Who is doing or has done the Grand Traverse

Thanks Jan - excellent write up!

We (2 of us) are planning to go in 3 week's time and are aiming for 6 days. We will be carrying a tent and therefor our packs will weigh in at about 12kg excluding water - I know, very heavy...

You mentioned 4kg of food but you only ate 2.2kg. Will 3.5kg be enough for 6 days with maybe 2 days of emergency pro nutro? We will be taking Back Country's Freeze dried meals for dinner. The rest of the day will be Pro Nutro, John West Tuna, Dry Wors, Nuts, Jelly Babies etc. What can you recommend in terms of snacks?

Did you use a bladder and how many liters of water will be sufficient? Maybe 2 liters?

We went to the Berg last weekend and it is awesome - green and beautiful. And we can't wait for 19 March!!

Well thats hard to say for somebody else. I'm a small guy, 62 kg. 4000Kcal is usually the max I can swallow a day. That didn't work out this time (? because of the altitude ???) but I know I can rely on my body fat burning capacities. The secret is to varie as much as possible during the day, so you don't get disgusted. My favorites during the day remain; winegums, M&M's, dry sausage, nuts. mixed together in a ziplock bag. some muselibars as breakfast. Dry meal at night.
My mate Luc - 85 Kg - ate almost everything he brought, 4000Kcal/day.
But I would never recommand gowing lower than 3200Kcal/day, especially if you're away for 6 long days.

The lack of oxygen makes you go slower (lower intensity); also meaning you burn a highr percentage of bodyfat. if you're well trained (!!)

Water is quite personel aswell. I did Ok with a 0,5 liter bottle. Just filled up another 1 ltr bottle at the last possibility before our bivy. But in that resect I try to be efficient and lazy. At some long dry ridges de 0,5 ltr was a bit "light".
Luc used and filled his 2 x 0,75 ltr bottles all the time and needed them.
Just to illustrate how personal it is.

Some valleys on the lesoto side were quite dry; lots of cattle and little slow running water.

I took 3.6kg for my 5 day GT and ate less than half of it, so it really depends on the individual. Fortunately I had sufficient fat reserves to live off

A packet of chips in the pocket worked very well for me - it is easy to snack on while walking. I didn't use Lays or Simba style chips as these break in your pocket - I opted for small thin stick chips. On my 14 day not-fast GT, I used a variety of chip types - Doritos and Nic-Naks worked well.

For water it also depends on various factors - weather and proximity to water over the next hour would be big ones. E.g. the Cutback Highway is long and high. Even though you will probably do good pace through it, you won't see water between the river behind Mbundini Pass and the tributary of the Senqu that you cross before hitting the Senqu itself. Similarly the Didima Highway is a good 12km of dryness between leaving the Yodeler's River (or even earlier if you take the higher line) and hitting the river behind Starboard.

We carried a lot of water on the 5 day due to the rivers being dry. The Mokhotlong was particularly bad, with only the occasional stagnant pool, and luckily a slow flowing side stream somewhere near the end. With the recent rain, though, I doubt you will have the same issue there.

My team is heading up March 17th so possibly a bit prior to your leave date. We should be off the DGT by March 26th or 27th.

A little article with some pics about our traverse. Sorry its in Dutch, but that should'nt be to hard for anyone 'baie goed' in Afrikaans. Its pretty general, for people without any knowledge on the Berg.
www.mudsweattrails.nl/drakensberg_traverse_2016

Jan wrote: Sorry its in Dutch, but that should'nt be to hard for anyone 'baie goed' in Afrikaans.

And for people like me who are not great with languages, there's always Google Translate!

Enjoyed reading that. Had a good chuckle at how you took a while to decide on the highest point on Mafadi - anyone who has stood on that summit can identify!

Not sure if I caught that correctly - did a Basotho ask you for a car? That seems to trump AndrewP being asked for a diamond, and when a Basotho asked me for a condom

He actually préféréd a book. But à car would bé fine aswell. Easy going lad.

We will be attempting a S-N DGT between 17-28 March 2016. We are aiming for 7 nights out, but have flexibility for more nights. Our team consists of 4 people with varying mountain hiking experience, but all are experienced adventurers.
We will be following the same line up as Ryno and Ryan came down with on their record achievement - or at least close to it, with the aim of 25-30km per day average.
Hoping to see you guys out there. You will recognize our team by the big red beard on one of our members...

Hi. If anyone has a lift or knows of a lift from Harrismith to Sentinel Car Park on the 19th of March for 2 hikers please let me know. (we will most definitely pay you for your kind services

Hi
I'm looking for contacts in Underberg area that transport hikers back to their cars at the starting point. In my case we are hiking from Injisuthi to Sani.
Tanks
Frik