The record for covering this traverse was set last March by two
South Africans, Ryan Sandes and Ryno Griesel who crushed the previous
record finishing the entire thing in 41 hrs 49 min. They were
gracious enough to share their GPS track with us as it turned out
that this traverse would have been impossible without it due to the
confusing landscape and often thick fog his time of year. One night shortly before we
left for the traverse we were hanging out at our local friends house,
the Bensons. Alcohol may have been involved. Their son had 2 hobby
horses (one horse, one zebra) that he had gotten for Christmas. I
started to ride it around the house and then had an idea.
Lately many people we know have been doing a variety of crazy things
that have never been done before to get the “Only Known Time” and
thereby setting a record. Without doing any research, I was pretty sure that no one had ever ridden a hobby horse/zebra across
the Drakensberg Mountains and I decided that I wanted to be the first
one to do this. Luke Benson (without his knowledge) donated his
hobby zebra to the mission. Other local friends also helped us out
with the logistics. Georgina Ayre offered to meet us in the middle
for a resupply and Andrew and Suzie Jed offered to drive us down to
the trailhead. None of this would have been possible without the
help of everyone listed above and we want to say a HUGE THANKS for
their help. Also a big thanks goes to Dawn Greensides and Paul Pleva
(Home Base South Africa) where we have spent a lot of our time. I
have watched the movie Madagascar pretty much once a day with their 2
year old, so in Piper's honor, the zebra was named Marty.
Day 1: We were given a ride to the trailhead where we found
ourselves within a cloud with the wind blowing and a heavy mist
making everything wet. I pulled out Marty the Zebra and off we rode
into the fog. The first few kilometers was the only real trail we
would see for the next week. This trail led up to the Chain Ladders
which climb up a ~40 foot section of cliff. Not a good place to
slip. Once above these cliffs you are on the escarpment and the
terrain becomes more rolling. There is also no trail after this
point and the navigation across the alpine landscape began. The fog
made it difficult to see any landmarks but using the GPS we were able
to head in the right direction to Mount Aux Sources, our first peak.
From the top of the Chain Ladders we started to pass Basotho
tribesmen dressed in leather shorts, rubber boots, and a brown cloak.
As it became afternoon we were able to gain enough elevation to get
above the cloud cover. At 5pm as we were contemplating where to camp
a tribesman came to the other side of the river from where we were
and started to do a dance. He chanted, danced, shook his stick,
yelled, and leaped into the air for over 5 minutes. We just sat
there with our mouths hanging open. We weren't sure if we were being
challenged, if he was praying to the setting sun, or what was going
on. When he was done he just walked off and disappeared over the
hill. We hiked a little further and found a place to camp. 5
tribesmen came over to check us out. They spoke no English but gave
us a lot of thumbs up. When I rode Marty around they were in
hysterics and when one of them grabbed him and started to ride him
also the other tribesmen had tears in their eyes they were laughing
so hard. Marty ended up being a great ice breaker. Through hand
gestures they told us that it was ok to camp where we were and we had
an uneventful night.
Riding Marty out of the parking lot
Marty climbing the chain ladder
Summit of Mount Aux Source 
Basotho taking a ride with Marty
Day 2: The Marty rider and his friend came back in the
morning. These people do not seem to see many white people. They
were fascinated by our tent. They kept wanting to touch the material
and when I folded up the tent poles they yelled out and were very
excited by that. The day started by climbing up a river valley. We
found a sheep path to follow for part of it. Occasionally we would
find a cliff blocking our way and would have to traverse around it.
The terrain was often fairly flat so once again the GPS was very
useful to find the correct way. We only met one Basotho who spoke
English and it was on this day. He already knew about us. It
appeared that news travels fast in these highlands. We passed many
more Basotho that day. They were as fascinated by us as much as we
were them. Fathers would call their sons over to look at us. We saw
no women or young children- only men and adolescent boys. The day
remained sunny where we were but below us was a solid sea of clouds.
View over the sea of clouds 
Riding Marty across the river
View of the escarpment edge
Basotho huts along the trail
Day 3: Each day usually started with us climbing out of a
river drainage and moving into the next watershed. Today we did this
twice. We saw fewer people but there were multiple times where
Kathleen and I both felt like we were being watched. Around mid-day
the clouds rose up from the valley below and rolled over the edge of
the escarpment in huge waves. When we were enveloped by fog the
visibility was only about 10 yards. However breaks in the cloud
would open up so we could see the route ahead. When we got to the
saddle above the river it was very difficult to determine which way
to go. We could tell that there were cliffs all around and needed to
be careful so we ended up camping earlier then we had hoped.
Kokoatsoan River Valley 
Clouds starting to spill over escarpment
About to be hit by fog bank 
Peering through fog at Elephant Peak
Day 4: We started very early to try to make up for lost time.
The fog was still present but not as thick. The mornings goal was
Cleft Peak, the second checkpoint. I became completely turned around
at one point when my brain said we needed to go one way and the GPS
said the complete opposite. We followed the GPS. The top of the
Peak was on the edge of the escarpment cliff – a drop of over a
thousand feet with mist swirling around below so that the bottom
could not be seen. Luckily the fog dissipated as the next section
involved climbing around the side of a mountain called Ndudemi Dome
on a series of narrow ledges. Even with the GPS this would have been
a stupid place to be stumbling around in the fog. Luckily we could
see what we needed to though we occasionally got cliffed out again.
Today was a musical day. We passed two teenagers playing harmonica,
had 2 younger boys ask us for sweets (they got a granola bar), and
then another teenager playing a single stringed instrument made out
of an old can with his friend dancing down the trail in front of him.
This was a long day that led to us being camped high on a ridge line.
To go get water took an extra hour of hiking into the valley below
that night.
Wild horses 
Looking down the cleft of Cleft Peak
Another view from the escarpment 
Young Basotho boys 
Basotho musician Day 5: We saw a beautiful sunrise though the red sky made me worried about the weather to come later in the day. The first part of the day was easy as we followed the ridgeline for several miles. It was sunny but very windy. This led to Champagne Castle, the third checkpoint, which reminded me of neither champagne nor a castle. This was another cliff where it would have been a great place to BASE jump. We needed to meet Georgina with our resupply at Giant's Castle Camp so looking at the map it looked like it would be a shortcut to descend Ship's Prow Pass and follow a trail on the map to the camp. This ended up being the wrong decision. Ship's Prow Pass was a super steep grass and rock slope that descended into the valley below. We had to be very careful not to slip. This led to one of the worst bushwhacks we have ever done in the mountains. It took us 6 hours to go 4 kilometers and we ended up having to camp in the middle of this area due to a thunderstorm starting and running out of daylight.
View down Ship's Prow Pass 
The bushwhack along Ship's Prow Creek
The inside of the bushwhack
Day 6: It was another frustrating couple of hours for us to
finally bash our way out of the bushes, trees, rocks, and creeks. We
then had to scramble up a steep grassy hillside using clumps of grass
as hand holds. We found a faint dirt trail overgrown by grass which
made us excited but after 20 minutes we lost the trail and it took us
30 minutes to find it again and another detour around more cliffs. A
troop of baboons moved across the hillside in front of us. After the
third time of losing the trail we realized that we were never going
to make it to Giant's Camp in time so we elected to go to Injisuthi
Camp which was the closest ranger station. It was also during this
section that I stepped on a Berg Adder, one of the three types of
poisonous snake in the park. The effects of the venom are described
as “disorientation, double vision, and deterioration of the other
senses”. I didn't even notice that I had stepped on it. Kathleen
watched the whole thing as I stepped on its head. Luckily it was
early in the morning and cold so the snake was still lethargic and I
pinned its head with my foot instead of stepping on the tail. This
was the final straw that made us decide to quit the traverse when we
met Georgina and to come back in April when the weather was better. Both Kathleen and I had been having a 6th sense that we had recently been pushing our luck in the mountains and that this was a time where we should not push so hard. It wasn't any one thing, just an accumulation of small things that we were feeling in our gut.
We were able to get to the Injisuthi Camp within a few more hours where cold
beer, red wine, and a cabin was found for the night. A fierce
thunderstorm hit the area that afternoon.
Sunrise on Ship's Prow Pass 
Marty and I having differences
Making up with Marty
Day 7: This day was an adventure in hitching rides. We
initially caught a ride with the camp's handyman named Robert who was
taking employees into the town 1 ½ hours away to buy groceries since
it was payday. We left first thing in the morning and as we drove
down the road there were hundreds of children walking from every
direction going to school in their uniforms. Robert was a Zulu and
had grown up in the area. He was able to explain a lot about peoples
living conditions, the schools, hospitals, and how things had changed
in recent years. Once in town he talked to some other park employees
from Giants Castle and arranged for us to get a ride with them that
afternoon when they returned. That ride was in the back of a 2 ½
ton truck. There were a large group of employees returning home with
their groceries in this truck. Live chickens wandered in the back
with us and one of the employees and I shared beers and did vodka
shots on the way to Giant's Camp. The employees were definitely not
used to white people hanging out with them in the truck. They kept
talking to us in Afrikaans and were surprised when we told them we
were from America. Georgina and her friends Tim and Rich showed up
later that night and cooked us a great feast of a BBQ.
Day 8 and 9: We spent the next two days with Georgina, Rich and Tim hiking up to Bannerman Hut and spending the night there. The original plan was to camp in Spare Rib Cave but the weather turned and we were not able to climb that high. We met a South African named Mark that night and he soon became a part of our party. The next day we hiked up Bannerman Pass to the top of the escarpment (passing Spare Rib Cave along the way) and then walked south to Langalibalele Pass. We had been warned that hikers had been roughed up in this area by tribesmen but we were a big enough group that we didn't have to be worried about this. The views from the edge of the cliffs were like being in an airplane. It was a nice mellow couple of days with new friends. As we drove away from the mountains to go back to Pretoria the entire mountain range was covered with very dark clouds and we were hit by repeated violent thunderstorms for the rest of the day and night. We were very glad that we were not up in the mountains that night.
Bushman's River 
Hiking to Bannerman Hut
Sunrise at Bannerman Hut 
View from Bannerman Face
Looking at Bannerman Face
Eland near Giant's Castle
We found the Drakensberg to be an
amazing place. We only had positive encounters with the Basotho
people, the scenery was like no other, the danger of poisonous
snakes and lightning, the wild horses and baboons, and the challenge of the navigation made it a
place where we want to return to. Our plan is to come back in April
when the weather is more stable and make another attempt. Marty the
Zebra now has his own Facebook page (Marty Marty) and is recruiting
Facebook friends for his next attempt to be the first hobby
horse/zebra to cross the Drakensberg. Please feel free to support
his effort.
Adventure Tours Comment Thanks for sharing good information !
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