As wide-eyed lighties, Peter Frost and his twin brother, Nigel, used to pack a couple of sleeping bags, climb on their Honda MT and MB 50s and two-stroke off in a blue haze looking for fun in Zimbabwe's Eastern Highlands.

Fast-forward 25 years; replace the 50s with a Harley Softail and a Buell Ulysses, the Highlands with the Lowveld and you have the makings of a first-class midlife-crisis buster.

On March 1st my brother and I turned 40, an impossible feat made all the more painful by the fact that it was the first birthday where our combined age had finally overtaken our dad's. We were officially old, death was just around the corner, we would never win the Comrades or play (anything) for our country. So we did the only sensible thing we could think of — we decided to ride off as we once had, sleeping bags on the back of Honda 50s, with no plans, no kids and feel the winds of freedom one last time.

Still, we had to acknowledge that some things had changed forever. Doing it on an MT50 wasn't going to happen and neither were a ground sheet and one change of clothing. It was winter, after all, down in the Lowveld. So we went to see the fine folk at Harley-Davidson.

Two months later we stood outside Jos Joubert's Menlyn Park Harley showroom, thinking maybe we'd bitten off more than we could chew. Millions of rands worth of chrome, intimidation and attitude sparkled at us in the winter sun. The thing was, neither of us had ever ridden a Harley before. The closest I had ever come was hurling obscenities at the Sunday crowd of Hogs that power under my window every weekend at 7.30am and wake me up.

But there was no going back. We had organised to take a Harley classic, the Softail, as well as America's answer to the BMW GS and Honda's TransAlp, the Buell Ulysses. Buell is known for their short-wheelbase trick bikes, but the Ulysses is their real-world attempt to get a slice of the lucrative on-off-road pie.

I approached the Softail with mock bluster. Astride it felt huge. When the starter button fired and ripped open the showroom's quiet, it got even bigger, a proverbial 32-wheeler ready to flatten Dennis Weaver in Duel.

Jos and his team watched us head out of the parking lot — no pressure — Nigel on the Buell, me on the Harley. Safely out of sight, I relaxed. It's hard not to feel like Peter Fonda in 'Easy Rider', even in suburban traffic escaping Gauteng's clutches. You practically lie down, feet well forward, arms bent. It's like reading in the bath — short reach, long legs. And that noise….

Hoedspruit cheetahs, the road to Graskop

Out on the N4 heading east beyond Bronkhorstspruit a rhythm set in; the Softail steady at 100km/h, the Buell disappearing up the road like an angry wasp, slowing, buzzing again. Later, riding it, I'd understand why — it's the nature of the relatively light and very responsive bike to want to gun it and play. The Harley's fairing — you — and impossibly long front forks don't make for high-speed slalom antics. Anyway it would be undignified, like a Springsteen fan at a Boyzone concert.

The city released its grip and there was time to think about the road ahead. The only planned stop was at Lente Roode's Hoedspruit Endangered Species Centre. We'd turn off at Waterval Boven onto the R539, go over the Abel Erasmus Pass, through the Strydom Tunnel and on to Hoedspruit. After that it was wherever the protruding nose of the Harley led us.

Sound bombs in the Strydom Tunnel

Among bikers, it's accepted that you officially start your Lowveld break when you turn off the N4 and hit the back roads. And the best welcome the Lowveld has to offer is the R36 from Waterval Boven, over Erasmus and through the tunnel.

On a Harley it was sublime. The cliffs closed in and the blacktop spaghettied; the bike growled its pleasure. We'd change down for the hell of it, just to hear those big ol' pistons play Wisconsin jazz. The music crescendoed through the tunnel, which, of course, I had to ride through at least twice. The Buell watched, mute and jealous.

But by the time Lente's Endangered Species Centre revealed itself on the Kruger side of Hoedspruit, the Buell, with its fairing, was having the last laugh - being a parachute takes its toll and I was looking forward to getting off the Hog, into a nice hot shower.

Cheetahs among the Hogs

The Hoedspruit Endangered Species Centre is part of the much larger Kapama Game Reserve, with Kapama Lodge, Kapama River Lodge, Buffalo Camp and Camp Jabulani all linked to it, catering to the well heeled. But Jabulani's elephant-back rides and five-star luxuries were not what we had in mind. We'd got a ride already and in the spirit of our original trips, had fixed on staying basic but fun - and that meant the group's Hoedspruit Safari Tented Camp.

Two brothers, a potjie and a campfire. Perfect. And about R1000 change in our pockets. The Hog and the Buell looked happy next to the large tent, glowing in the firelight, much like their temporary owners.

The next morning, after a Land Rover trip through the centre's enclosures to see the cheetahs, dogs and rescued lions of Lente's lifework, we set off for Tzaneen. Or not. The call of Blyde River Canyon turned out to be louder than the forests of Magoebaskloof, so we ditched the Tzaneen idea and happily threaded our way back through the Strydom Tunnel and over Erasmus once again before turning left onto the delicious R532.

The road is one of the country's most intox-icating blends of curves, vistas and well-engineered cambers and on a sharp, clear morning, it's a world-beater. The canyon teased us on the left, appearing and disappearing, before offering up its full glory just this side of Graskop at the Three Rondavels viewing site.

Which was also the spot for the first barny. Brothers know each other too well.

"What's the rush boet? Chill," said Nigel.

"I want to be in Graskop early, to see what's what," I replied.

"Right. Well off you go then."

So we didn't enter Graskop in formation, but that's the beauty of touring on bikes. If you have a moment with your travelling companion, you've got a ready-made single occupancy chill-out zone to retire to. We'd swapped bikes by now and I had to wait 20 minutes at Harrie's Pancakes for the dof-dof of the Harley to break the quiet. I think Niggle was making a point.

Any residual crustiness evaporated when we checked out our accommodation for the night. The Graskop Hotel is to the burgeoning town what De Waterkant is to Cape Town — the triumph of art over the everyday. Downstairs is like a contemporary art museum and each of the rooms upstairs has been designed by a different well-known South African artist. If the hotel's empty, you get to look around and choose your favourite bedroom. Not much to do with camping, but we checked in anyway. I chose Andrew Milne's orange and grey 1950s delight, Nigel chose the more traditional Adriaan van Zyl lighthouse-themed bedroom. Typical.

Brothers in arms once again, we headed for the Boat House pub next door for a few drinks to contemplate the next day's madness. We'd seen a signboard at the end of the main street suggesting a leap of faith. The 80-year-old collective was going to jump off a cliff.

Just jump, moron

The sensible thing to do when you're about to attempt a 68-metre free fall is not to have breakfast. But Nigel, typically, had the full English anyway. 'I told you so' is a much-used phrase between brothers and all the more fun when approaching terminal velocity.

The Big Swing is everything you expect it to be — great to imagine but totally insane when you're standing on a wooden platform ready to commit play-play suicide. It makes you realise you're not ready to die just yet, old as you may be. But too late. Across the gorge at the company's Edge Bar, smirky tourists just off a bloated bus waved nicely.

"When I count to three, you just step out. Don't jump. Onetwothree."

Nigel disappeared. A second later I heard a strangled gurgle, then a tenor keen and finally a maniacal cackle. He lived, and as he was lowered onto the valley floor, it was my turn. Honestly? It wasn't fun up there contemplating your mortality, but the trip down was. Never believe anyone who says a jumper blacks out before they hit the ground. You remember everything….

A nice chap named Chris

Back in the saddle after the death leap, the Hog and Buell headed for Hazyview, not the prettiest spot in the Lowveld, with its strip malls and roadside curio markets. But the Graskop-Hazyview road is another winner and we couldn't miss it. Bikes were everywhere, most going way too fast even for this perfect road. I wasn't surprised to learn later that evening from Chris Harvie at Rissington Inn in Hazyview that an average of two bikes a week are scraped off the tarmac during the holiday months.

I'd heard of Chris through the traveller's grapevine; a former Pom, he'd lost his heart to Africa decades ago and spent much of the intervening years exploring its nooks and crannies. His inn is the kind of place you hope to find on a trip like ours - happy, relaxed, with good chats and evenings full of excellent wine and wit. It was so comfortable - huge rooms, lots of space to breathe outside too - that we stayed two nights, forgetting our tent promises to keep it basic.

More aerial antics in the sky

The meat in the sandwich of Rissington nights was the Skyways aerial cable trail, based in Hazyview. It's a tree-tops foefie slide, but a very grand one. You start at the top of the Sabie River Valley and fizz your way down through 10 different stages, stopping at platforms as you go. It seemed just the kind of silly thing two mid-lifers should do. The first sections are a real buzz: 230 metres of really high, really fast sliding. By the time you're in the valley proper, it's much slower and the slides go through the forest rather than over it, great for birders.

Back on the road - Barberton calling

After two days of dawdling, it was time to get back on the bikes and clock up some real kilometres. We'd decided to make for the less-travelled roads of Mpumalanga's Panorama Route around Barberton. As kids we'd loved jumping on cotton bales in the town and got our hands dirty trying to push the old locomotive outside the caravan park off its tracks. Was it still there? And I'd heard of a funky little village in the mountains, where wild horses still roamed. It seemed appropriate to find them, given the steeds we were riding.

But first the Sudwala Caves and the Artist's Café at Hendriksdal. Like a Nissan 1400 bakkie, the caves have become part of a landscape we don't think about anymore and we wanted to see if they were still worth visiting. The answer was a big yes, although there's still a de-cidedly 1970s feel to the whole place. There's a tearoom and the old dinosaur park and the caves themselves, which are smaller than Cango, but no less intriguing, especially if you believe the boast that they're the oldest in the world.

The Artist's Café is 30 kilometres up the road, a former railway station (the trains still go by) that was converted into a B&B some time ago and is now well known in the area for its food. The cosy restaurant is the old stationmaster's house, presided over by Leon and Hetta Steyn. Leon spent much of the past two decades working for the railways, so it's kind of cool that he's running the place now.

But we were itching to make for the south. By Hendriksdal the bikes had fully revealed their characters. Despite its image, the Softail was now an old friend, dependable, solid, strong, easy and forgiving, while the Buell, though no less interesting, wasn't quite so infectious. The Harley gets under your skin. The Buell you'll forget in time. I was beginning to understand the Hog phenomena.

That's not what a Harley's for

The R40 from Nelspruit to Barberton is a nightmare — unless you're on a bike. Narrow, old and twisty, it takes only one truck climbing Nelshoogte Pass to back up traffic 10-deep. That's when you need 103Nm of torque to catapult you into the clear air. It's a great feeling leaving the rural congestion behind.

Barberton, unlike Nelspruit, hadn't changed much. We pulled up alongside the old locomotive still gracing General Street and gave it a nostalgic pat before tucking into a late lunch at the delightful boere-baroque Bye Apart Ate restaurant in De Villiers Street. It was a quick meal because the plan was to find the village of Kaapsehoop before sundown. And there were unmarked back roads involved….

It was just as well we didn't linger. Trying to get across the escarpment from Barberton to Kaapsehoop without trekking back to Nelspruit is a tricky business. The forestry roads are dirt and they don't like Harleys. The feeling was mutual. While the Buell came into its own with its fat wheels and long-travel suspension, the Hog felt like a couch potato at an aerobics class.

It got worse. Kaapsehoop, as cute as everyone had said, with its corrugated-iron mining houses, was booked out. All four guesthouses were stuffed with forestry workers taking their annual time-out from the woods. The only accommodation was deep into those forests, at the Kaapsehoop Horse Trails cottages. A quick call to get directions from horse-whisperer Christo ver Bruggen and we were off again into the loaming, saddle sore and worried about the roads.

With good reason. It was only 20 minutes, but the forestry track descended in steep wet, slippery switchbacks, winter fog not making things any easier. On a long-wheelbase Hog with a Marie biscuit front tyre way out in front, it was nervy going. The lights in the pretty little clearing were a welcome relief, as was the bath in the 1920s forestry cottage. The silence that night was as thick as the fog blanket that closed out the escarpment views.

Gauteng or bust

Our final morning dawned with an icy crispness, the kind that bikers love and fear in equal measure. Picking our way back to the main tar road, we were glad of the low speeds. Cold like that cuts through anything. But the freshness was intoxicating. Out on the sweeping Panorama Route road down to the paper mill at Ngodwana on the N4, we were chilled to the bone but wouldn't slow down - it was biking heaven, early, empty, bright and newly minted.

Which is more than can be said for much of the N4 from Waterval Boven. Factories, mine dumps, power pylons and industrial traffic were a rude reality check for us, sedated as we'd been by the last-century feel of the past week.

We pulled into Jos' chrome-infested forecourt with a great deal more authority than we'd left it, but, Murphy's Law, there was no-one to witness the by now second-nature hunt for the Hog stand or skilled extraction of the Buell's bizarrely located ignition key under the front forks. But it didn't matter. The plan had been to rekindle a little of that pared-down magic that only bikes can give you — and we'd succeeded.

We didn't feel 16, but that was fine. We didn't feel 80 anymore either. And, really, who wants to be that hormonally challenged ever again, anyway?

This feature originally appeared in Getaway Magazine. For more, visit getawaytoafrica.co.za