SIDECAR
AFRICA

Our first Ride Along for the year 2012 with Sidecar Africa and the good people had decided we should kick the year off with breakfast at the Upper Deck at the Welwitchia Craft Market near Hartebeespoortdam and then ride the Brits canal route to Greens.
What a turn out! We turned out to be the biggest group that has ever departed from Skyview and Lindsay & Nicky as well as Ian & Diana were still joining us at the Upper Deck at Harties. Paul ventured out with Sofia and her trailer which we all thought looked absolutely beautiful. We were all very happy to see Richard riding again after his surgery, with his real live monkey Eleanor – yeah! Sheilagh had gotten a new jacket and we were all most impressed, good to see Jude, smiling as always. Herman decided to ride along and Marius and Madol joined us all the way from Tzaneen nogal – good to see you guys.
Sputnik with his rider and monkey, Arno & Zeta joined, stalwarts Jacquie and Jenna with Katrina, Ry and Emma and me and monkey Klara on the ever trusty Lola. And last but definitely not least, our very own two wheeler Greg – who went on to Los My Cherrie other side of Sun City after breakfast? Please let us know more about this trip Greg – we want photos!!
The happy monkeys and riders all rode down the long hill and over the Hennops River (3 times) through the Schurveberg and all the way to the Hartebeespoortdam over the dam wall to our breakfast place – in all honesty we have never done such a short leg before eating.
At the Upper Deck we met up with Lindsay and Nicky who literally came from around the corner at Cosmos and Ian & Diana who also joined us.

Not everyone could join for the next leg of our Ride Along but we were still 6 sidecars strong when we hit the dirt for the Brits Canal leg.  What joy! The road was incredibly quiet with very little going on and us meandering along, trundling steadily through the very green landscape along the canal. The Canal ride offers quite a variety of road surfaces – all different versions of dirt! You encounter loose gravel, good dirt sections, slightly sandy to more sandy, curves and corners that make us laugh out loud and real nice water puddles with some mud mixed in. Tralala – this makes us sing – sometimes out loud. My monkey and I have been known to be heard when we hit the high notes in our own version of sidecar opera.
Lindsay and Nicky quickly got into the spirit of things and experienced their very first Ride Along through a mud baptism as Lindsay got more and more enthusiastic about the big puddles we encountered. Their sidecar Pushkin seemed to absolutely love it and the more muddy Nicky got the whiter her smile beamed. Although they’ve had Pushkin for a long time, this was his first Ride Along and he seemed to love seeing other Urals! We loved having them along and hopefully Pushkin will be trotted out for another muddy morning?
Marius had a ball and Madol who has never ridden with us before ended up with a spectacular ‘dust beard’ – Jax you clearly now have competition in the dust beard department!
2012 bring it on! Cannot wait for the next Ride Along Sidecar Africa cooks up for us.

Written by Alpha Greeff