Our first two Lesotho destinations were Quacha's Nek and Quthing. We arrived in Quacha's Nek (the border town) in the cold, misty, drizzly dark after a day of no less than 3 minibuses and an overpacked covered pick-up, and since you can see the town from the border post we decided to walk there. Sean and I made our way to the Lonely Planet's cheapest recommendation only to discover that it's no longer cheap. And neither is anywhere else. We ended up going from one place to another as prices got higher and the drizzle got heavier. We picked up the only food we could find - a loaf of bread and some apples - and headed to one more place (deciding that we'd take it regardless of cost as we were both now a bit grumpy). But we couldn't find it in the dark and ended up stumbling into what was the local police station who kindly offered to drive us there - now that's service!
Okay, so the place was pricey. But it was lovely with a bed so rugged up that it didn't matter how cold it was outside. And waking up the next morning to the blue skies and sunshine and seeing for the first time the mountains of Lesotho was incredible. As was their free breakfast!
We hadn't planned to stay in Quacha's Nek very long as we wanted to head to Quthing (pronounced "'click'-ting" - I'll never get the hang of the clicks!). Our guest house gave us a lift to the bus station and we waited. We understand you have to wait for minibus journeys. We don't mind doing that. What we do mind is when they change the minibus at the last moment before leaving and you go from a seat of relative comfort to one squished into the back where people over 5 foot tall should not have to venture. We were then kicked off that minibus onto another one where we managed to get slightly comfier seats, but where the price had gone up by 10 maloti. Oh well. Fortunately we were dropped off just down the hill from the thing we'd come to see - fossilised dinosaur footprints. Since it was still light, we decided to go and visit them straight off the minibus so that we could save a day. We thought initially that the place was closed (padlocks have a habit of giving you that impression), but a local girl soon arrived and called up the man who ran the place and in we went. We were expecting maybe one footprint, but it turned out to be a small shed's worth with a balcony around the outside and a small bridge across the middle. The chap who ran it started to get very excited when we got excited and told us all sorts of things. For example, these are 200 million years old. They were found only recently in the early '60s. They were preserved on a riverbed sandwiched between sandstone layers and discovered when the road was built. There are only 3 sites in Lesotho where dinosaur footprints have been found. These footprints are of a smaller ostrich-sized tridactyl type (i.e. stands on hind legs, has tail) - look! there's the tail print. It was fascinating!
We said our goodbyes feeling very happy and made our way the few km to Quthing centre where in the dark we managed to get directed to a semi-decent lodge, got some pretty shoddy food and made our way to the local bar. It's name was Lantern Pub and upon arrival the bar-man pretty quickly got us playing pool. Turns out that the locals all wanted to play the winner of our game and even though I managed to make 3 awesome pots in a row (one of which was a double rebound) I managed to follow it up with three complete misses which gave Sean time to win.
He then managed to beat his next 2 opponents before handing over to someone else to play so as not to monopolise the table. Good job too 'cause the next guy he would have played was some kind of genius player (Sean insists he would have beaten him too and that he retired as Lesotho's undefeated pool champion)!!! We met some really lovely, friendly people that night (Mary and her husband, the ref of the pool and the drunk teacher). It's a night I'll remember fondly.
But we'd already seen what we'd come to see here, so there was no reason to hang around another day. So we headed off the next day towards Malealea. And another adventurous Lesotho journey awaited us! We started walking towards the junction, but a minibus passed us and so in we hopped. The driver then immediately turned around to us and said "I hope you don't mind me drinking" and held up a beer can. We then noticed 2 or 3 other empty cans. Oh dear. But we were in now and so we just closed our eyes and wished for safety. A few km down the road the driver was stopped by a police check. "Oh good", we thought, "he's going to get done for drink driving and we can get into another minibus. Sure enough the police man came up to the minibus and explained our driver had been arrested.... for not having the right paperwork. It seems no one cares about drink driving here. After a quick bribe the driver got back in again and we continued to Mohale's Hoek where we needed to get a connection. Now our Lonely Planet maps aren't all that great and it took us a while to figure out how we were going to get to Malealea. We didn't really know what to do, so took the majority advice and hopped on this big bus (just in time to get the last two seats) to Motsekuoa. Turned out to be a great decision as we got there in record time for next to nothing. We stopped into a shop to pick up some staples (rice, tinned goods, packet soup) for us to eat for the next 3 days and then waited for our next minibus to Malealea. And it arrived quickly and said it was going direct. But obviously half way it changed its mind because we were dropped off 7km away at a junction. Great. So we started to walk, not knowing if minibuses did this leg at all. But this turned out to be great too, because we walked through the Gates of Paradise Pass (something our Lonely Planet map had told us was somewhere else by the way).
And after about 3.5km of walking another minibus picked us up and took us the rest of the way to our destination - Malealea Lodge. As soon as we walked through the gates we were stunned. This place was beautiful. It had little bungalows, a huge games room and bar, braai area, coffee shop, self-catering kitchen and the most stunning views of the mountains. A chap called Bob booked us in and even gave us a free upgrade! Even the weather seemed to be on our side as the sunshine was out in all its glory after a couple of drizzly days.
Every evening a local choir sings, followed by a band which plays home-made instruments. They were incredibly talented and gave us a great hours entertainment. The drummer especially was very passionate about his music and was great to watch. We got some great video clips which are better than the photos, but will have to wait to be loaded to be shared.
The lodge is run by Debbie & Michael and they have two lovely children, Bryce and Jemma, with whom I took a bit of a shine in the bar that evening. They were adorable and said the funniest things. Turns out that we were to be rewarded for my few minutes of child watching as Debbie invited us to join them for dinner, for free. Blimey! This place just keeps on giving! So we ate more food in an hour than Sean and I have eaten in weeks and chatted away with Debbie & Michael and their other guest, Paul Gosselin. Now Paul was extremely insightful on all topics and had a particular love of Lesotho. It was fascinating to hear him talk about the Besotho people and their country. In fact, we could have done so all night had we not been compelled to bed by the imminent lights out as the generators were turned off.
The next day we headed off on a pony trek into the mountains. We first rode down towards some cave paintings and could see in them many things that we had learned on our 'behind the scenes of archeology' tour in Cape Town. In fact, even the blurb sheet we had been given sounded familiar... Hang on! It was written by the curator that had given us our tour - Sven Ouzman. What a small world! We laughed as we realised we knew the author!
We then continued our ride towards Botsoela waterfall where we stopped for lunch of fat cakes and apples then headed home.
Sean's pony riding skills have definitely improved as he didn't fall off once as we went down the steepest rockiest tiniest little paths. It was a really great day.
More guests had turned up that evening, including a South African couple and 3 overlanders. We had a good old chin wag in the bar as Sean polished off a second bottle of wine all to himself - nothing one of their Amarula Coffees / Hot Chocolates wouldn't sort out the next morning though! And it turned out that the guest we'd met last night was the photographer for a famous book on Lesotho that was on the bar as a 'coffee table' display. Crazy! His photos were amazing! No wonder he was so insightful about the country.
So we've done what we'd come to Lesotho to do and now all that is left is to journey towards Sani Pass back into South Africa to make our way to Swaziland. We will be incredibly sad to leave this lovely place and are sincerely grateful to Debbie, Michael and Bob for making our stay so warm and welcoming. I highly recommend a visit here if you're ever in the area. You won't be disappointed!
Other things Jennie will remember:
1) The old fat lady on the minibus from Kokstad to Matatielle that shouted when she talked on her mobile phone.
2) The baby with the lady next to me on that same journey who was very smiley
3) That I want to send a roll of new pool table cloth covering to the pub in Quthing (Lantern Public Bar, PO Box 16, Quthing)
4) Bryce & Jemma (and Jemma's great new fringe haircut courtesy of her mum!)
5) The dogs of course! Jonty the big soppy dog, Jessie the little bulldog who'd just had the small op and the other dog that we were never formally introduced to.
6) The peacocks:
7) The Malealea weather station:
Here are the photos:
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