Wellies, blankets and stars.

After a great night at the Sani Pass some of us got up to watch the sunrise, well Gerard, our photographer and I did, anyway.  The other slugabeds snoozed for a bit longer and missed the best part of the day when the world is waking up.

Having only really crossed into Lesotho the day before, as our hotel was in sight of the border post, we set off excitedly into the country. We had an easy start as the road was tarmacced but that soon ended before long and we were on dirt and very rough tracks that were only passable with a 4x4 and presented us with some very challenging driving.  All good fun.

 It's not called the 'Kingdom in the sky' for nothing.  Up, down, up, down is the order of the day.  We passed through many attractive villages of mainly thatched rondevals, all with their own shiny new latrine next to them. There has been a massive programme to give every household its own latrine and it is good to see. The villages are very orderly and mostly completely free of litter, which is also good to see. The housing, whilst simple, I spoke of a good standard and no one is homeless or living in shanty towns.

The Basothos usually wear a thick blanket wrapped around them and Wellington boots.  White, with an orange sole, are favourites.  In the high altitudes it can turn chilly at any moment and rain can appear at any time.

We passed many herders with their flocks of sheep or sometimes glossy coated cows. Usually, they are walking but sometimes they will be on ponies or donkeys, the favoured mode of transport in this land of very few cars.

Everyone is so friendly and waving with broad grins is the norm. That's lovely, what's not so lovely I sthe number of children with their hands out asking for sweets.  It's all good natured though and not getting anything is accepted with equanimity.  I hate seeing children beg more than anything as a large part of my life is devoted to dealing with the fall out from that.  Apparaently, here, it goes back to when missionaries gave out sweets to get children to go to church. I don't buy that in this era though as if visitors didn't give anything the practise would soon die out.

We bush camped last night in as lovely a spot as you could ever find.  We had every luxury, great food, fine wines, gin, chocolate and a pit loo with a view. Actually, we'll draw a veil over the sanitation department except to say that it was adequate.

There was a fab atmosphere in camp, possibly to do with starting on the g & t's at 3.30.  Gin o'clock is early in bush camps. As a consequence, we all repaired to bed by 8.30 but not before a jolly, very jolly time was had by all.

The magic happened when it got dark. In a country with almost no light pollution, the starry sky was one of the most incredible I have ever seen. The stars, usually just dots at home, looked like giant
splodges falling onto our heads.  We could see the Milky Way very clearly too. It was stupendous.

Today, we had a change of plan as the 'road' to where we were meant to be staying the night in a National Park, was impassable after heavy rain.  Amazingly, the wizard organisers were able to find a lodge that had room for us all an interesting 5 hours drive away.  This is where you find me, squeaky clean - how good the first shower feels after camping - still thinking of the amazing stars last night.