For the weekend that we were in Kwazulu-Natal my parents and sister took the three of us into the Drakensburg Mountains to an area called The Sani Pass. It is one of the routes into the land-locked mountaintop Kingdom of Lesotho. We stayed at the Sani Pass hotel and, on the Saturday, were driven up the VERY winding and steep Sani Pass in a four-wheel drive Landrover. We were treated to some of the most stunning views of where we had come from and where we were going to.
We had a really interesting and informed guide so were told a lot about the local people and how they lived and also about the local countryside and indigenous vegetation. One of our stops was at the home of a lady who has been befriended by our tour guide. Although she does not speak English she invited us all into her mud hut to show us how people in Lesotho typically live. The floor has a fire in the middle of it and the rest of the floor is covered in mud and dung which serves as a form of central heating! The lady we visited also bakes delicious bread in the fire for all of the visitors to eat with their lunch which was our next stop.
On the way from the hut we had visited to lunch we passed through some typical Lesotho scenes. Being both at a very high-altitude and a very poor country, the people of Lesotho farm hardy sheep and goats as a source of food and income, live in very poor conditions and generally use donkeys and horses for work and transporation.
Lunch was served at "Africa's Highest Pub" where we had great beer, a South African brewed Bitter. Lunch was a delicious soup and "hut made" bread, followed by a buffet of chicken curry, lasagne, vegetables, salads and a few other dishes I can't remember (-; Being so high up we were afforded some of the most spectacular views of the Sani Pass we had diven up and the countryside beyond it.
After lunch and coffee we had a mad dash back down the pass as the border gates closed at 16H00 and we were about as close to missing the time as we could get. Never mind, we made it out in time and were dropped off back at the hotel.
The next morning we had a walk around the hotel grounds and golf course to admire nature and take in the beautiful views of the mountains one more time. We also crossed over a small river on a VERY rickety bridge which swayed and wobbled all over the place. Another new experience for David (-: Then after a good breakfast we set off back to Durban.
Along the way we stopped to visit one of the private gardens that were open to the public for the day. WOW, what an impressive garden it was. We met the lady of the garden who told us that this was just a hobby of hers as she also held a fulltime job, she clearly has a whole troop of gardeners to carry out her planning and instructions!
For the weekend that we were in Kwazulu-Natal my parents and sister took the three of us into the Drakensburg Mountains to an area called The Sani Pass. It is one of the routes into the land-locked mountaintop Kingdom of Lesotho. We stayed at the Sani Pass hotel and, on the Saturday, were driven up the VERY winding and steep Sani Pass in a four-wheel drive Landrover. We were treated to some of the most stunning views of where we had come from and where we were going to.
We had a really interesting and informed guide so were told a lot about the local people and how they lived and also about the local countryside and indigenous vegetation. One of our stops was at the home of a lady who has been befriended by our tour guide. Although she does not speak English she invited us all into her mud hut to show us how people in Lesotho typically live. The floor has a fire in the middle of it and the rest of the floor is covered in mud and dung which serves as a form of central heating! The lady we visited also bakes delicious bread in the fire for all of the visitors to eat with their lunch which was our next stop.
On the way from the hut we had visited to lunch we passed through some typical Lesotho scenes. Being both at a very high-altitude and a very poor country, the people of Lesotho farm hardy sheep and goats as a source of food and income, live in very poor conditions and generally use donkeys and horses for work and transporation.
Lunch was served at "Africa's Highest Pub" where we had great beer, a South African brewed Bitter. Lunch was a delicious soup and "hut made" bread, followed by a buffet of chicken curry, lasagne, vegetables, salads and a few other dishes I can't remember (-; Being so high up we were afforded some of the most spectacular views of the Sani Pass we had diven up and the countryside beyond it.
The next morning we had a walk around the hotel grounds and golf course to admire nature and take in the beautiful views of the mountains one more time. We also crossed over a small river on a VERY rickety bridge which swayed and wobbled all over the place. Another new experience for David (-: Then after a good breakfast we set off back to Durban.
Along the way we stopped to visit one of the private gardens that were open to the public for the day. WOW, what an impressive garden it was. We met the lady of the garden who told us that this was just a hobby of hers as she also held a fulltime job, she clearly has a whole troop of gardeners to carry out her planning and instructions!