A view from the back, with Richard and friends by Michelle

Any start of a tour is always exciting, no matter whether you have done the route before or not. We had a group of 8 friends from the UK joining us on our bespoke Windhoek-to-Windhoek weeklong Namibia tour for them.

After meeting Richard, Graeme, Alan, Darren, Billy, Phil, Neil and Dave on Saturday, they took delivery of their rental bikes, and everyone was raring to go by Sunday morning.

Once everyone’s luggage was loaded, we headed off out of Windhoek.

The familiar feeling of excitement at the start of a trip had me grinning from ear to ear as I watched the 9 bikes in front of me winding their way along the route.

Good tunes (70’s and 80’s obviously), a super capable 4x4 to drive and the start of a new adventure is always exhilarating!

All luggage is carried on the vehicle, and we have a trailer with us in case we need to load a bike for any reason. Well, the reason didn’t wait too long to arrive – Alan had a puncture in his front tyre, just before our lunch stop (about 40 clicks!).

This is where the support vehicle gets a chance to warrant why it is necessary!

Instead of repairing the puncture on the side of the road in 30+ degrees with no shade in sight, we loaded the bike, Alan jumped in the vehicle, and we headed to lunch.

While the group had a quick bite to eat Darrell, and I (newly designated spanner girl) fixed the puncture. The trailer was used to prop the bike up and in true African bush mechanic style the puncture was repaired!

FLAT REPAIR

The road into our lodge was a combination of the most god-awful corrugations and thick sand. The corrugations were bone-jarring, and this kind of road was going to be part of our journey for most of the trip. In Namibia, you want to travel the roads about 3-4 days after the grader has been over it – the road is not too loose, and the corrugations have been broken and compacted. But it is what it is on the day!

Our rest day turned out to be especially memorable. More bone-jarring, teeth-rattling corrugations, me calling Darrell on the radio to no avail, no WhatsApp messages going through – now I’m worried. Finally happy to see an approaching dust cloud in the distance, not so happy to see only one bike. Darrell has lost his tank bag with his whole tour life in it – wallet, passport, cell phone and handheld radio.

DEVASTATION!!

I haven’t seen the bag on the road along the way and now the thoughts are running wild – how does Darrell carry on with the next trip without a passport? How easily can we get a new phone? How many bank cards must be stopped? Do I have a copy of his passport on my phone? OMG his ID as well!! If you live in South Africa these bureaucratic exercises can seem like a death sentence!!

We retrace our tracks. Some good Samaritan found it, tried Darrell’s number, realised he was the owner of the bag, then called me and we met up at an intersection on the route we had come along.

I must confess, I passed the gentleman on the side of the road and couldn’t decide whether he was trying to wave me down or just lifted his hand in greeting. Silly me!!

LEG STRETCH

There was much elation at having found Darrell’s tour life, and a lovely warm glow surrounding us thinking about how good people are still out there! Once the group arrived back with us, we thought we were headed for home, but you know Murphy – he always has something up his sleeve - Darrell’s BMW was stone dead – no dash lights, no starting, nothing, NADA!

REALLY!

Now you would think the best thing to do is load the bike and go back to the lodge because you have a vehicle and that’s what the vehicle is there for. This does not happen. Darrell wants to figure out what’s wrong with the bike and has a nasty suspicion that it may be battery related.

The answer of course is tow starting!! Just to see if the bike will run.

I overheard very interesting conversations on the communication system between Richard and friends ranging from What? Are you sure? How? And some that we probably shouldn’t put into print.

Alan was the chosen one to tow-start the Adventure with his Yamaha T7. A very interesting feat in thick sand and corrugated roads! The bike runs, after much verbal abuse from me watching from behind!

We had a couple of restarts during the ride home and I have become quite a good spanner girl while Darrell was retightening everything that could possibly be loose around the battery terminals. I’m also furiously on the phone to Dylan in Johannesburg to try and source a battery for the bike when we’re in Swakopmund.

BIKE MAINTENANCE

The next day I have Neil as my companion in the vehicle. He had decided he had had enough of being a pillion and opted for a more comfortable ride. After visiting the Cape Cross Seal colony, I went ahead to collect the new battery in Swakopmund – fingers crossed that this was indeed the problem!

After unloading everyone’s luggage, Darrell and I replaced the battery – and then the moment of truth was upon us – was this the fix we needed? Indeed, it was! The roar of gratitude that came from Darrell was enough to bring all the clients – in different stages of undress – to their balcony’s – and join in the happy moment. I’m thinking thank the gods I don’t have to watch anymore tow starting!

Our trip down to Sossuvlei was through gorgeous countryside with the roads differing from hard-packed sand, vast patches of seriously soft sand where the bike riders’ squiggles tell a story of their own, good tar sections through the canyon, corrugations, corrugations and did I mention corrugations? The road was so bad that I lost the spare tyre and its entire bracket!

After another rest day we headed back towards Windhoek and the last stretch of the tar road into Windhoek was a welcome change from the gravel from the past few days.

Sadly, this meant the end of a stunning trip with Richard, Graeme, Allan, Darren, Billy, Phil, Dave and Neil (who made me laugh when he put his helmet on in the vehicle to chat to everyone on the bikes). Passersby must have wondered what was going on in the cab of our vehicle!

Following a group of riders may seem to be tedious and the support vehicle on a bike trip is often thought of as an unnecessary addition and cost to the trip.

In my experience, it is an absolute essential. The comfort of not having to carry your luggage on your bike, having tools and spares for the bikes on hand, the knowledge that there is a Plan B if you wake up ill or something goes wrong with your bike during the day must ease some of the worry you may have when on a trip.

I’m looking forward to my next trip with a view from the back!