If you think that chivalry is dead, you need to move to the Ceres region. For the first three days of the Epic, we found ourselves in Op-die-Berg in the Koue Bokkeveld. (Yes, that’s really what it’s called). I don’t think you could really call it a town. It literally consists of two roads: one residential and one commercial. The commercial road boasts no fewer than two drankwinkels and a Spar. I don’t know if it’s the proliferation of liquor outlets but the residents could not have been friendlier.

We checked into Oppi Berg (not a typo) Guest House, owned and run by the Hanekom family, aka Oom, Tannie, Boetie, Sussie and Boetie’s wife. And each family member was more charming than the next. In fact, I think Tannie’s biefstuk may have saved The Husband’s life. I brought him back to the B&B at 10pm at the end of Day 1, battered and bruised by The Masseuse and just generally looking miserable. After a few bites of rump, he had regained his sense of humour and forgotten about his debilitating ITB from just an hour earlier.

Subsequent meals featured not one, but two types of meat. We’d be served chicken AND lamb the one night and then pork AND beef the next. Luckily, the surrounding dirt roads provided gorgeous, peaceful running routes for the two soigneuses, since every time we crossed paths with Tannie Aletta, she offered to feed us.

At lunch on Day 2 we shared the dining room with four friendly, khaki-clad farmers who’d tootled into town for Tannie Aletta’s famous grub. I honestly think I spotted one of them tipping his hat at us as he walked in. Before we knew it, we were “aangename kennis-ing” left, right and centre and 20 minutes later we’d been invited on a “farm tour”. Later that day, we had another taste of local chivalry. We were headed for Ceres to go and fetch the boys when a piece of industrial plastic flew up and got caught in our front fender. We didn’t feel like stopping and figured we’d simply rip it out when we got to Ceres 40 minutes later. But just as we were entering the outskirts of the town, we saw a farmer in a bakkie behaving rather strangely. He pulled over in front of us and seemed to be making hand signals at us. Ever the alert Joburg gals, we assumed he was the local loon and we put foot. Only to have him follow us. He was flashing his lights madly and seemed to be signalling for us to pull over, which we eventually did. He then appeared at our window, tipping his hat and smiling broadly, before ripping out the piece of plastic now wedged in between our front grill. He politely explained how dangerous this was as it would overheat, melt and cause all sorts of complications. And then he smiled, tipped his hat and was gone.

Then it was back to real life with “where’s my burger” and “go get my bike from the wash-bay” as we met our boys at the finish. “It’s fine,” I thought. “The Masseuse will exact revenge on our behalves”.

When we arrived at The House of Pain, we were greeted by the now slightly more familiar sight of near-naked men. But this time, one of the riders (a respectable dentist, I might add) had his jocks whipped into a wedgy to form a lovely thong up his butt. Not only did this reveal his taut bum cheeks, it also exposed the nastiest-looking boil-like butt sore I’ve ever seen. Ouch. And then on top of it, he was wincing in pain as The Masseuse dug her elbows into his quads. If only his root canal patients could see him now.

The Masseuse interrupted her work to thrust a box of Epsom Salts at me and to tell me to get The Husband into bath in these salts. I decided not to beat around the bush and told her that The Husband doesn’t bath.
“Just tell him he must,” she said, looking at me as thought I was nuts.
“I’ll tell him but he still won’t bath,” I said.
She looked at me as if to say, “what do you mean he doesn’t do what you tell him to do?”
I just stood there, so she grabbed the Epsom Salts in one hand, the Husband in the other and marched him off to the bathroom.

I heard running water and then The Masseuse emerged from the bathroom sans The Husband. I actually think she may have locked him in.

Welcome to the Boland. Where the men treat the women like ladies and the women take no sh**.
Love it.

Photo: The “Bum Clinic” inside the medical tent at the race village.