Lions insider Richard Anderson gets lost on the road to Rustenburg, venue of Saturday's tour opener.
Lions insider Richard Anderson negotiates a few travel difficulties ahead of the tour opener
The tour moved on briefly on Friday, making a two-day stop in Rustenburg. For those unfamiliar with Rustenburg's, erm, charms, have a look here.
That's the city, but pretty much the entire media fraternity fell foul of South Africa's navigational idiosyncracies in getting there from Johannesburg: namely the lack of logic and signposts to the route-making.
I was told to head to Pretoria from Johannesburg and take the N4 west to Rustenburg, which was fair enough and was borne out by a map I had glanced at.
What the map did
not tell you was that the N4 currently takes a break for about 20km, sending you on a scenic route around Hartebeespoort dam among other things. There was one sign to Rustenburg; beyond that? I ended up navigating mostly by the position of the sun in the sky for a good half hour.
One other driver in the fleet headed the wrong direction in similar circumstances and found himself passing a sign displaying the legend: 'Frequent hi-jacking point', which did little for his already addled mind.
Another was pulled over at random by a police patrol - those were also out in heavy numbers, it has to be said - causing no end of confusion for the chaps in the car following him. The followers lost sight initially and, believing they had lost the trail, speeded up, passing the leaders as they co-operated with the police, but crucially not noticing them.
Once done with the police, the leaders also speeded up in order to catch up, but that was proving a little tricky since the followers in front were already going at quite a lick to catch up the leaders they thought were far ahead... you get the drift. Suffice to say, they were the first two cars to arrive at the press conference venue.
Scenic
But back to that navigating by the sun aspect. Despite all the stress involved in finding the way and making sure none of the resident lunatics run you off the road, you can not help but be relaxed by the sights and scenery of this magnificent country.
Wild ridged and rocky formations dot the landscape in wild lumps among the reddish soils like gigantic boulders of elephant dung, sprouting tufts of baked yellow grass and waist-high dried-out green bushes, all bathed in the cold, dry sunlight of a winter day.
All this as far as the eye can see and, eventually, on an open road with not a building in sight. It's the kind of place Thoreau might have come for his simple living.
It seems appropriate that in such an untouched and wild landscape, navigation should be by such a primitive and archaic method (even if from an air-conditioned Volkswagen).
Many of the touring party have reflected - including a few of the playing staff - that they all wish there was more time to see South Africa by car within the schedule, and they are absolutely spot on. Cheap flights abound here, cities offer all the creature comforts you might never even need, but to see the real South Africa you should travel it by land.
Saturday's match is to be played at the Royal Bafokeng Stadium, which is in the territory of the Royal Bafokeng Nation, a territory about 795 square miles.
The Bafokeng - the word means 'People of the Dew' - number about 160,000 people residing in the territory, but the number of the tribe members existing is thought to be around double that. They have been both plucky and fortunate in equal measure to have been able to retain their land in spite of annexation attempts from others.
The land has been dsicovered to hold one of the world's richest deposits of platinum (and many other metals as well), the mining rights to which the nation has sold wisely and invested even more wisely, with a budding infrastructure, schooling system, and, as you will see on Saturday, a superb multi-purpose sports facility which will be used for the soccer next year as well as the Lions.
Mystery
Back closer to the tour, the week's big mystery surrounds Andy Powell's hand. On Wednesday the Welshman ambled into a press briefing with his hand all bandaged up and replied, when asked, that he had been bitten by an insect. Big deal.
On Friday, Powell's injury had been upgraded to... a secret! Even when asked if it was an insect bite or not, Graham Rowntree insisted that the only people who even vaguely knew what the ailment might be would be the team medics. A cover-up? Mis-communication?
Either way, as we all contemplated what the truth might actually be, Rowntree did manage to thaw out the ice a bit by remarking: "If it was an insect, it must have been a hell of a creature to damage him!"
It seemed appropriate that next into the press briefing on Friday after Rowntree was Andrew Sheridan, whose track record with insects in the south of France is well-known.
Sheridan was hospitalised during the World Cup as a result of a reaction to an insect bite, the same problem which may see Powell out of Saturday's opener.
The fines are going well and building up quite a substantial kitty, the larger part of which will be donated to charity at the end of the tour.
They also include fines incurred at training, with all sixteen of the participants at Wednesday's live scrumming session fined twice for letting it collapse. We are not at liberty to divulge the amounts involved per person, but it is safe to say that it might be beyond the reach of the common or garden club player.
These chaps are of course not common or garden club players though, which is why we move on finally to the Lions Luxury of the Day: Their latest hotel. Fiendishly hard to find, you run a risk of even getting lost on the driveway once through the gate, worryingly manned by chaps in full army combat gear (I was assured it was just a private security company uniform). A fantastic place.
There's a full-on games room, a nine-hole golf course, a splash pool, two restaurants, all miles from anywhere, you struggle even to hear cars on the road in the distance... everything you might need but: no weights room.
The solution? Out came the boys and begun heaving their bars and dumbells on the lawn in front of the restaurant! That might have set a few female hearts a-flutter had the Lions not had the entire place to themselves.
As one player remarked: "It's kind of like California, but without the silicone!"
