double-carriage road. 
The R555 that links the two towns was frightening more often than not. It is narrow, and busy with very fast-moving traffic. Every few kms there seems to be a sign warning that you are in a "High Accident Zone". Impatience makes South African drivers stupid. On a couple of occasions we were forced off the road onto the rough dirt shoulder. We either walked or rode the shoulder for extended periods, Charl taking a fall when he hit a patch of soft sand. At one point, two men in a _bakkie_ (small pick-up) stopped to accost Charl walking some distance behind me. They spent a considerable time trying to persuade him to accept a lift, saying the road was much too dangerous to cycle. On long inclines, where the road widened to double, we risked cycling the tar, much faster than the dirt. 
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Some time ago, I posted a video of a man talking of building good relationships. He amusingly talked of those who enjoyed "Type 2 Fun" ie fun in retrospect, saying they needed medical attention. Much of today was not enjoyable and I wondered why we do it. Dropping into Middelburg reminded me why. 
A wide, quiet stretch of road taking us past manicured pavements and blooming agapanthas. A cooling decline. On the outskirts of town were several cop cars parked in eucalyptus shade. I stopped to ask a rotund cop if he could recommend a good Shisanyama (shop or restaurant specialising in barbecued meat (Zulu)). He told us there was one opposite Nando's. It was not quite what we wanted, having seen and smelt freshly braaing meat at an earlier Shisanyama, but its already-prepped braai meat and pap (maize meal porridge) was pretty good. 
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Two sad things... 
1. Charl captured a photo of a man sleeping in a drainage ditch. 
2. After our nap, we walked the 400m to the OK food store for dinner supplies and padkos (road food) for our long ride to Belfast tomorrow. The pavement we walked was wide enough to easily accommodate three abreast, but an African man walking toward us stepped into the road to pass us, and back onto the sidewalk after. It was reminiscent of apartheid-era behaviour, of blacks "knowing their place". He seemed too young to have learned this except perhaps as a child, so maybe we misinterpreted a simple politeness to two oldies.