Team Here Be Dragons “is a phrase used to denote dangerous or unexplored territories, in imitation of the medieval practice of putting sea serpents and other mythological creatures in blank areas of maps” (Wikipedia)
Because all fairy tales have a villain and everything turns out to be a little apt… But more about this in due course- this tale is just beginning! It was a tale with many players, from the king (sometimes good, sometimes bad, but we’ll call him Darron) and his lovely Queen Anita, to knights in shining armour (we’ll call them seconds and marshalls), to jesters (known in other circles as cartographers), to sages (these’ll be the locals) and lastly the minions (who could this be other than the teams?). This is the tale of Here be Dragons; of Tony Abbott, Steven Erasmus, Mike Crone and myself (Kate Swarbreck).
The race began quickly and solidly, startling a giraffe across our path in the post-dawn (or day, if you’re a little less inclined to flights of fancy) light. A quick climb up to the OPs and a brief search netted their results and we were ready for the first cycle.
As a reluctant cyclist at times, it took me a while (and a helping hand once or twice) to enthuse me on this idea of the mode of transport. This enthusiasm gained a little momentum, although it could have been linked to the downhills. This leg definitely holds some highlights- the friendliness of the locals, the views down some of the valleys, the view up THAT hill and that blissful regroup rest at the top, and the smile of a lady as she sat on a shop stoep and directed us to take a “Sho’t Left”. As a team, we progressed solidly and made it into the paddle transition fairly early, having decided to skip the OPs.
After a fairly quick transition, we were ready to stake our claim on the paddle. And it was here that those sea serpents made their mark. Steven and I put in first and negotiated (can’t be a more apt word to describe the transaction between us and these fickle sea serpents) our way through those reeds and waited for our second vessel. Mike and Tony had a little more trouble – seems they and the canal were not seeing eye to eye. It is safe to say that the negotiation didn’t go all that well – it ended with two paddlers, a K2 and a moist map floating downstream. It seems these serpents weren’t satisfied- whilst Tony was pulling the front of the boat in, the current whipped the back around to snugly cradle it between the banks. This left us with one K2, two K1s – held together by a rudder cable, and four grumpy paddlers. We managed to find our way to a sand bank from where Steve and I could take out and then give the others a hand. Whilst assessing our options, we saw the same fate befall Brendan and Casper of Team iBiGiDiF and a very narrow escape by Chris and Motlasi of Team Milon.
With our map a little dysfunctional and taciturn, we were relying on info that the bridge where our seconds would be was about 5kms downstream, so we decided that our best option would be for Steven and I to reach this bridge and send Ken back for the other boat. Tony and Mike swam the boat back across and portaged up to the road.
Left without a map – Steven and I were relying on descriptions of the CPs in order to locate them. Which is how Team Red Ants came to find us latching onto the bank, searching the first Syringa tree we saw for the CP, having passed them earlier on the paddle. It made for a good couple of laughs as they refined our search strategy. The rest of the paddle passed quickly and pleasantly as we made good time; it seems that the sea serpents had had their fill.
Meeting up with the other two at transition, it transpired that they’d had quite a cacophony of miscommunication, parallel roads, hiking and very opportune timing to allow them to meet up with our second, Ken. The next hike passed fairly uneventfully (at this stage things would have to be pretty extraordinary to be classed as anything more than “uneventful”), although it was great doing bits of it with Chris and Motlasi from Milon.
After a quick supper we were ready to hit the trail again. A quick climb over the fence revealed some interesting skills and lessons. Should you ever want a partner in crime, Mike or myself will not aid in a quick getaway. After a bit of a search, and a closer appreciation of the night life of the mill workers, for a road that no longer existed we found the right route and a short stretch of conversation with Team BAMF. With some spot on navigation, it was really just a case of up, down and up and up and up (and up).
Getting back on the bikes required some steely resolve – especially after we discovered we were down one pair of cycling shorts and one pair of gloves. That was not the last we heard of those missing cycling shorts! Nursing a very painful ITB made it tough going for Steven and the team, but after some adjustments to his bike set up and some extra work from Tony, Steven dug deep for an incredible comeback – by the end of that leg he was one of the strongest. After some trouble finding an OP we found ourselves a little off course in the sugar cane fields. Although we seemed to be making progress, the Sugar Mill did not materialise. Trucks heading towards the mill agreed to show us the way, provided we could keep up.
The sun had started to come up, bringing both fresh legs and an impending fear about not making the 7 o’clock cut-off. The second spanner in the works (after being in the sugar cane, of course) was when I managed to snap my chain with such great force that it flew back into the road. And I had just hoped it was chainsuck. We managed to find it fairly easily, considering that the second truck had ridden over it. But, if I am being completely honest, it is only fair that I admit that it was my stupidity that I broke my chain. And that, guys, yes, I have learnt my lesson- I will not try and shift gears in heavy mud again. During this roadside repair (I was taking the archetypal role – “Scalpel… Chain links… Water… ”) we were passed by a foreman who must have taken pity on this fair maiden in the dragon filled fairytale, for on passing us again when we were further down the road he agreed to show us the way out. This turned into a bit of a time trial session, although to this day I’m not quite sure where we found those legs.
We reached the Mill at about 6.50am, with the decision made to take a chance and try and get through the gate at the bottom of Van Eck Dam. Finding it still locked, we portaged the bikes over the fence and headed towards the transition. That last CP proved a little difficult to locate – we’d headed back onto the dirt road just past the entrance of the gate and after a couple of attack point decisions and the conclusion that the map was a little out of date, decided it was best to portage over the fence to take a direct line towards the CP. At that stage, it seemed like a lot less effort than riding around. And we needed to settle the debate – Tony’s bike is the lightest. The CP found, we headed back for a short transition before hitting the next mountain bike.
With a full complement of cycling shorts, it was a little quieter on the whining side and we headed off for a short but enjoyable bike ride – those single track sections by the river were great and the mud gave me lots of opportunity to reaffirm when NOT to change gear. At this transition we waited for Ken who then drove us to the transition at the soccer field. This was when it first started to sink in that we were very much “unofficial” – we had to miss out on both the paddle and the long hike afterwards- something I was really looking forward to. At the soccer field transition we used the opportunity to catch a bit of sleep, eat some lunch and give the bikes a bit of attention.
We headed off onto the next 60km leg just before the rain broke and were afforded a magnificent view of the valley down below. We caught the first section of Darron’s it’ll-be-fun-in-the-light singletrack section in the light. Our good luck didn’t continue – it seems darkness was destined to follow that daylight, leaving us with what seemed like a washed out river/rock factory. I think even the sea serpents had jumped ship at this stage. We located the OP which adjusted our path slightly (thanks Darron) and headed onto some slightly quicker singletrack. Coming around a corner we came across six young men in the path, wielding crutches, sticks, groaning, chanting and shouting in Zulu. We stopped. I was not a particularly brave dragon in this situation, and was rather keen to back up (even if it meant back up that hill) – the second guy had a white hoodie on and in the skittish light it looked like a sangoma’s wig – I was not sure if we’d chanced upon a sacred ritual. Steven and Tony held their ground a little better, and managed to calm them down, converse in English and let us pass. In retrospect, we decided that we had spooked them – the set up of bike lights and head lights coming rapidly down a dark path, coupled by a strange mechanical sound, on a Saturday night would definitely be extraordinary enough to count as eventful. We passed onwards without incident.
In our search for next CP, we took a little bit of an extended route, in order to really get a feel of this part of Swaziland. We can report that the Sivunga Dam Wall is very sturdily built, there are many crocodile- and hippo-width set eyes inhabiting this body of water (Darron obviously did not look in the correct places for these creatures in his scouting missions), and the cane fields are healthy and nearing optimum ripeness. The locals are generally quite friendly and I am a little embarrassed to admit that one such local had a greater affinity for staying on his bike than I did, even though he was not able to walk in a straight line. This may be an interesting strategy to make the forthcoming cycling legs pass swiftly. Something to look into.
After a bit of rerouting, we found the correct CP and racing male pair. We headed towards transition, opting not to go searching for the Holy Ghost School although it would have been in line with the theme of our evening.
A quick sleep and supper in transition, and a good chance to say hi to a few other teams and we headed out on our 18km (and a bit extra) hike just behind Team Red Ants. With a few clues from the gate keeper we did make good progress until we went a little off course looking for CP36 in the dark. We were joined by Red Ants and we had a compounding of errors. Although it was great to see them and get a slightly different perspective on the race, it was a good lesson that two teams’ nav is not necessarily better than one team’s, and always question, even if you are with the team who are in first place. It something that they are probably also still thinking about. We decided to cut our losses and sleep for an hour along the trail till the sun came up, which was a good decision for us. They pressed on and headed back to the point of last certainty, where Lisa and Bruce found them.
Once day broke, we headed back to this point as well found the correct path and made good time from there. The “self-service” water station and oranges at Mabuda Farm were such a welcome surprise and blessing – those oranges were great after my third Lemon and Lime PVM Bar. We headed onwards to Lincoln farm and passed Bruce and Lisa, who were starting the next leg, just before reaching it – always a joy to get forewarning of another 20-odd km hike and 75km mountain bike stretch.
A fairly quick transition later – they’d even packed up the toilets (many teams had skipped the previous night hike, with only five or six of the pro teams completing it), we headed onto our last hike leg- fantastic! We had a few navigational disagreements with the map and so struggled to find the first OP, losing us a little more daylight than we would have liked. At the start of the kloof we had two decisions – either walk all the way around, potentially making it a lot later into transition, or head into the kloof and hope to get out by nightfall. We picked the latter option, also hoping that should night fall it may not be too technical an exit. We had no problems finding our way through the kloof, although we were going a bit too quickly to really appreciate that beauty of that waterfall.
Night fell once we’d split off that main kloof and were in the interleading kloof and we struggled to find those CPs by the ropework (we reckoned they removed them when the climbers left the kloof). So although we were pretty sure we were in the correct gully, we backtracked a little up and down the kloof to ensure we hadn’t headed into the right hand gully. We tried to climb out near where the Jumars were, but without much success. We made a call based on safety first – to wait for daybreak and ensure we got out safely. It was difficult knowing that everyone would be worried but we reckoned it was the best call and the sleep would enable us to drive home safely the next day. So that’s how we had our night in the kloof. We’d picked a very small, sheltered space which meant that when one of us rolled over, we all did. At least we weren’t cold! So whilst the rest of you were slogging it out on that 15 hour mountain bike, we were having a decent night’s sleep under the stars!
Once day broke, we tried a few options to get out, aborting them all conservatively on safety concerns, backtracked further down the kloof, found the OP at the junction where we left a note in case anyone was looking for us and then found a long gradual climb/hike out and onto the ridge. From there it was just walking on our compass bearings until we found the road and then into transition, to a very relieved Ken. Which is how we managed to finish a full stage behind the winners – we were going for the extra value option. So after 77 hours, we’d covered well over 300km and even had a night’s sleep.
Many thanks to Ken Erasmus, for seconding us – you did the work of three. Thank you for your patience and not worrying too much when we were missing in action.
To Darron and Anita, thank you for all you did and for all the work you’ve put into Swazi Xtreme. Darron – thank you for the route, for its epicness, for its toughness and for those wide empty spaces where we could make our mark and form memories. We would never have managed without all the marshalls and the seconds who did so much.
And to all the other teams out there- you guys did well and are what makes AR what it is. So to those who finished and those who didn’t, awesome effort…
To this team, Here Be Dragons, we achieved so much more together than we ever could by ourselves. For the laughter, the jokes, those Super C gums and wet maps (again!). Tony, who always put everyone before himself; Steven, who was strong as a rock, and Mike, who navigated like a machine (on his second AR nav) – thank you.
This has been a tale with all the trappings of a great adventure, of a great fairy tale, of a legend. But mostly it has been a light-hearted look at those three and a half days- everyone knows and remembers those mind-numbing kilometres, the pain and the toughness, but we tend to forget the joy. This is the tale of Here Be Dragons, how we filled those blank spaces in the map, went deep into unexplored territory and battled those sea serpents and sleep monsters.