East, west, South Africa’s best

There’s something wrong with this ocean. The water is supposed to be warm – more than 20 °C. It’s August, after all, and this is the Indian Ocean.

But here in Port Edward, the water is freezing cold. It’s starting to rain, and the wind’s blowing with a vengeance. Our plan was to start our big journey from the East Coast to the West Coast with a lovely dip in the warm sea. We dip a tentative big toe, but that’s as far as we get.

And so we check the weather forecast to see what awaits us on the journey from Port Edward to Lamberts Bay – all 1 700 km of it. The news is not good: it’s cold and there may even be snow.

when we leave the Wild Coast Sun in the morning and head northwest on the N2. Driving this road is unpleasant: cattle and goats wander over the road – sometimes stopping in it –as if it were their pasture; and it seems drivers of cars, lorries, and minibus taxis don’t care much about the rules of the road.