SASSU Regatta- Vanderkloof Dam

The weekend after the Klein Karoo, I went with the Rhodes University Rowing team to Vanderkloof Dam in the Free State which is the province in the middle of the country. Its very dry and hot and full of people descended from the original Dutch-Afrikaaners. It was cool to experience South African university level rowing but it was incredibly unorganized and out of control. We raced in a bunch of events which you can do here and did ok. I haven't exercised since December so it was a bit of a shock. The town is a small resort town situated on a giant reservoir. Its empty most of the year as it was when we were there. Because South Africa only has about ten universities with rowing programs, the entire rowing community of the country was there. The last night they throw a giant party that I had been hearing was ridiculous. So everyone gets ready to go out and because this is a holiday resort there is a giant water slide. Kids told me before that every year it gets broken into and put into use. This year the committee who runs the regatta told us it would be open from 8pm-10pm and that was it. Well as everyone heads down towards the slide we see that is has been broken into and there are hundreds of drunken rowers (men and women) running around completely naked. The police show up, two officers get out of the car and observe what is going on and they to strip down and begin to use the water slide...I'm NOT kidding. Later in the evening the party moves down to a pavilion where there is a DJ. Things got out of hand as they always do. Ive had my share of South African rowing for now. Attached are some pics of the damn and our V8 loading the boat in the water.