Trip Report: The Motorcycle Train Tour, October 2009
Click here to view the online gallery of this tour

Before we tell you about the tour, let’s first tell you about the tour participants. Norbert Schroeder, a German biker was attending the Intermot motorcycle show in Cologne (October 200). At the show, Nicole convinced him to enter Sama Tours lucky draw to win a 10 Day motorcycle tour of South Africa. He didn’t think he had much to lose, so he wrote down his details and never thought about it again

You can imagine his surprise, when he got a call, a couple of days later to say that he had won the tour! Norbert decided that he would like to take the Tour in September 2009, and proceeded to book himself, his Girlfriend Inge and 3 of his friends onto the tour.

Norbert (The prize Winner) and Inge at Cape Point

On the other side of the world, Sue Taylor STUMBLED ACROSS THE Sama Tours website and also booked herself onto the tour.
Now let’s tell you something about Sue. Sue could sell shoes to a shoemaker!
She is a very feisty, very persuasive tall blonde chick who rides a BMWR1200GS and loves animals. Within 2 weeks she had already convinced her two biker buddies John and Fino to join her trip to Africa. If that’s not all, leading up to the tour she rallied around, telling all her friends about her trip ensuring that on her arrival she would have tons of educational colouring books and other basic supplies for one of the Aids orphanages in Johannesburg

Sue interacting with the Kids at IKOLWHA childrens home

On the first day it was quite an interesting mixture of cultures. We had a welcome braai at the Sama tours headquarters to welcome everyone to South Africa. Norbert and his friends arrived with big bottle of GIN. They argued that their doctor in Germany hadn’t prescribed any medication for the prevention of malaria- only gin- apparently gin makes your blood taste so bitter that mosquito’s don’t like it... who knew?

Enjoying the Welcome Braai. From Left: John, Fino, Tarryn, Sue, Mauritius, Juergen, Chris, Jo, Norbert and Inge

It was funny to find out that, except for Norbert, all the rest of the Germans were involved in the dentistry industry. Juergen is a dentist specialising in (scaring) children. Joachim works on creating caps for teeth and his son Christoph is an engineer that creates the material used in tooth caps. Wow what a combination!

The next morning was the official first day of the tour. The whole group was up bright and early, despite the gin and we were on our way to Magoebaskloof. We were driving along pretty peacefully when we decided to pull over and take a rest stop. All was good and well until we discovered that one of the group members was missing!!! Where was Norbert?!

Norbert, Inge and a F650GS with a faulty battery were 50km behind us, stuck in Marble Hall. Luckily, we off-loaded the spare bike from the back-up vehicle and Norbert was back on the road within 30 minutes (That’s the beauty of having a back-up vehicle with a spare motorcycle) the battery was replaced in Polokwane later that day.

In the late afternoon, we arrived at the biggest and oldest Baobab tree in Southern Africa (3000 years old). This tree is so big that it even has a pub inside it. Unfortunately we couldn’t stop for a drink as we still had 50km to drive to our hotel for the evening. The evening was spent around the dinner table- recalling our day’s experiences. Later we all enjoyed the Fireman and Phoenix pub with our new friends

The Big Baobab

The next couple of days were spent exploring the beautiful bikers area known as Mpumalanga- we stopped off to take in awe inspiring views at Gods window and had a scrumptious picnic lunch at Bourkes luck potholes. On one of the evenings we went to a Shangana festival. African warriors laden in animal skins and beads danced for us to the beat of powerful drums. The Dancing was followed by an African Buffet with delicious foods to choose from such as “Marogo” (spinach) and “Sheba” (Meat).

Gods Window and Bourkes Luck Potholes

On the 3rd day of the trip the group was booked onto a half day safari into the Kruger National Park. Sometimes you can drive around the Kruger National Park for days without seeing so much as a single lion. However this group must have been really lucky- they saw the whole of the Big 5: Lion, Leopard, Rhino, Elephant and Buffalo- all within the first 2 hours of their game drive. Great Game spotting guys!

What a lucky day of game spotting!

Half a day in the park was enough- later in the afternoon some members of the group went for an afternoon drive, the roads in Mpumalanga are just too good to miss. We stopped off at the top of Long Tom Pass to “ride” a canon. The Long Tom Canon is an exact replica of the canons used in the Anglo-Boer war, a war fought between Britain and the Republic of South Africa in the early 20th century

Fino, Sue, Richard and John riding the Long Tom Canon

After exploring Mpumalanga and Swaziland- it was time to return to Pretoria for our train trip to Cape Town

On the morning of day 6 we were up bright and early to get to the Train Station by 8:00am. This was the part of the tour, where we joined forces with some local bikers from South Africa. The train station was alive with excited chatter, and after loading our bikes onto the train it was time to depart.

Norbert likes his sound. On the first day of the tour he was telling us all about his portable bosè sound system that he had brought with on the tour. We never thought that such a small sound system could make so much noise!

As the train was pulling out of the train station- Norbert put on the song “BORN TO BE WILD” on full blast and the whole train was signing along.
The day before, the group had stocked up on cheese, olives and other tasty snacks as well as lots and lots of wine for the journey to Cape Town. The Train was converted into a party train.

Enjoying the Party Train

What happened on the rest of the journey was a blur of good food, wine, card games and good tunes.
Just ask Fino and Joachim. Neither of them remembers how or why, but somehow they swapped their socks in the middle of the night. The both woke up with a different sock on each foot.

The great sock mystery of 2009???

The next morning we arrived in Worcester, after offloading our motorcycles, we spent the next couple of days exploring the Cape Region. The great thing was that we used one hotel in Cape Town as our base- and every day we would do a different ride.

We explored the Cape wine lands, Cape Point and all the beautiful winding coastal roads around Cape Town, and the mountain passes throughout the rest of the area. A definite highlight was a visit to the Simons Town penguins followed with good old fashioned fish and chips..YUM!

Beutiful sights in and around Cape Town

On Day 8 we rode to Cape Agulhas the most southern point in South Africa. At one point, Mauritius the tour guide, pulled the guys over and told them that the next 50km stretch of road was wide open and free of speeding cameras! Everyone could ride as fast they liked. Of course he did warn them that you must ALWAYS drive within your own capabilities.  Well 50km later EVERYONE was smiling from ear to ear, with stories of putting their motorcycles up to 200km/h- what a ride!

Arriving at the Southernmost point of Africa is always a highlight

After each days ride when we arrived back to our hotel in Cape Town- we would all meet up in Richards room for wine, cheese and good tunes, a good way to wind down from the days ride. The evenings were spent dining at the V&A Waterfront, eating the best food that South Africa has on offer.

Sadly as all good things must, the train tour came to an end! Everyone on the tour got along with each other to such as degree that lifetime friends were made.

Norbert is actually in the process of organising a tour though Germany, Switzerland, the French Alps, Southern France and into Spain and almost everyone who was on the train tour is planning on joining him for this exciting Europe tour in September next year!

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