Drakensberg Hiking: South Africa

After making our escape from Lesotho, we were off to the Drakensburg  Mountains, which form most of the eastern border of Lesotho with South Africa. The Drakensberg is where you go for hiking, and it was spectacular. We were there in the winter, which has a lot of implications, some of which we expected and others we didn’t. We did know the amazing waterfalls would be (mostly) dry and that the startling green in the pictures we’d seen would likely be browner. We had unfortunately forgotten to factor in that the days would be quite short so far south in the winter (about 12 hours of sunlight), and discovered that the South Africans set the whole countryside on fire in the winter. They burn their fields in the countryside and it produces some rather horrendous smoke. All that being said, we had beautiful sunny days (apparently it storms in the afternoons in the summer) and did some great hikes.

view from the cottage

our little barn cottage

Cathkin peak & Champagne Castle

We stayed in a little cottage on a working farm and were happy to have our own space and be able to cook for ourselves. The area was rural but not remote and the smoke produced fantastic sunsets. We did the Blindmans Corner hike from Monks Cowl and the Tugela Falls hike in the Escarpment. It was perfect shorts and tank top weather during the day and quite chilly at night.

sunset

fire on the road

sunrise from the cottage

Drakensberg Escarpment

Steven climbing the ladder

Looking down

on fire

...and some of Steven's gems

goose parade every morning at the cottage

Ash on her way up

pegs

Lesotho: Kingdom of the Sky

After a mere two flights (one being 14hrs and 45 minutes long) Matt and I arrived at the Johannesburg airport on Sunday morning. Travel buddies Ashley & Steven had arrived a few hours earlier from their short stay in Germany. In what later proved to be a very valuable move, they spent the hours chatting it up with the guy at the car rental place where they were waiting for us. We were ‘upgraded’ to a Nissan Micra. As we packed the car, we wondered what on earth sort of creation this could be an upgrade from, but we easily discovered when we arrived in Cape Town two weeks later to a Kia Picanto. The Micra would be both our faithful companion and the bane of our existence for the next two weeks. Packing procedures involved filling the spare tire compartment with shoes and anything else small, stuffing the glove box, and taking up every inch under each of the seats. The Micra travelled 2200 miles with us.

Anyways, then we had had enough and left South Africa.

Just kidding. But we did leave – we drove immediately to Lesotho (pronounced li-SOO-too). Lesotho is one of the two small countries inside of South Africa. We crossed the border in a place called Ficksburg, where we got stamped out of South Africa, and waved on by some guy at a gate, paid a couple dollar ‘toll’ to Lesotho and were off. I expressed some concern that we had not gotten Lesotho-an stamps but we had asked and been waved along and the town was downright frightening so we kept moving. Our goal was the town of Butha Buthe which the guidebooks said didn’t have much to say for itself but was near some lovely hiking.

Our time in Lesotho is hard to describe. Butha Buthe was also somewhere where we felt uncomfortable driving through, and had no desire to stop in. Our hotel was relatively comfortable and we ate there. The lowest point in Lesotho is some 5,000 feet in elevation so we woke to frost and a frozen windshield the next morning – but a beautiful drive through the mountains and fog. We made a short hop out to a national park, which to our surprise had an amazing luxury lodge within it. We swooned at the thought of real espresso and postponed the start of our hike for an hour. After caffeine, we headed out into the hills for a hike. It was beautiful, striking scenery, with snow on the mountaintops which is very unusual for Africa. We enjoyed the lodge and our hike very much, and expect there we could have enjoyed more time in the countryside.

Unfortunately, we had to leave that afternoon and when we arrived at the border crossing (a different one) we were asked where our entry stamps were. We were angrily told we should have received them and blamed for not having done so (why would they have let us in??). What followed was a unnerving, angering, slightly comical 40 minutes of alternately being asked for a bribe, threatened with arrest, and lectured on the fact that Lesotho is in fact a separate country from South Africa and ‘this is not America, you do not just do what you want’. In the end we left $25 poorer each and with a sour taste of the country in our mouths. 

late lunch in Clarens

Golden Gate National Park

our first zebras!

 

Looking back we would have probably skipped it just due to our time constraints, but it was beautiful and I’m sure warranted a better chance. After that slightly depressing first trip report, we’ll have some spectacular hiking in the Drankensberg mountain range up next.

(some of Steven's photos below)

Sneak Peek: South Africa

Haven't gotten to writing any posts yet but here's a few of my faves from the real camera.

hiking in the Drakensberg Mountains

Kruger Nat'l Park

three days of hiking the Wild Coast

surfs up

Sunrise hike of Lion's Head - table mountain in the background

sunset in the wine country