We drove up Sani Pass to day. This forms a border between SA and Lesotho. Its a rocky steep drive with ice and snow in the odd place at the top and its also for the Sunday drive so its busy up and down with Bikes and Cars. All you need is your pasport to leave SA into no mans land and you can go all the way to the top where the Lesotho customs are waiting. This in itself is another story as we didn't really want to go into Lesotho but the cafe at the top is on their side of the fence. One unsuccesful atempt to get there without "signing in" and we got sent back to the gate. The man explained it was "30 Dollars" for my car having seen me pass him already and we "people" were free. I declined the offer and told him to "stick it" as it would be the most expensive cup of coffee in history (i had no intention of drinking coffee only tea but nobody understands the English and Tea) so a whipped my passport back from his hands and retreated. Only after he'd stamped me in though and not out. I later found out 30 dollars meant 30 bucks....i.e. RAND. The idiot should realised from my passport i'm not from SA and Dollars means $$$ and not rand. "Bucks" on the other hand means either to me so i would have questioned him further had he said anything but Dollars. Anyhow we saw the view all the same and missed the expensive "coffee" and we did actually take Matilda illegally into Lesotho so can add the country sticker...maybe.
The way down was easier in all but the fact that the driver side rear shock top ring decided to unscrew itself from the shock piston. A few choice words later and a bit of epoxy resin i screwed it back on and its stayed put since. These are the shocks i got in Kenya for 110 Euro each. Seems like Bilstein screw the top mounting rings onto their shocks and don't weld them. How it unscrewed i will never understand. All it does is go up and down and there is no unscrewing movements. It could be the case it was just ripped clean off the threads but the thread looked OK so i screwed it back on. I have one spare shock in my box anyhow. A lot of other Land Rovers stopped to help in the 20 minutes i was there. None were half as well equiped as we were but they stopped all the same. Thanks to all that stopped. Especially the V8 (sorry no name) and the 1996 300Tdi Kalahari ( A County Station Wagon) driven by Charlie with his family.
The camp that night was not good. Another one for Trip Advisor. Noisy ! and we now have a rule. If a camp site is actually their car park, we do not stay. Ever.
Tonight its another 4 star camp site but not actually 4 star as its a bit run down. We;ve done some washing and for the first time in many years, Tumble Drying !
Did i mention I checked the trans box fully by taking off the props again. All sounds fine. Its driving me a bit mad all the things that are going wrong. Matilda needs a smacked bottom for being so naughty.
The way down was easier in all but the fact that the driver side rear shock top ring decided to unscrew itself from the shock piston. A few choice words later and a bit of epoxy resin i screwed it back on and its stayed put since. These are the shocks i got in Kenya for 110 Euro each. Seems like Bilstein screw the top mounting rings onto their shocks and don't weld them. How it unscrewed i will never understand. All it does is go up and down and there is no unscrewing movements. It could be the case it was just ripped clean off the threads but the thread looked OK so i screwed it back on. I have one spare shock in my box anyhow. A lot of other Land Rovers stopped to help in the 20 minutes i was there. None were half as well equiped as we were but they stopped all the same. Thanks to all that stopped. Especially the V8 (sorry no name) and the 1996 300Tdi Kalahari ( A County Station Wagon) driven by Charlie with his family.
The camp that night was not good. Another one for Trip Advisor. Noisy ! and we now have a rule. If a camp site is actually their car park, we do not stay. Ever.
Tonight its another 4 star camp site but not actually 4 star as its a bit run down. We;ve done some washing and for the first time in many years, Tumble Drying !
Did i mention I checked the trans box fully by taking off the props again. All sounds fine. Its driving me a bit mad all the things that are going wrong. Matilda needs a smacked bottom for being so naughty.
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