December 2011 - Lesotho

Our urge of getting back to the ocean has been compensated by the extreme busyness of the coastal region to which, as we realised, everybody is heading over the Christmas season. So we decided to change plans (once more) and it was a good decision.
Within South Africa’s boundaries there are two distinct countries Swaziland (which we briefly passed on the way out) and Lesotho, they have nothing to do with South Africa and you even get your passport stamped when entering and exiting.
Above the Drakensberg where we spend the last couple of days there is Lesotho. It’s a tiny country with only 2 million people living here. It is referred to as the “Kingdom of the Sky” because it is entirely above an altitude of 1200m and yes it has its own king.
Since we were so close by we could not resist on driving through.
Lesotho is a different world compared to SA! The moment you cross the border the tarmac ends, cars disappear and are replaced by horses and houses turn once more into huts; making one wonder again about this weird phenomenon of national borders.
Many villages are so remote that they do not have roads to access them so people are used to walk for endless stretches if they do not use horses to transport them. The temperatures are much lower here because of the high altitude and in winter the country is covered in snow, so most people walk around with is a woollen blanket wrapped around them. Their main income source is cattle and they can spend endless hours on the fields with their animals.
We did not stay very long but long enough to do some hikes and one of the most common things to do in Lesotho go on a pony trek. Although everybody here calls their horses ponies it’s not really what we had in our mind when we arrived here.
It was great fun for us although you would have not wanted to be in the pony’s duty, this country is extremely stony and hilly making you feel sorry for the poor animal to have to carry the tourists around, but it seems that this is what they are used to. One does not really have to do much apart from letting the pony go its way and holding on steep sections. Sometimes even the poor pony though can be mistaken and one wrong step on a slippery rock is all it needs to fall. Unfortunately on one of those occasions, Fred was on its back luckily though neither of the two got hurt.
Nice break and beautiful country!