Readers' Africa: The wild side of walking

Doug Laurie turns an 'easy amble' into an epic adventure

'Let's do the Rustenburg Nature Trail," I said to my wife. "It's only a bit over 10km from Explorer Camp to the Avon More Camp."

It sounded like a great idea. Granted, I was in my 60s and my wife just under, but heck, we were used to walking 3km most mornings in little over half-an-hour. "It'll be a doddle," I assured her. "Only 10.4km - we'll do it in a couple of hours."

So, new backpacks bought, we arrived at the Explorer Camp for the first night's sleep-over. Next morning we made a leisurely start - we only had 10.4km to walk, so we left at about 9am. And walked. And walked. And walked. Although it was September, it was blisteringly hot. The 5l of water we carried between us dwindled to a litre by early afternoon.

The hours dragged on while our energy flagged. I'm not sure if we made detours - the guiding "footsteps" painted several hundred metres apart on the path were often obscured by dead leaves - but the 10.4km seemed more like 20.

Five arrived, then 6pm. It was starting to get dark and the camp was nowhere in sight. Eventually we stumbled down the side of a mountain, crossed a small river and pitch darkness descended. We could no longer see the path. I was finished.

My ever-practical wife saved the day. "We can't sleep here," she said. "It's getting cold and there are mozzies." So we started to scramble straight up the mountain in the dark, over rocks, through bushes. There was just blackness ahead - the mountain itself - while a band of stars gradually grew larger overhead. Eventually, we reached the top. The lamb chops I had brought for the braai were discarded - we couldn't light a fire there - and we snacked on trail food and beer, replacing some electrolytes.

Down to our last litre of water, we couldn't wash, and bedded down in our sleeping bags on the ground, shoving away stones in order to get comfortable. No tent, but I wasn't worried about sleeping in the open because I knew baboons, prevalent in the area, aren't nocturnal creatures. At 3am I woke, admired the million stars overhead, then fell fast asleep again.

Next morning was a nightmare. Coming down the far side of the mountain, we slipped and fell over the steep rocky areas, eventually reaching the path again. I was worried we might have bypassed Avon More Camp with our detour, and our water was perilously low. However, just 1km further on, there it was - water in abundance. However, our legs were sore, the morning was dragging on and another 9km (or 20?) walk back to Explorer Camp was a rather daunting prospect.

Divine providence intervened in the form of a Parks Board bakkie come to collect the rubbish. Pocketing my pride, I asked for a lift back to the main camp, and we climbed aboard. Once back at the main camp, we asked directions to Explorer Camp where our car was parked. "Oh, it's just over the hill," we were assured. "Follow the road."

The "hill" turned out to be another mountain of the kind that required us to stop and gasp for breath every 10 paces or so. At the top, there was a chain across the road, as it was open only to Parks Board officials. And below us, the road zigzagged away into infinity. As we started to descend, our feet shoved forward into the toes of our boots. Our backs were sore. Our legs were sore. And it was fiendishly hot again.

Then providence intervened a second time. A car appeared, stopped and the driver enquired: "Want a lift?" Oh boy, did we. It turned out he was an official with the Parks Board and had access to this private road. What we smelled like, I hate to think, but he graciously delivered us back to our car and we wearily drove back home to civilisation.

Two days later, I had a call from a lady at the Parks Board. "Are you the old couple who got lost on the trail?"

I harrumphed: "Well, yes, we are, er, mature, but we didn't get lost, we just didn't make the camp before dark."

"So where did you sleep," she asked.

"Oh, on the mountain," I responded breezily.

"But what about the leopards?" she enquired.

"Uhm . leopards?" I said .