Oh, the things we’ll do when all of this is over…

We were young and irresponsible, so of course we went. Garve drove, because we was sober. I immediately passed out, swearing all the while that I was going to take over as soon as he got tired.

As it turned out, I woke up on the beach at Wacky Point. Wacky is a right-hand point break, which is to say, a surf spot. It is precisely 256km from where our journey started, in the erstwhile Grahamstown.

We had apparently picked up our surfboards on the way out of town, and we could therefore just about manage a hungover surf in the limpid morning waves, squinting a little as the sun asserted itself in the sky.

Then that most satisfying part of the process, changing out of our wetsuits by the car. There, beneath a lone banana tree, the subtropical air gradually warming us as the salt crusted on our hopeful faces. We watched a last perfect set of chest-high right-handers reel down the point; we winked at each other and climbed aboard for the three-hour journey back to the G-spot. That day’s lectures would be a write-off.

The other time, Grahamstown was the destination, not the source. Smiler and myself were in Port Elizabeth, again looking for waves. Finding none, we drove past Bluewater Bay and just kept on going for the 120km to eRhini, where we knew we would find a town full of willing party partners. And why not? We were irresponsible, we had the use of a car and the open road.

Driving was my thing. I just felt blessed, because I never suffered an unfortunate accident of any consequence. My road angels are strong.

Once my dad and I left Joburg and headed off to Gaborone, across the Botswana border on a whim. He was in Joburg for a visit, and was interested in checking out a dam he had been involved in building during the 1960s.

Today, I can confirm that Gaborone Dam still stands, though it gets worryingly empty at times. Also Gaborone is not blessed with nightlife of any great consequence, and its beer contains only 3.5% alcohol.

Not much else to report. But heading off that time, in a northwesterly direction out of Jozi, I don’t think we expected much. We expected a gentle three hours’ cruising through the pale highveld bush, a Steers burger in Zeerust and a B&B in Gaborone. That is precisely what we got.

That experience was out there waiting for us, that road trip. As it always was. We just needed a small gap in our schedule and the strength of purpose to grasp it.

That Gabs trip was one of a million possibilities that lay glistening around us, every minute of every day, back then. We could just as easily have hit Nelspruit, Mbabane or Maputo, any time we felt like it. Really felt like it.

Or we could have just not done that. We could have stayed in. Watched something on the TV and chilled on the couch, which is what we actually ended up doing most days.

We let those million gems of possibility lie glistening in vain, unexamined, all around us. And we chilled on the couch.

That, though, has been done to death. That chilling on the couch. When those possibilities once more become possible, let me tell you. That is when we once again start prospecting for gems.

Hagen Engler. Picture: Supplied

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