Day 378 South Africa 15/11/2011, Mkuze – Bushbaby Lodge, Hluhluwe. 39.39miles/63.30km, 3hr37minutes, Av 10.8mph.

It is always the way, you have a nice room and end up having a rubbish night's sleep. At least I did, apart from aching from her falls and the exertions of fighting the wind, Debs had a good night.

Waking to a fairly calm day raised my tired spirits, although Debs spotting that she had a puncture in her rear tyre dampened them a little. Instead of fixing it there and then, we went to breakfast and decided to sort it out later. Having had a good breakfast we returned to fix the puncture. By now I am pretty professional at it and we were soon loaded and on our way.

There isn't much to say about the road to Hluhluwe (sort of pronounced shu-shloue) except that it was pretty rolling and fairly uninteresting. Riding on the N2 highway means that traffic is our constant companion, which doesn't make for the most peaceful of rides. Fortunately we are generally given plenty of room although, as I have previously mentioned, it is quite common to drive in the hard shoulder here.

At around midday we turned off towards and then rode through Hluhluwe, stopping in the local Spar supermarket to get some lunch and a few supplies along the way. Leaving the town we had a 8km ride along a generally good dirt road to reach Bushbaby lodge.

The dirt road went without incident except when we had to negotiate our way round a huge lorry that had clearly got itself stuck. We have no idea if the truck was supposed to be on this road, knowing Africa the driver probably just felt like a change. It may well mean that he gets a change of jobs as well!

The bush baby lodge is very nice and we are the only ones in the camp-site, possibly the only ones staying. The pool was a little bit cold, but we still braved a dip. Later this evening we should get to see the owner feed the resident bush babies and there is always the possibility of a cold beer to round off the day. Tomorrow we should make it to St Lucia wetlands park where we plan to stop for a few nights.

The bush-baby feeding turned out to be a total highlight. We had been told that the feeding would start at 7pm and sure enough as the time arrived several incredibly sweet bush-babies arrived. We were able to feed them pieces of chopped banana that, the older one at least, delicately took out of our hands.

The other younger ones were a bit more eager, but were still very gentle. Photographs were difficult, as they are obviously nocturnal animals but we did our best.

It is not every day that you get to feed bush-babies!

Day 377 South Africa 14/11/2011, Pongola – Biweda Nguni lodge, Mkuze. 26.61miles/42.77km, 3hr11minutes, Av 8.3mph.

Our day started very early this morning when I spotted Nandi, the lodge's resident spotted eagle owl, sitting on our balcony. I was a bit undecided about waking Debs up as it was only 5am, but I figured she would be a bit upset if she missed seeing the owl.

After a bit more sleep we headed to the restaurant for breakfast and then after saying our thanks and farewells to Gavin, we hit the road.

Our day on the road started pretty well, despite being sunnier than we had expected it was still fairly cool. With a long day ahead of us, we certainly didn't want the same temperatures we had encountered when we returned to South Africa.

Having checked our route, we knew we had a one fairly long climb and then the road should be at worse rolling. Riding along in the wide hard shoulder we found that we were not alone; early on at least, we had to share it with dung beetles, lizards, millipedes and at one point a leopard tortoise.

It was all going so well and then the wind strengthened. As we neared the town of Mkuze, having been fighting the wind for the last 2 hours, we began to realise that we were unlikely to make it to our intended destination. During some of the stronger gusts of wind we had almost been brought to a halt.

Turning off to the town, we stopped at a tourist office to find out if there was anywhere reasonably priced to stay nearby. We couldn't describe the staff member as informed, or even attentive, but we did get some vague directions. Arriving outside Biweda Nguni lodge it looked fairly promising and with no sign of the wind abating we weren't exactly filled with options. On the plus point the room is enormous and the lodge/B&B is very nice. For some reason however South African guest-houses charge ludicrous prices. Rooms seem to run at a very similar price to what you would pay for a decent hotel in central London. We have always accepted that occasionally we may have no choice, but at this rate our funds are not going to last the distance. Thankfully it looks like from now onwards we should be able to find camp-sites, cheap backpackers and even better we have several offers of accommodation.

Needing to get some food from the town, we got a lift in with the woman who is running the B&B. Just outside the local supermarket we encountered not one, not two, but four cyclists from England! They were on their way to Swaziland and had the benefit of the terrific tail wind. Once again we were reminded what a small world it is, when it turned out that they had all been students at the UEA (University of East Anglia). We gave them as much information about the road ahead that we could, but they are on a very tight schedule so are going to have to miss most of the sights. It is quite sad how unrealistic a timetable people give themselves sometimes. Although in their case it seems that they have just miscalculated. Wishing them well on their trip, we headed into the supermarket to get some lunch.

Back at the room and we have just holed ourselves up in front of the television. With any luck the wind will have died down a bit tomorrow. We have a shorter day ahead of ourselves now, thanks to our enforced early stop. So even if the wind doesn't drop we should be fine.