Category Archives: Trip Reports

Desert Country

Desert Country

Posted on: 19th September 2023| By: Marielle

For those who don’t follow the Quirky Girl Traveller blog, you might like to visit the site here to see what we got up to recently over a 3-week, 4,700-kilometre road trip from Kgalagadi to Fish River Canyon, then to the Richtersveld, Augrabies Gorge and Falls, and finally Papkuilsfontein, on the West Coast flower route….
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Richtersveld Adventure

Richtersveld Adventure

Posted on: 9th September 2023| By: Marielle

For those of you who are not following the Quirky Girl Traveller blog, you can tune in here for our trip into the Richtersveld. Some teaser photographs … SANParks offices at Sendelingsdrift, where we took the Pont across the Orange River to get to the Richtersveld entrance. A sign outside the only shop at SANParks…
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Chased by a Lion

Chased by a Lion

Posted on: 5th September 2023| By: Marielle

In Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park we’ve gone over to the dark side … waking up early and setting out as the gates open, resting during the hottest time of the day when most respectable cats are under a tree, sleeping. Sadly, we still go to bed late … ish. First we stayed at the Nossob riverfront…
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Where Have All the Ellies Gone?

Where Have All the Ellies Gone?

Posted on: 9th June 2023| By: Marielle

The best time to go to Addo National Elephant Park? Funnily enough, all the tourist websites say the Winter months. Why? Because there are fewer visitors … and it’s dry. Ha-ha-ha! They’ve obviously not heard of global warming. We’ve just returned from Addo, early June, slap-bang in winter. And it poured. Thunderclaps roared above us,…
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Rus en Vrede 4×4 Trail

Rus en Vrede 4×4 Trail

Posted on: 2nd May 2023| By: Marielle

Our Baviaans trip Mach 2 … It begins on the farm Rus en Vrede in the Baviaanskloof Valley, after having obtained a permit for the trail at the farmhouse. We set off on this 78-kilometre track in the morning at around 10 a.m. It winds its way up and over the crests of many, many…
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Mountain Trail into Baviaanskloof

Mountain Trail into Baviaanskloof

Posted on: 30th April 2023| By: Marielle

We are not strangers to the Baviaanskloof valley, but we haven’t explored it for a long, long time. So we set out to put things right. Just under 200 kilometres in length, the valley is hemmed in by the Baviaanskloof mountains to the north and the Kouga mountains to the south. Our Gravel Road Adventures…
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A Gastronomical Adventure

A Gastronomical Adventure

Posted on: 16th November 2022| By: Marielle

Gravel Road Adventures doesn’t ALWAYS spend time in the dusty, gravelly, stony gramadoelas … sometimes we go a little off-piste … and sally off on a foray into gastronomy-land with, um, perhaps just a little wine thrown in to mark the occasion. Which is what we did recently. So, for now, it’s not about cat…
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Etosha & its Wildlife

Etosha & its Wildlife

Posted on: 3rd November 2021| By: Marielle

So … here is the promised sequel to our recent Namibian trip. Etosha, and Okaukuejo’s much-loved waterhole, always always deliver. It is such a thrill to spend time there. If you were a lazy traveller, all you’d need to do is book into Okaukuejo Camp for several days and hang out on a bench with…
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Into the Namib Desert

Into the Namib Desert

Posted on: 27th September 2021| By: Marielle

Eighteen months of forced seclusion meant that immensely itchy feet, and a Land Rover and Toyota Prado panting for the sensation of gravel under their tyres, was Priority Numero Uno. So, doubly-vaccinated, it was time to remedy this matter. An unspooling of 3 1/2 weeks and a rough and tumble, corrugated, stony/shalely journey of 6,175…
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Escape into the Wild

Escape into the Wild

Posted on: 24th July 2021| By: Marielle

Covid-19 mutations. Delta variant. All sorts of other variants. Renewed lockdowns. First and second vaccinations. Astra-Zeneca, Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson. Suffice to say, it’s been a helluva year. As truly horrible as last year, in fact. We just had to get ourselves out of there. So we did. Into the wide open spaces that are…
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