Cycling Tour d'Afrique 2019: 19/05/08, stage 80, Springbok to Garies

A 116k ride today with quite some climbing and descending. And it was cold. Yesterday we climbed to an altitude of about 1000 meters and we stayed there more or less all day today, meaning that the night was cold, the morning was cold and the rest of the day was cold too. Luckily I brought my hoodie:-)

I rode my bike very easy today. No stress. On the one hand I’m quite done with the long days in the saddle, on the other hand I don’t want it to stop. Because even today, our 80st riding day, scenery was spectacular again! And I know I wrote before that I need to get away from the people in the group now and then, but on the other hand I might never see them again after the next four days, which is strange because I got quite close with quite a big number of these people. So it’s a bit of a double feeling. Bittersweet, as Lenore called it... So I think the best way of making it through these last days is by taking it easy and by enjoying myself as much as possible. Because it is ending...

For that reason I lingered for quite some time at lunch. And after lunch I lingered for quite some time at the cokestop. And after the cokestop I lingered quite some time at the first view we got at the ocean, some 45k westwards of where we were riding. I think that view is what made me really realize how far we’ve come: we could see the ocean again! It made me smile :-) And to increase that feeling I passed the 10.000k mark today towards the end of the day. Just some 500k left.

Tomorrow we camp at the beach, which will be really special. However before that we’ll have a last hard day: 162k on undulating roads. It’s a last work day, but when I look at the map and see all the work days that we already did, I feel confident that I’ll make it throug this one as well. And the view on the ocean will be my incentive for it!