Day 106 The Growcery, Vioolsdrift, South Africa

Woke to the delights of a bout of food poisoning – not ideal for a long day’s drive and meant for a late start on the road.  The road south to Rosh Pinah is alongside the diamond mining area which is out of bounds but the mines are out of sight so it is not possible to see the impact on the landscape.  Ian’s collection of “diamonds” continues to grow – it is a strange assortment of rocks but I am sure none is a diamond which is just as well as the rules around collecting diamonds is pretty strict! 

Rosh Pinah is at the heart of mining country with the Skorpion zinc mine just to the north and the town itself has a large mine with huge slag heaps all around.  The town has not changed much since we were here four years ago except there is some efforts ongoing now to reinstate plants on the slag heaps – it will take years to hide the enormous grey mounds though.

Ian really wanted to cross into South Africa on the pontoon and drive through the Richterveld National Park but we eventually decided that we really didn’t have enough time so we headed through the Al-Ais Transfrontier Park towards the border.  

This road hugs the Orange river for a large part of the journey and goes through the middle of stunning mountain scenery on both the Namibian and South African sides of the river.  

As we exited the gorge we were surprised to find ourselves surrounded by vineyards and passed a gigantic shanty town made of straw huts housing the seasonal grape pickers – the first harvest has apparently just happened.

The border crossing was really smooth and we soon found ourselves heading back along the Orange River but this time on the South African side for 12 km to the Growcery Campsite.  The guys running the campsite seemed to be trying a bit too hard to be “cool” but we were directed to a grassy spot on the banks of the river.  

Our space did have a car already parked in it but someone who had left it in the shade (without permission) when they went on their 4 day rafting trip – Ian spent the evening considering various ways of moving it with the help of our landrover!