Rest day 2 at Scruff and Jan in Harare
Distance 8431
Total from Amsterdam 13831
A day of sports. I lay in bed waiting for the sun to warm up Harare. After breakfast of oats (still in bed), we surfaced around 9 and quickly jumped into dirty cycling gear (still not washed) before the cold air froze my joints preventing me riding to Trent’s final game of rugby, 24 km away at Gateway College. Just as we were getting ready to ride to the school, Scruff appeared out of nowhere. Peter had Jan’s breakfast as she doesn’t like hard poached eggs. We were told that the snobbish ladies living in the posh suburb of Borrowdale were known as the ‘Barrowdale bitches’!
On the way to collect keys to the office Peter asked Scruff what the white population of Zim is at present and was told it used to be around 250000 and now around 20000. The keys to his office and to collect his bakkie was at his partner’s house. We took Jan’s Prada to the school to see Trent and Lomagundi College whipp Gateway 54-21. The game was reffed by an international African lady in her early 20’s who resides at Lomagundi. Trent leaves for the States in December to study in Idaho. His elder brother Zane is already there studying medicine. We also got to meet an amazing young guy, Jesse Steele, who has just qualified as a veterinarian from the university in Harare. He arrived by bicycle to watch the rugby and intends to stay in Zim to practice as a vet. We followed the Adams family to Spar and bought yummy chicken pies and a few essentials, bread, Milky Bar chocolate and bananas. Sad farewells to Lindale and Nick and we managed to deliver Jan’s Prado back home without any bumps or scratches. They had friends over for lunch and were braaiing yummy pork chops … the beer and wine were flowing.
In teams of two we had a game of darts, yours truly managed to hit almost everything but the dart board … but before the first dart was thrown the distance from the board to where one stood had to be agreed upon. This took about a half an hour?? I partnered Brady, turning 60 tomorrow, Peter and Mike were partners but the winners of the game were Suzie and (off the wall) Kerry. Everyone other than Brady, Peter and I, smoked like chimneys but they all used filters … as if that made excessive smoking acceptable!
I was scorekeeper when they decided to play a game of singles but it was eventually declared a draw. None of them could end the game with a bulls eye so Mike attempted this using a steak knife and almost succeeded. As the braai started at lunchtime everyone started drinking around lunchtime, I held off until around 8 pm and had about three glasses of nice KWV Pinotage. With great music playing I eventually got McNulty onto the dance floor for a twirl. We ended up watching 7’s rugby being played in San Francisco, waiting for midnight to celebrate Brady’s 60th. By now Jan had gone to bed ages ago and Suzie and Mike had left around 22h00. It was the die hards who were left … Kerry, Brady the birthday boy, Scruff, Peter and myself. The pub looked a mess but with full time hired help nobody cleaned up. Peter and I eventually got into bed well after 02h30 with tea and Tyler’s hot chocolate to warm us up. Thank goodness partying and very late nights aren’t the norm while riding. I can’t say sleep well as it’s Sunday 10h50. Cheers all, have a nice day xx
– Trent Adams, the tallest player in the team scored two tries and converted one in his final game of rugby for Lomagundi College.
– A small Mexican wave
– Dr Jesse who has just qualified as a veterinarian
– I resorted to keeping score as I was a burden to my partner playing darts
– Peter’s throwing arm quickly got into the swing of it
– Scruff doubling up as barman and DJ, also played a mean game of darts
– Kerry with Brady, having just turned 60
