A Little Lesotho

We went up the Sani Pass, got stamps at the South African and Lesotho borders, and then drove to Black Mountain. Even though it was very cold and windy, we had lunch on top with a view of the mountains below us. While we were eating, two shepherds came up to the group and one of them, with a makeshift guitar, started playing and singing for us. He seemed so happy to be playing - I liked it very much. Some people shared their lunch with him but I had eaten mine already.


After Black Mountain, we visited a Basotho village. (The people of Lesotho are called Basotho (plural) and Mosotho (singular).


A Mosotho woman invited us into her hut and shared bread and homemade beer with us. To gain entry into a hut, you say "koo-koo" --kind of like you'd say "knock-knock"--because there are no doorbells or hard surfaces to knock on. There is no running water or electricity and wood is very expensive, so cow dung is used for heating.


She gave us some fresh-baked bread that was cooked in a pot over cow dung. Incidentally, the pot also had cow dung on top of it - to heat the top of the bread like coals would, I think. Thankfully the bread had no traces of cow dung and was actually really good. We tried her homemade beer; it was okay. It was the color of milk, grainy in consistency, and tasted a bit sour.

Next stop was the "highest pub in Africa" where I tried a Maluti - local beer made in Lesotho. It was hoppier than I would have liked and it made me wish I'd gotten gluwein instead. Apparently, the highest pub in Africa, at 3800+ meters, specializes in gluwein. How random =)


And that was my experience of Lesotho (pronounced Leh-soo-too in Southern Africa). After the pub, we got our exit/entry stamps again and then went back down the Sani Pass past/through those gorgeous mountains.