There are all sorts of reasons for not being on a lonely Karoo road after dusk. Huge cross-country trucks with sleepy eyes behind the wheel suddenly appear in your lane. A little
bakoorjakkals (bat-eared fox) becomes roadkill in your headlights. A midwinter kudu smashes into your windscreen with disastrous results all round.
Or a ghost appears out of the inky blackness and then what? I tend to roam the Karoo by day and park indoors at night, which is probably why I’ve never really seen a spectre while sober. But, simply judging by legend, one knows they’re out there.