The Faulty Credit Card that Saved Our Lives
A typical summer sunday for us in Canada entails a beer by the dock, honking on the 401, and a disheveled unpacking before facing Monday.
In Africa, it was a head on collision, a mountain of fire, and memories of the mans screams ringing in my mind as I fell asleep.
This is how that Sunday went.
We were in gridlock on a mountain pass in Southern Africa. Traffic was blocked in both directions, and only one truck separated us from a deadly head on collision.
Although we had planned to be asleep by this time, a gruelling 4 hour trek in the mountain had delayed us. Instead of laying in bed in classic Sunday fashion, we were blinded by flashing lights as police, fire trucks and ambulance approached the wreckage. As they did, we held our breath.
Earlier that day
Sunday adventure is our thing. While most head home around lunch, my partner and I pride ourselves on enjoying the daylight hours to refuel our adventurous souls. In this case, we bit of more than we could chew.
We were in Cederberg National Park for a weekend adventure before her Masters program kicked off. Our Sunday adventure had led us to some 1000 year old rock art, where a local gave us some impromptu advice about a “must do” hike.
We took the local advice, and navigated using landmarks to find the entrance gate. We hadn’t purchased permits, but the local told us the code to the gate. We slide open a huge rusted iron gate to explore the area.
We wandered through “The Valley of the Red Gods” — a stunning view of red rock structures on a private land reserve. Beyond the valley was a large summit of the “Wolfgang Cracks”, a mountain with a massive split in the rock to climb through.
Our egos were inflated, assuming we could conquer the hike in roughly two hours.
We were wrong.
Four hours of bouldering in the blistering sun later and we were put in our place by mother nature.
We had climbed through majestic red cracks in the landscape, ascending to a landscape that looked like I would imagine Mars looking.
It was one of the best hikes of our lives. After a break to relieve a dizzy spell & some breathing exercises to refuel my body with oxygen, we marched back down to our car.
We were exhausted, but time was ticking and we needed to hustle to return our rental car on time.
We made it down, and back to our hostel. We asked about the nearest gas station, they told us it was them. Better put, they had emergency petrol that we sifened into the Car, to hold us over until the next gas station 100km away.
“We’re not in Kansas anymore” — Wizard of Oz.
100km away didn’t sound so bad, but we didn’t realize that would be 100km of bumpy unmaintained dirt roads. These roads were brutal — better suited for dirt bikes and 4 wheelers than cars, let alone cheap rental cars.
We were rightfully nervous — it was getting late, our brains were getting rattled from the unforgiving dirt roads, and the sun was going down over the mountain earlier than we expected…
Further than expected, darker than expected, and rougher than expected on a low tank of gas before the start of a Masters program.
We were in for it.
Key Context: Our not-so-offroad Vehicle.
To understand our stress levels, it’s important to understand the shiny piece of crap we had rented.
Nicely put, it was not built for these roads. It was a bare bones, cheap Chinese vehicle known as a “Datsun Go”, rented for $20/day. It was intended for basic city driving, not African dirt roads.
As a Canadian, these roads were rougher than I expected. Our northern camp has some bumpy roads, but you can still cruise along at 50km/hour. Without a truck, these roads were too ruthless for 50km. Our speed was more of a casual bike ride.
To give you an exaple— the day prior our battery was dislodged and the car shut down completely while we were driving.
Lucky for us, we were pulling into a winery, so the staff was able to grab a wrench and help fix the car and they were pour us wine inside of 10 minutes.
As a side effect of the mishap, we lost our music for the rest of the trip. The battery disconnect was a factory reset for the radio — so without a code we lost both our faith in the vehicle and our music. But the wine was top notch.
That’s some context — back to our sunset journey into town.
Sundown on the Dirt Road to Cape Town.
So here we were driving away from our Hostel in South Africa with just enough fuel to pinball our way to the next town.
The sun was dropping over the mountains earlier than expected, and we had lost cell phone reception.
Our car had proven unreliable, and we were bumping along at ~20km/hour.
My partner Carley started school the next day, and we knew our “1.5 hour drive” was destined to be more of a 4 hour drive. We would miss returning the car rental, and she would be short on sleep the night before she starts her masters.
“White-Knuckling” is a massive understatement. We were blue-knuckling it.
To be fair, my risk-taking tendencies were largely to blame.
After roughly 3 hours, and long after nightfall we had made it the 100km to the next town for a refuel. En route, we saw about a dozen cars broken down on the roadside, countless cars with missing headlights, and a guy pushing his car along. Just about everything about that drive was new for us, not to mention we’re still adjusting to driving a manual vehicle on the opposite side of the road.
We reached the station (Hallelujah!), caught our breath and filled up with fuel. I grabbed us some snacks (Chocolate to ease Carley’s nerves), and attempted to pay with my American Express. Of course, another hurdle. They don’t take Amex, the it’s the only credit card on me.
Slightly frustrated but glad to be out of the car for a few minutes, this forced me to walk back to the car and get Carley’s Visa to pay. It was a slight hiccup causing a 30 second delay that may have changed our lives.
This delay left us as witnesses of a horrific accident — instead of victims.
Thirty seconds of delay had us driving behind a mack truck, instead of in front if it. As they were turning the corner, the car in front of the mack truck was embraced by a ton of steel travelling 80km/hour towards them. If they were going 80, that’s a combined impact of 160km/hour.
The smash was chilling, as we watched the cars flight around on the highway in front of us until coming to a stop.
A hubcap whizzed by our car as we gasped for a breath.
Head on Collision.
Our first task was to catch our breath. We had just witnessed a Sedan round the corner on a winding highway and slam right into a blue Car, sandwiching them into an 18 wheeler.
A hubcap flew past us as we stopped. We were fine, but rattled as we held each others hands.
Our second task was to decide — do we go help? People may be dead or seriously injured. After watching people walk away from the crash, and others attending to the scene, we decide to leave it to the locals. We were new, and our nerves were shot.
We didn’t know the local protocol or any have any emergency medical training. We wouldn’t be very useful to the injured had this happened in Canada, let alone Africa.
We were stressed and navigating safety in a country with one of the highest murder rates in the world.
So we waited in the car.
We had one truck between us and the accident, and there were about 6 people in the back that had jumped out, investigated and called emergency responders. They had already done what we could do, so we waited.
Police were the first on the scene, followed by fire trucks. A fire truck showed up, but it looked like it just took a look and kept driving. Why didn’t they stop?
As emergency crews arrived, our minds went to the cause — this person must have been drinking. What other reason would they have to cross into the oncoming lane? A big judgement — in reality they could have fallen asleep, had a seizure, or had their brakes fail. That said one of the first responders was a breath testing team — a clear indication that drinking and driving is a big problem here. We later found out that Sunday evenings are the most dangerous day on the roads, as drinking is common after church gatherings. In any case, there were some very serious injuries up ahead.
As traffic piled up, onlookers approach the scene of the accident. Police and ambulance hadn’t blocked it off, so it was an effective free for all. That was a first — not something you would expect to see in Canada.
After about an hour of waiting, I worked up the courage to join the crowd. Stepping out of the car in the dead of night, I investigated the wreckage. What I saw wasn’t easy.
First was a blue car, sideways on the opposite side of the road. The front of the car was facing the guard rail, 20 meters from the collision. The front end was smashed right through the engine block, and looking inside at the twisted steering wheel gave some insight into the massive trauma the driver faced.
There were CD’s, onions and nectarines slung around the car. I walked around to see the back was smashed too, from being sandwiched into the Mac truck. Fuck. This was the victims car — the person that went from singing along to the radio to being sandwiched into an 18 wheeler by an oncoming car.
On the other side of the vehicle, I see the driver lying on the pavement. The man is conscious, but not moving. He’s not dead, but is he paralyzed? There are ~20 people around him, smoking and on their cellphones. No effort is made to give him space, but he has paramedics placing goz on his wounds in a fashion that looks haphazard. I see them try to move him, and hear his shrieks of pain. Not a sound I’d soon forget.
Ahead was the white car, and what I can only imagine is the driver that had caused the accident. The person is a limp fish, likely unconscious. It’s an hour after the accident, so they must be in serious trouble. They are loaded onto a stretcher by multiple paramedics.
I return to the car and update Carley on what I saw.
Two hours later, the ambulances and tow trucks have the road clear and we are free to drive onward.
The Fires of Mordor.
We drive ahead, in awe at the number of stressors on this drive.
It’s now 11pm, and we are both tired and rattled. Carley was stuck doing all the driving as my license went missing in Thailand a few months back. White-knuckling it, she’s a champ as we wind through the mountain pass in silence.
We’ve barely caught our breath, and ahead we see what looks like lava streaming down a mountain. Our jaws drop.
Above, the smoke is illuminated with an eerie red glow. “What in the world…this can’t be real”.
Only minutes after driving away from the scene of a head on collision, our route is taking us into a mountain of fire. Into a mountain fire.
You can’t make this shit up. The map indicates a detour is 2 hours, making the remaining drive 4 hours long. The vehicles ahead of us don’t seem worried, so we grip a little tighter and drive into it.
One last hurdle. At our distance, the fire is harmless. But my God is it a terrifying sight. We crack some jokes, watching for Orcs as we wind through the mountain, admiring the red glow in the nights sky.
With the size of this blaze, there’s no way it was intentional. We later found out it was raging out of control for the entire day, and it explains why a fire truck was passing the scene of the accident.
As we pull into Cape Town, a sign on the highway reads “High-crime area, do not stop. Emergency number is 0–12”. So we swallow, lock our doors and Carley grips the wheel a little tighter.
The map is taking us on a route home that I’ve been before. As we are going to be off the highway, I take a precaution to google the most dangerous areas of cape town. This was not one of the listed, so we take the route.
Ahead, there is a red light. We had heard that at night, you must not stop the car. We imagined it was an exageration.
When the person ahead of us rolled right through the red light, our jaws dropped. It was true — don’t risk stopping at night. There was risk enough that running a red light is safer than stopping. We followed suit.
As we pulled into our neighbourhood, we had a few litres of cortisol coursing through our veins. We unlocked our first steel gate, and then our second, and then our front door. I held my breath as I unpack the car in the darkness — anything left in the car risks a break in.
We showered off the dirt, and lied in bed by 1:30am. We were warm, safe, and glad to be alive. Two small town Canadians navigating a whole new world, blessed by a contrast of natural beauty and cursed by a heart-breaking history of inequality and racism.
Yes, this is what we signed up for. We knew it wouldn’t be easy, and we’re earning our stripes as we learn more about how the world works outside of our western oasis.
We’re here, we’re safe, and we’re growing thicker skin every day.
Welcome to Africa.
