Berg Alert 2024

They relied on the moon. As far as I recall, it was a full moon, or a very close one. I myself wouldn't have problem walking without headlamps and I could well see them with a distance over 50 m for sure.

Just finished a DGT on Saturday - I thought I'd post about two incidents along the way here.

As we were nearing the end of the valley north of Mafadi, basically directly west of Lithabolong where the valley gets much steeper, two men with balaclavas completely covering their faces stopped us. They asked where our porters were, if there were other people behind us that needed to catch up, why we had so little gear with us, where we were sleeping tonight etc. I tried to be friendly, but they kept demanding answers from us. I introduced myself, but they wouldn't tell us their names, and they kept their faces hidden the entire time. They were also clearly eying out what we had in our pockets. Ultimately they let us go without issue, and nothing came of it - but I've never met someone in Lesotho who wouldn't show their face nor tell me their name after I had introduced myself. It was incredibly unnerving.

We had a less worrying incident on Thabana Ntlenyana (which now has a concrete sign on the summit and is covered in graffiti). Two men were sitting on the summit when we arrived, and didn't respond to our greeting or anything. As we left the summit, they followed us till we met with two other men. We gave them all some sweets and all seemed fine, but one continued to follow us for a while thereafter. When we stopped for a break, he stopped and then stood and watched us - we ultimately just continued down to the Sehonghong River since we didn't want to open our packs in front of him. He followed us about halfway down the ridge before heading in a different direction. If he hadn't stopped and watched us when we stopped for a break, I might have thought he was just heading in the same direction as us, but him stopping and staring at us was worrying.

Thanks for posting Ghaz. It is really helpful to know of these precursor incidents. Once an attack or theft has occurred, it is too late for the party concerned. 

How many were in your group? What time of day did the encounters happen?

Did you get the sense that the Mafadi incident was about clearing the pathway for some contraband? Were they trying to establish who was in the region and where they’d be in the hours to come? Or were they more likely interested in the contents of a porter’s bag as there are likely relatively frequent guided hikes to Mafadi? 
i have a suspicion that Basuthos dislike Zulu guides operating on their patch. 

It was two of us - myself and Anita (African Hiker on YouTube). The Mafadi incident was late afternoon, Thabana was around midday.

I don't think the Mafadi incident had anything to do with smuggling, but you never know. It felt like they were interested in what our non-existent porters could be carrying, but I may be projecting my opinions onto my memory of what happened. You may have a point on the concerns re guiding, though, it could also be that.

The reality is that most of our interactions with people on-route were great (as usual). It was just these two that were bad. Around the bottom of the Mokhotlong we were invited in for drinks by some people, which we politely declined due to having to remain unsupported. When we hit the Pitsaneng in the dark and almost got attacked by dogs, we were invited to stay in the nearby kraal for the night for our safety, and when we declined, the person who had made the offer helped us get past the nearby dogs and pointed where we needed to go to get across the valley without encountering the other dogs nearby. It seems that when areas become more touristy, they become less friendly - which is really sad, but I guess it is to be expected.

I have a sad feeling that these paid portered hikes are creating anamosity as they are bringing a lot more people in larger groups to certain areas and or routes.  Mafadi vs Mokhotlong attitude realting to people pressure and or cutural dynamics.  It is worrying.

I have noticed on my guided trips that some of the locals are relatively friendly but there are some elements showing animosity towards groups. I have to agree, with the increase in tourists, they see them as easy targets. Porters help carry a lot of expensive gear and also seen as easy targets. I would think that the prospects of easy money is always going to make groups an easy target. There could of course also be a sense of jealousy as people could feel that they don't have opportunities for employment as porters, as all work goes to Zulu's - but I could be wrong.

There was a work group set up to address the issues around security in and on the Drakensberg escarpment, but I am not sure what transpired as I could not attend the meeting. I know that some suggestions was tabled, ranging from patrols to extra surcharges paid to the Lesotho side when entering the escarpment. 
As things stand at the moment - it feels like we are on a powder keg, and soon we could have a serious situation that could get way out of hand, and this is as both sides of the political divide does not seem to want to address the issues. 

Hi Ghaz
Further to my coment about your interaction.  How articulate in english were the two hooded guys when asking all those questions of you?  Did they disapear after the interrogation, or did they just hang there while you walked away?  

The one guy did all the talking, he spoke English pretty well. He kept talking to the other guy in Sotho during our conversation. They shouted something to someone on the ridge above us at one point, who we later walked past and was relatively friendly. They didn't seem to move much after we moved on, although I didn't want to look back too much.

On a side note - we met a lot more shepherds who speak English on this traverse than I'm used to. The shepherds we met south of Sani all seemed to speak a fair amount of English.

This latest 'incident' got me into GE sleuthing mode, not that it takes much for me to look at interesting berg GE features.  Some interesting 'digging' going on GE.  Just west of Mafadi.  Not sure what this is, perhaps material for walls, though thought they were moslty dry, mineral deposits for cattle.  Perhaps diamond deposits

And also huts that were'nt there in in 2020, but are now in 2024.  The huts are on the ridge that GT folk would move along to Mafadi.  So they know whoever is coming and going, especially large parties of hikers and porters.

      

You raise an interest point - there are tons of those holes popping up everywhere. A few basically on the summit of Thabana Ntlenyana too.

I actually got a video in March 2024 when I did Thaba Phafane West (well, that's what Peak Bagger calls it www.peakbagger.com/peak.aspx?pid=60172) looking at the ones on the summit there and commenting on how all the rock had been broken open. Here's a photo of that one.


There are definitely a lot of new kraals up there. Even when I did my Leqooa Ridge Traverse in Sep 2023, we encountered a lot of kraals between Tsepeng and Mashai that weren't there when I had last headed up Tsepeng in 2018. Plenty of kraals on this traverse that I don't recall from previous traverses.

I mentioned the Pitsaneng dog incident below. The guy who helped us past the dogs actually works for the Department of Agriculture in Lesotho, so the fact that the government is getting involved in cattle farming on the Pitsaneng is something I found interesting. If they are aiding in training shepherds, especially around managing grazing land to avoid over-grazing, that would be good news.