RI7ER JOURNAL POSTS

A shower of rain at five and I thought I would be taking the day off, but it stopped soon after and I was on the water by eight.

Beautiful fun section through Vaalkrans. Huge flocks, 200 plus, of Egyptian and spurwing geese along the way.

Long, long flat pools after Vaalkrans ... 5,6,7 kilometres long ... making me wonder sometimes: ‘What the fuck am I doing here?’ A part of the journey that has given me good workouts, opportunity to check out the scenery and also time for lots of thinking ... thinking about what I want to do with the rest of my life ... thinking about what to do with all this writing, photos and video.

Whenever, I get too pensive on these sections, I remind myself: I am the paddling machine - Yeah!!

I travelled much further than I expected - there is a good flow, even in the flood and I am really fortunate to have these water levels. It would be murder with low water, I think. The cloudy weather was also great again today - temperature in the low thirties.

I watched a storm build up behind me until it grew to Hiroshima proportions, racing ahead of it to get to camp. 15 minute mad dash to set up camp and just sat down for tea when it came pouring down. Lucky again!

Big diamond mine on river right, with a sign: ‘Environmentally friendly zone’. Yeah, whatever, the place still looked like Beirut.

Another, hot sticky evening after the storms - the humidity levels are cranked up high. While making dinner caught two yellowfish with my wonder bait that I bought in Douglas.

goodnight all!