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  • African shoestrings – South Africa Day Sixteen

    The rest of our journey in Lesotho passed without incident as we passed the odd town, which appeared more western than those we had seen in the Malealea area, but still dusty and neglected and yet somehow thriving and functional!
    As it was Sunday a lot of the locals tend to dress in their best clothes and we were treated to men in their shiny black suits and women in colourful dresses wondering along the road on their way to or from somewhere or other.

    The Buthe border post was a lot quieter than Maseru Bridge however we still had get out of the car and go to the Lesotho passport control for a stamp, go back to the car, drive across the border, get out of the car, go to the South African passport office for another stamp and get asked a question or two and then finally get back in the car and drive past customs officials who normally just look at you suspiciously. Today however we were pulled over and our passport and car registration nos. duly noted by a rather stern and non-communicative official.

    Now back in South Africa the difference is almost startling, no longer are there numerous villages clinging to the roadside. If there are any they are usually hidden away from the road. Where in Lesotho there are either signs of erosion or intensive tracts of crops, here the countryside is in the main, relatively unscarred.

    The previous white apartheid regime seemed to always create two towns, the white dominated main town centre and its white suburbs and about 5 kilometres away the black dominated satellite. This is, of course, all changing but the evidence is still there as the population both black and white grapple with the changes necessary to evolve into a fair and equitable society. Nowhere is the difficulty more obvious than a place called Clarens, about 40 kilometres north of Buthe Buthe.

    Clarens is trendsville! Curio shops and cafes jostle for your attention along the single short main street. You could have been anywhere in the western world. White South Africans from the bigger towns around strolled and stopped for lunch or a drink enjoying their day out. There was not a black face to be seen. For us after just ‘roughing’ the last week in Lesotho, it was timely if somewhat culturally disturbing. We had a nice lunch in “Bruce’s Pub” and then moved on.

    A singer from the Basotho children's choir near Malealea, Lesotho
    A singer from the Basotho children’s choir near Malealea, Lesotho

  • African shoestrings – Lesotho Day six

    Malealea Lodge is set in the quaintly called Valley of Paradise that’s about 2200 metres high.
    To get to it, after travelling on what can only be described as the ‘road from hell’, 13 kilometres of potholes loose rock and shifting gravel, you have to travel through the “Gates of Paradise”.

    This is a pass with such a beautiful vista, that a guy called Mervyn Smith left the words “Wayfarer Pause and Look Upon a Gateway of Paradise” inscribed on a plaque.
    Mervyn also founded the Malealea trading post so I guess you could accuse him of being a little bit one eyed.
    Even so the view is magnificent and gives the feeling that you are entering a secret valley of gentle rolling hills with a dramatic backdrop of mountains and storm clouds, hidden over the centuries by the locals from the mass commercialism of the white man.
    As we stood absorbed by all of this, one of those buses that can only be found in the third world, charged up the hill towards us and came to an abrupt stop amongst it’s own clouds of diesel fumes.
    This was the local bus stop and this vehicle was unloading some of it’s cargo of bags, people, children, chooks, goats and anything else that could hang onto the outside or be crammed into the interior, there were even two guys on the roof!
    Before I had time to point the camera it was off again, incredibly still jammed packed and leaving behind clouds of black smoke and some of the cutest kids that have ever been put on this earth.
    Three of these kids came up to talk us, which we thought was so nice until they stretched out the palm and asked for money or “sweets”.

    Young girl from Lesotho looking for her mother on a remote roadside.
    Young girl from Lesotho looking for her mother on a remote roadside.