Wednesday and Thursday, 8-9 June, 2011
Graskop to Johannesburg to Tennessee
Our flight doesn't leave till this evening, so no need to make too
early a go of it this morning. Linda did some shopping first thing,
then we checked out of the chalet and headed off to see some
waterfalls before leaving the area.
Lisbon Falls, 92 meters (300 feet) high, is a couple of kilometers
to the north of Graskop. The entry fee is R10 per person, and
you're able to drive right up to the edge of the falls, which was
good for Linda because by this point of the trip, she was pretty
worn out. The waterfall was beautiful!
Lisbon
Falls
From Lisbon
Falls
Next we drove just a couple more kilometers to Berlin Falls, a
45-meter waterfall. Unfortunately, work crews were doing controlled
burns of the tall grass right in this vicinity, so the view was
completely obscured by smoke.
We headed back south through Graskop, making one more stop, at the
Big Swing, a 180-foot-drop cable swing over the gorge, like the one
we did in New Zealand. But now a haze of low clouds combined with
the smoke from area fires to completely conceal the canyon, so we
moved on.
As we left Graskop, the weather turned ugly and stayed ugly for
hours. It started to rain, then it poured. At times, until we left
the mountains, the visibility was almost zero. When we left the
mountains, although the rain continued, the visibility greatly
improved, but the wind was brutal, and it was a struggle to keep
the car on the road. Sheesh! Another day to spend in the Blyde
Canyon area would have been great, but not this day. It was just as
well to move on.
Along the
highway
We stopped for lunch at a Spur Burger at the PetroPort Alzu on the
N4 toll road. The Spur mascot is an American Indian in full
headdress, which was surreal. The burgers were good.
After lunch, the rain stopped, thank goodness, because then we
entered the heavy traffic and road construction of the greater
Johannesburg metro area. I didn't have too much trouble exiting and
reentering the highway for a last tank of petrol, but in the mess
of construction around the airport, I missed an exit and had to go
back around. Much cussing occurred, all by me.
Even with the slight trouble, we arrived at the airport and
returned our car to Thrifty at 4:20 p.m., four hours before our
flight was scheduled to leave, which was exactly our plan. The
rental folks looked over the car, and the only damage they were
concerned about was the two chips in the windshield. Tom had to
sign off acknowledging the damage, but they couldn't tell us what
the charge would be. The rental guy thought “not much,” whatever
that means. We were a bit concerned of what “not much” would turn
out to be. When we got back to Tennessee, I watched my credit card
bill with great anticipation, till finally a week later the charge
showed up - $6.90. Woo-hoo! If we'd known they were that lenient,
we could have driven even more recklessly! Maybe next time.
Summary of the journey home, in four parts:
(1) The Johannesburg airport was reasonably efficient, with hardly
any hassles. The only oddity is that everyone on our flight was
rescreened by security at the gate before boarding the plane, at
which time my water was confiscated, but Tom's was allowed
through.
(2) Left Johannesburg at 8:20 p.m. The flight was long, 17 hours,
'nuff said.
(3) Arrived in Atlanta just before 7:00 a.m. The Atlanta airport is
inefficient, confusing, and the airport employees are extremely
rude. It took us TWO HOURS just to exit the airport, even though it
was our final destination.
(4) Just after 9:00 a.m., we started the drive home. We had lunch
at Hardee's in Athens, Tennessee, dropped off Linda in Knoxville,
picked up Spike in Powell, and Tom and I (and Spike) arrived home
in Clinton at 2:00 p.m., where I had 2,446 emails waiting for
me.
Trip Mileage/Kilometerage:
Driving in South Africa: 2,675 kilometers/1,605 miles
Driving in U.S., round trip Clinton-Atlanta: 500 miles
In the air, round trip Atlanta-Johannesburg: 17,000 miles
It was a good trip, but it's always good to get home!
THE END
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