Taking the inland road, we leave Durban early, heading south into the Transkei. The yellowed hills are dotted with thousands of pastel painted houses, with animals, washing lines and children playing outside.
Where there are clumps of trees by the road, we often spy monkeys – sometimes sitting on the road signs!
In places, the long dry grass is being cut and neatly prepared, to be sold as thatch – perfectly lined up by the roadside. 
We pass through bustling towns where market stalls are set up all along the routes, selling everything you could possibly imagine…
We pass many children immaculately dressed in school uniform, despite the poverty, there is huge pride in sending children to school, and a child may be kept at home if something is wrong with his or her uniform.
By mid afternoon, we’re at Mthatha – a chaotic and overcrowded town where obeying road signals appears optional… We stop at the Nelson Mandela Museum, and later (out of town) the village where he grew up. He still has a house here, (substantially larger than the one he grew up in) where he and his family spend some holidays.
That evening, we are staying Anthea and Bronwens’ parents, Tony and Naomi – who are wonderful hosts and welcome us into their home in Butterworth. Naomi runs a small nursery and primary school in the building next to their house, and Christel and I meet some of the youth group (most of whom are ex-students of the school) in their Friday evening devotion.
They are in training for a race, so we join them in a couple of laps of the (extremely hilly!) block. There is lots of laughing and cajoling as we struggle up the steep incline together. Later we are fed wonderful home cooking and sleep well. 
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