We were enjoying our first coffee of the day in Drakensberg National Park, taking in the wonderous views of the mountains all around us, when I spotted some movement on the slope rising from the little river below us.  Sure enough, it was a small herd of elands, the largest of the antelope species, graceful straight horns, handsome tan hides.  We watched them slowly traverse the hillside as they graze for breakfast and we pinched ourselves for having this amazing scene all to ourselves. 

We reluctantly drove back down the mountain, out of the national park and through a series of busy villages along rough dirt roads.  Locals were walking along side the road, often carrying goods on their heads, always quick with a wave and a friendly greeting.  The villages were poor, that’s for sure, but they were generally well kept, very little litter anywhere, and the homes were well maintained, often painted with bright colours and very tidy.  With high expectations we turned Tramp towards one of the area’s most well-known landmarks – the famous Sani Pass.

Sani Pass is unique because it essentially crosses the dramatic Drakensberg mountains, peaking out at almost 3,000 metres, and is mainly a steep, rocky and poorly maintained four wheel drive track that challenges the most experienced drivers and is a siren for all overlanders.  We were keen to get the full experience and tackle this imposing pass.  And the stunning mountains all around would provide plenty of wonderful distractions.  And at the top we would pass into Lesotho.

The South African side of the road was a long construction site, sometimes in extremely bad condition, precariously cut into the steep mountain, tractors, workers, equipment and building supplies scattered hither and non.  With flag girls either waving us through or waving us to stop – usually with the same type of flag wave – it was a challenging little driving experience.

Part way up the track on a particularly bad section, Tramp working hard in 4WD to carry us up, we heard an almighty clunk come from the back of the truck.  It was a scary, horrible sound for any driver but made much worse by the situation we were in.  Another big pothole and another sickening deep metallic clunk.  Not good. 

We pulled over and had a good search underneath, seeing nothing unusual.   We kept driving but this horrible clunking sounds continued, especially in the bad sections – which was most of the track – and especially uphill.  Two wheel drive or four wheel drive, it didn’t matter.  High gear, low gear, whatever.  Shocks, leaf springs, tyres, all the obvious bits, all looked good. 

We crossed the South African border, got stamped out, and passed into Lesotho, the 44^th country of our Follow the Sun adventure.  The road work finished and the road instantly deteriorated, loose gravel and rock, badly washed out sections.  And as the road got steeper and Tramp worked harder the clunking sound got worse.   I crawled under again, desperate to find anything that would help us understand the problem but my untrained eyes could see nothing out of place.  With the rain starting to fall and the worst of the road still ahead of us we knew we had to turn around.  Sani Pass had beaten us.  We were devastated to say the least.

We slowly crawled back down the steep track, stamped back into South Africa to the confusion of the border guard, through the terrible road construction as the rain came pelting down.  Soon the muddy track had turned to a river, visibility almost zero.  And then it started to hail, stones the size of marbles, smashing into Tramp, all views of these amazing mountains obliterated.  Yesterday was such an extraordinary experience and today this.

Tramp was wounded but he did not drop, slowly taking us down the mountain across some desperately slippery steep sections, no other car sighted for ages, all workers long gone, my speedometer saying I was going zero kilometres per hour…but it seemed a little faster than that.  A few more hair-raising switch backs and badly flooded sections before we finally reached the flat valley floor and the bitumen. 

But of course this was late Saturday afternoon and in this torrential monsoon rain not a soul, especially not one admitting to being a mechanic, was in sight.  We limped through the town of Underberg and out to a horse riding ranch where we camped for the night on the banks of a babbling brook. The manager of the ranch contacted the local mechanic for an early Monday morning visit to his shop. 

On Sunday we set about making the best of an unexpected and unwanted free day.  And also unexpectedly, Tyrone the local mechanic made a house call and crawled under Tramp for a quick look.  The plan was to visit his shop on Monday, check the truck out more carefully and figure out how to fix our problem.

Julie and I spent the rest of the warm breezy day doing a number of chores and in the late afternoon I built a fire and we had our first barbeque in Africa before the thunder and lightning heralded a heavy rain that forced us inside. 

Later that night, after a half a bottle of wine and with rain pelting down, we had a desperate knock on the door. The owner of the ranch called out saying that we were getting flooded and had to move immediately.  I stepped off the last rung of the ladder and into a foot of rushing water, the entire camping area completely under water.  Amongst the pandemonium we quickly raised the ladder and I drove Tramp upstream and onto higher ground within the camping area.  It was crazy, the little creek behind the camping area had dramatically flooded due to a burst dam upstream and the water level was almost two metres higher than normal.  Very scary stuff.  It had been a heck of a day!

The next day Tyrone identified the problem with Tramp – some welding in the tray that sits between the camper and the truck’s chassis had broken loose and the front of the tray was slamming up and down on the bumps.  This looked like more shoddy workmanship from the original tray manufacturer – why would you spot weld when you can use heavy duty bolts? – which couldn’t get rewelded here. But a large strap and ratchet seemed to hold the tray down good enough for us to hit the road.

And so it was that we tackled Sani Pass again, confident mighty Tramp was operating just fine, moving slowly up the steep mountain track, negotiating the rocky and tight hair pin turns in 4WD Low, taking in the stunning scenery, savouring the moment.  We finally made the top of the pass, through the border post to get officially stamped into Lesotho, and back on paved road.  Sani Pass had lived up to its reputation, a steep and difficult 4WD experience, mastered by Tramp once we were certain he was in fine fiddle, fabulous views all around.  Ready to explore Lesotho!