Witsieshoek Weekend
June 2011
By Carin le Roux
Hikers: Alex (Leader) & Trudy Elshove, Tonie & Bertha Lazarus, Betsie Smit, Lesley van Vuuren, Elaine Deysel, Piet van Heerden, Dalene Süpra, Cynthia Webber, Carin le Roux.
Witsieshoek Mountain Lodge is less than 400 km from the East Rand and all hikers had arrived at our destination for the Long Weekend by lunchtime on Thursday, obviously keen to get away from Gauteng for a couple of days!
The Lodge is under serious refurbishing and the original accommodation we were shown was less than satisfactory as we were informed that we would be accommodated in Chalets with en-suite bathrooms – a real luxury for us hikers, but none-the-less expected for the weekend. After Betsie used her usual charm and powers of persuasion we were indeed given very comfortable, clean Chalets with the most fantastic views of the mountains, namely the Sentinel.
The Lodge has a Restaurant where we were provided with substantial home-type, wholesome breakfasts and dinners. After a latish lunch everyone spent the afternoon unpacking, making themselves comfortable and enjoying the scenery. As the evening closed in it became bitterly cold and the wind, straight from the Antarctic, blew right in, howling around the corners and windows. I lay awake most of the night thinking of every excuse why I could not hike the following day, BUT the dawn broke bright and beautiful and the wind had settled!
Just on 8a.m. on Friday morning we set off from an altitude of 2286m down the mountain, but, within a few hundred metres the more knowledgeable hikers stopped to have a serious conference as to where we were headed …. downwards towards Mahai was good! The scenery was spectacular to say the least! Along the Gubu Pass we stopped to admire several different rock formations, including ‘mushroom’ rocks and Castle Rock. We were not allowed to venture to The Cracks as the route was closed; we also missed/bypassed the Mudslide, but saw many Waterfalls along the way including the Tiger Falls.
We left Bertha to fend for herself for a few hours near an indigenous forest with a waterfall. Bertha is very good at imitating the mating call of baboons, so we knew that she wouldn’t be lonely. From there the rest of us hiked more than half the mileage for the day down to Mahai Campsite which is at an altitude 731m lower than our starting point. After a short coffee break we set off back up the mountains on the far side of the Gorge. The beginning of the up-climb was easy-going along a paved pathway, but after a while it became rather steep and a little tiring, but with plenty more amazing views. We had lunch once we located Bertha again.
Then we started on the last leg of the day’s hike, with fantastic views of the Amphitheatre. I am still not sure if this was planned or not, but we (namely Tonie) found our way “home” via a little-used cattle track and not along the Royal Natal Parks trail! The sun had disappeared behind a mountain by the time we arrived home and it had become bitterly cold once more. We covered 15,5 km this day.
On Saturday morning we arose to another beautiful South African winter’s morn and were in the cars by 07:45 to travel to the car park, 7 km away, to climb towards the Sentinel. We HAD to stop along the way to take photos of icicles hanging from the rocks along the roadside. This turned out to be another spectacular day with the most amazing views.
Parts of the pathway were potentially dangerous, but thanks to Alex, Piet and Bertha for their guidance, patience and encouragement, we had no mishaps. In several places we had to tread over solid ice, which was very slippery, with the use of our walking sticks (which were essential), encouragement and with help from Piet and Bertha and ‘baby steps’ along the ice, we all made it across the first ice-path. The groans were clearly heard when we set eyes on the next ice-path! And this time a few of us got down on our hands and knees and crawled across the ice … by far the safest way!
Once we had conquered the ice on the paths we had some climbing to do before reaching the Chain Ladders. Some of us were a little anxious about this challenge: I think that Dalene and I felt the same way – it was a little daunting but also exhilarating - and by the time we had all climbed up and down both ladders we really felt that we had achieved something – another “tick” on our Bucket List!
Once we were at the top of the ladders we could again admire the view and especially a frozen waterfall. The altitude at the top of the Chain Ladders is 2988m; a vertical climb of just over 500m from the Car Park. A few metres on, many of us deposited our backpacks (in retrospect – not a very wise thing to do!) and went to ‘play in the snow’
The snow was only about 15 cm deep but very different to what we are accustomed to, so it was fun and we acted like children! When we were again at the bottom of the Chain Ladders we had our lunch break and watched many other people ascending/descending the Ladders – many of them younger, but less experienced than us. Several of these youngsters were planning to spend the night camping at the top of the mountain – they must have frozen that night as the wind came up again that evening. We did feel quite sorry for them when we were tucked up in our warm beds that night.
We returned to the Car Park along the same route as we originally came and along the way we met a group of locals with their ‘huskies’ (mangy looking dogs). We were a little concerned about the belongings of the people spending the night outdoors and of our lack of thought when we deposited our packs at the top to play in the snow.
Many of the iced pathways had partially melted on our descent and it made the hiking easier. Betsie told us that it is “tradition” to RUN the last 100m on the last day of a hike, so several of us took up the final challenge!! We hiked a total of just more than 10 km on this day. A wonderful weekend was had by all, thanks to Alex and everyone else who worked as a team.
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