Day 357 South Africa 25/10/2011, Sheri's Lodge, Graskop – Big 5 backpackers, Hazyview. 27.81miles/44.49km, 2hr46minutes, Av 10mph.

With the prospect of a short and more importantly downhill day ahead of us we set off for a return to the town of Hazyview. Having stopped in the town on our way north, we had decided to take a different route back. As we were once again travelling along the scenic panorama route we were expecting another day of beautiful scenery. For the main part we weren't disappointed, but it wasn't quite as spectacular as some of the other roads we had taken. We understand that the trees have been planted to be farmed, but large areas of deforestation doesn't make for the prettiest of environments.

Fortunately despite some notable ups, the route was largely downhill, a good thing as we are both still nursing upset stomachs. It has been a while now and we just don't seem to be able to shake them, it is making the cycling tougher than perhaps it should be. It may be time to take a course of antibiotics and hope that it clears up the problem.

Arriving in Hazyview quite early, we rode into town and stopped at a tourist centre to look for a better map of South Africa. The maps weren't suitable but we did find somewhere to have brunch. With our stomachs fuller and having imbibed my body weight in free refill cokes, we set off for 'Big 5' backpackers.

Having stayed in 'Bushpackers' last time we thought we would try somewhere different. While heading up the hill towards the hostel, uphill is a given, we encountered another cyclist coming the other way. He quickly introduced himself as Nigel and said that he was also staying at 'Big 5'. In the meantime we were also approached by a parks guy who had met some cyclists about a year ago and wanted to offer us somewhere to stay. We thanked him for his kind offer, but thought that it would be nice to stay in the same place as Nigel and find out what his plans are. Saying goodbye to both of them, we continued up the hill and shorty arrived at the hostel.

Big 5 is the cheapest place we have stayed for a while so we have taken a double room with shared bathroom, which is bizarrely less expensive than camping. It seems pretty basic, but the staff are friendly enough and we only plan to be here for one night before moving on. There is also a very nice view over the hills from our room.

While getting sorted, Nigel came back and we found out that he had just come from Johannesburg where his trip had begun. He has six months to explore Southern/Eastern Africa. He is potentially on a similar route to us, so we may meet along the way as we head south. He is likely to be moving much quicker than us though.

Dinner was followed by an early night. Debs started to feel a lot worse last night, so we will have to play our plans for tomorrow by ear. There is no point in moving on if she is going to feel rubbish all day. We certainly haven't cleared the mountains yet.

Day 351 South Africa 19/10/2011, Bushpackers camp-site, Hazyview – Sabie Backpackers, Sabie. 26.59miles/42.67km, 3hr56minutes, Av 6.7mph.

Thankfully there was no repeat of the snake incident this morning, instead we were joined by a small non-threatening frog! Having guided him gently out of the tent, we breakfasted, packed up and hit the road by 7:30am.

Almost immediately we were into the hills although we weren't the only cyclists to be tackling them. Shortly after setting off we encountered two mountain bikers making their way slowly up the hills. As luck would have it they only got to see us screaming down the hill. Still I think we gave them some food for thought as they looked at us on our heavily laden bikes. Having taken our bikes through the hills to the shops yesterday, we know how much easier it is on an unladen bike!

The trade off of taking such a hilly route was the amazing scenery. Despite the effort involved there was always something to look at. Banana plantations and dense forestry were interspersed with beautiful valleys and macadamia nut orchards. It was terrain that reminded us, aside form the crop diversity, of our time in Europe and Turkey. It was definitely one of those days that reminds us why we are doing this. The only downside was the high humidity. The skies have been threatening to rain heavily for a few days, which will hopefully, when it comes, clear the air a little.

With a final push up the hill into the town of Sabie, we stopped at the tourist office to check where the hostels were located. Our plan had been to stay at Billy Bongos, but finding that it was a bit out of town led us to take a look at Sabie Backpackers. It is a bit depressing having to get back on your bike when you need food, having spent hours getting here.

Enquiring as to whether we could camp at Sabie backpackers (our books don't mention camping), we were told yes. Better still, we were then offered dorm beds in what would be a private dorm for the same price. We may like camping, but it was too good an offer to refuse, especially as we could take our bikes into the dorm with us.

The rest of the day was spent shopping, eating a huge takeaway, suffering from the huge aforementioned takeaway, having a snack dinner because of the huge takeaway and having an early night to sleep off our very full stomachs.

Day 350 South Africa 18/10/2011, Bushpackers camp-site, Hazyview. Aaargh snake! and a rather less stressful shopping trip.

Considering it is the first time we have used the tent for a while, we slept pretty well. We woke to a light rain this morning and had an unexpected encounter with a sheltering snake. Once again it was me who moved a bag and practically gave myself a heart attack. The snake was only a baby about 30cm long, but that was plenty big enough to cause me to squeal like a girl. Or at least that is what Debs claimed I sounded like! All I could think of was that I had read somewhere that all brown coloured snakes in Africa are venomous. Here I was suddenly confronted by a small brown coloured snake.

I told Debs to stay in the inner tent, while I set about trying to usher it outside. This would have been much easier if we had two working doors. Eventually it rather slowly slithered out and into the undergrowth. It wasn't at all aggressive and had I known that it was harmless I would happily of picked it up, but as yet I still don't know what kind of snake it was.

Panic over, we headed to the kitchen to make breakfast and then rode into the town to get some food for the road. Taking the bikes to a shopping mall in South Africa was a bit of a problem. It seems that no-one rides a bike here so there is nowhere to secure them safely. When we tried to lock them to a post we were told that we couldn't leave them there and were directed to the motorbike parking area. As this was just an open bit of concrete we weren't overly keen to leave them locked and leaning against a dustbin. The security guards assured us that they would look after them, so other than leaving empty handed we had no choice but to trust them.

Walking round a shopping mall that contained three supermarkets is taking some getting used to. It is great being able to buy food, but is just too easy to get carried away. Showing remarkable restraint, we left with full bags of food that we actually needed and left the exotic treats behind.

Back at the bikes the security guard had been true to his word and everything was still there. We gave a small tip and guess this is what we will have to do when we stop anywhere with the bikes. Security of our possessions is not something we have had to worry about too much prior to now.

There was no mad partying at the camp-site tonight, instead it was an early dinner followed by an early night. We have a bit of climbing to do tomorrow and it has been a while since we have been seriously in the hills. Let's hopes our legs hold out!

Day 349 South Africa 17/10/2011, Komatipoort – Bushpackers camp-site, Hazyview. 10.58miles/17.09km, 1hr13minutes, Av 8.6mph.

We sadly packed up our gear this morning, loaded the bikes on the trailer Dave had borrowed, said goodbye to Mike and set off for the park at 7:30am.

We had an early sighting of some rhino and giraffe, but the main aim of the trip was to spot some lions. Julie has not seen lions in the wild and our last game drive was sadly devoid of them. Dave was confident that we would definitely see some before he dropped us off. For a while that looked like a bold claim as the park appeared almost empty of any wildlife. Four hours in the park passed and we still hadn't found any. We had seen elephants, impala, kudu, zebra, hippos and rhino, but no lions.

When it was looking like they may elude us again, Dave stopped to chat to a guide who told us that there was a pride of lions feeding on a dead hippo not too far away. We set off with a purpose, it looked like the day wouldn't be lion free after all. Sure enough we found the hippo carcass and with it three male lions. We could happily leave safe in the knowledge that we had seen the big five in Kruger NP.

Towing a trailer is not terribly conducive to game viewing, so when the traffic around the lion sighting started to move we had to go with it. Also the day was wearing on and Dave still needed to pay his fees. About an hour later and we were at the gate and unloading our bikes. It has been an absolute pleasure to meet Dave, Mike and Julie, but was definitely time to be moving on before we forget how to ride a bike!

Waving goodbye we headed off up the road and into the hills. The journey may have only been 17km, but it was a good work out to help prepare for the road ahead.

Arriving at Bushpackers camp-site, after stopping for supplies in the town, we met Adrian and were shown to the camping area. We plan to camp as much as possible in South Africa to try and keep the costs down.

Sadly our tent seems to be having other ideas as the long running zip saga came to a head when it refused to work at all. Even nipping the slider up with a pair of pliers didn't work this time. It is just fortunate that the front entrance zip is working. With a lot of swearing I eventually got the other zip done up, at the cost of one of the sliders which fell to bits! We will try to get it repaired on the road somewhere, but for now we will have to hope the other zip keeps working. I am finding it hard to be impressed by the performance of our very expensive Hilleberg tent.

After the stress of the zips, there was nothing else to do but go for a beer. It is just as well that we are staying put tomorrow as we had quite a few beers. Bushpackers is pretty far removed from Dave's Kruger View backpackers. Adrian is a little on the mad side and at some point we ended up wearing a selection of his hat collection.

It was a good night and I expect that there will be a small hangover to nurse in the morning.