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Hi All,

First off, lots of thanks for this site and the forums. It's fantastic reading about other people's adventures and I'm sure this site will prove to be an invaluable resource for any future hiking trips.

A bunch of friends and I are planning on visiting the Drakensberge early next month. We're thinking of doing a 3 day/2 night trip, leaving the cars at Cathedral Peak Hotel and spending the first night at the Cockade camping site. The next day we'd like to take Cockade pass to the top of the escarpment and Tseketseke pass down in order to spend the night at the Tseketseke camping site. The final day is reserved for the hike back to the hotel.

We've done Cockade pass before, in 2008 before the rock slide, and were wondering how feasible doing both it and Tseketseke in one day is? I believe there's a river on the top of the escarpment, will it be flowing this time of year? Finally, is there anything else we should take into consideration when doing this route (excluding "Fake Tseketseke" which we are aware of)?

Thank you!

Welcome to the community Zecrates.

I haven't seen the extent of the flood damage on Cockade, but in principal I see no issue with your intended day 2, even if you are delayed a little more. Get a good start on the day. The summits of the two passes are not far from each other and Tseke should be fairly quick to descend. The bottom end tends to be overgrown.

I've never tried to collect water right there in late winter before. You'll have to descend into the valley in any case - the water is seldom right at the passes. The question is how far you'll have to descend before you hit water....it could be up to 1km, but it does grow into a decent sized river at some point. Let us know!

Thanks for the response Intrepid.

Sounds good, the availibility of water was going to determine our lunch, but looks like it will be biscuits and crackers

Haven't there been some recent troubles at the campsite near Cathedral Peak, or am I wrong? Maybe just keep that in mind if you camp over the night before...that none of your gear goes "missing".

Hi Kelly,

Thanks for the warning, I think you're right. This thread mentions it:
http://www.vertical-endeavour.com/forums/2-drakensberg-security/1098-current-state-of-things.html?li

Well, we did the round trip this weekend, and despite being very unfit managed to survive. Cockade took us much longer than expected (probably due to the fitness level), so we had to spent the night on the escarpment. Luckily the river had a bit of flowing water, otherwise we would have had to rely on the few litres of water we had on us. As a side note, there was quite a bit of old snow in the shades - how save do you reckon it is to boil the snow for water? We had to hike from the top of Tseketseke to the hotel on the final day, which was hell on the knees but very doable otherwise.

Cockade looked much the same as when I was there last time, which probably means that was after the rock slide as well. The part between the camp side and the Cockade/Xeni split is overgrown with no clear path and very few cairns. The first bit of Cockade involves a lot of boulder hopping, once again without a clear path, but it gets better after about a quarter of the way up. Tseketseke has a very clear path, and although the bottom parts are also overgrown, it isn't as bad as with Cockade.

I see that Stijn rates both Tseketseke and Cockade a 6/10 for difficulty. Maybe because of the rock slide but Cockade certainly feels as if it deserves a higher rating than Tseketseke. The path felt more challenging and was certainly more difficult to find and follow than for Tseketseke.

Finally, for anyone still wondering about "fake Tseketseke", if you start down Tseketseke this is NOT what you should see:

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