Entering the farm we had a welcoming committee. These were three youngsters (Impala) that had split off from the herd and just wouldn't get off the road. But eventually they did and we could proceed to-wards the Kingdom camp. A place situated in the middle of the bush next to the Wilge river. And by the way this place is north from Witbank, about 30km by road. We have been there before, in 2010, check.
We were a mixture of a group, for this hike we joined Tom and Rita and their wayward hiking group, there were four of them and three of us. We did function well and there was no problem.
In the morning we tackled the big hike, it took us along the stream and up the mountain. Lovely country to walk through. The path was easy enough, just a few stretches with rocks and stones making waking a bit difficult. Frans tried to help by kicking a rock off the path now and then. But we need lots of Frans's to make a significant difference.
From the top of the shoulder down to the Wilge river and a well deserved mid-morning break. Soon after that we had a split in the party, The real hikers went straight to take in a loop which would eventually bring them back to the short cut. Us, was Rita, Jenny and me. We had lunch at the cross road where we expected to meet up again. But they took too long and we marched off again.
It was getting uncomfortably hot and when we met the stream again I poured water over my head to cool down and dropped my phone into the water. I managed to recover it before any damage was done.
As we approached the camp we were caught up by the first of the tough hikers, soon to be followed by the others.
One of the exiting things to do in the evening was to sit at the water's edge of the river and to watch the fire flies come past. And also to observe the moon come up over the mountain, as well as throwing stones into the river to watch the ripples in the moon shine. Isn't it nice not to grow up.
Again there was a split in the party, the toughies wanted to do a real hike following the route around for about 8 km. Whilst the softies decided to follow the road alongside the river and see what is there. It worked out very well. The slow group was able to admire the scenery, talk about and make some sense of the geology, to watch some birds and to have some birds and to have a dip in some rapids of the river. We didn't want to swim because of the crocodiles that do live in the pools.
On the way out we stopped at one of the gates to admire and inspect an old ox-wagon. Most of the wood is decayed, the steel parts are still there. Do I feel like restoring an old ox-wagon? Would be fun, but, I think, I lack the carpentry skills to do this job.