Mashai Pass

I know this is not related to Mashai pass , but our party went up from sani pass to Thabana Ntlenyana peak on the 30th Dec , encountered several bashuto groups each following us for at least and hour or so each, Most of the time they wanted clothing and cigarettes. I must say the most discomfort was to slog up those final grass slopes whilst trying to maintain conversation/hand gestures.

Reached the peak at 14:30 , set up camp 40 meters below the summit at 3442m . Then two bashuto parked themselves in front of our tent and continued to watch in amazement into one of the two tents. Swinging their sticks in intimidation efforts , my brother and I got out of our tents to negotiate with them, leaving the 2 girls in the tents.

We found the yin yang approach to be quite effective, when they show aggression/imtimidation you make jokes and laugh at EVERYTHING they say.

one of the bashuto pointed at my borther's pocket and asked what that silver thing was and my brother swiftly unflicked his flick knife with a massive quick flick , they 2 bashunto's jumped with fright, but all this happened in good spirit. however subconciously i think they realised that an ambush that night might result in some sort of injury to at least of of them

Now this might sound terrible but it wasn't really all that bad.

In my opinion /my advice is not to argue with them(bashuto), to show friendly nature at all times and to entertain their basic requests even though its irritating, when they step over the line its important to react in an unpredictable way so that they start questioning their own safety, now this must be subtle and non threatening - like removal of some sort of weapon from your pack and placing it into another pack.. just something subtle. Anyways this worked very well for us in a almost unpleasant situation.

We slept up top without any hassles... and then the mountain is also there to protect one.. raiding a campsite at 3440m at 3 in the morning is going to be very unpleasant.

My point i guess is, sleep as high and as cold as possible, this is natures defense against intruders

Two of us did Mashai pass about 2 weeks ago. What a pleasant pass, started at 5am and was back in camp at Garden Castle at 12am in perfect weather. The path was fairly straight forward, and we only encountered one Basotho with his hunting dogs. He was waiving and screaming at us from the cliffs, seemed like a bit of a lunatic. And for the baboons at the campsite, there was a guard on duty to chase them away. So I guess sometimes people just have bad luck.
I was disgusted though to find about three empty gas canisters and lots of empty packets (hiking food) at the rock slide close to the top of the pass. I’m starting to wonder if we’re not unfairly always blaming the Basotho’s for the litter on the Berg?
Two days before this, we also happened to spend two nights on the Amphitheater about 100m from the hut. (with no Basotho incident at all, lucky again)
The state of the hut is disgusting, and all the wrappers and rubbish are from hikers! I will post some photos soon!

plouw, what was the state of the hut apart from the rubbish? Are there any window panes that need repair etc?

It struck me at Sentinel hut, that even though it is occupied and regularly serviced (Coal for the watchmen, water etc) nobody bothers to arrange that the window panes are repaired, some cardboard has to do...

Furthermore, who is the body in charge of maintenance for these huts on the mountain, I take it they rely a lot on volunteers?

klipspringer, i took quite a few photos of the hut, will post it soon.

Klipspringer, here's some photos of the Amphitheatre hut:




Something else that concerned me on this hike to the Amphitheatre was how badly the paths are maintained! The stream is basically flowing down the pathway and eroding about half a meter deep in places. This is a very popular route and should be maintained!(even the erosion on the gravel road to the parking is shocking, with deep trenches forming on the inside edge of the road)
The local tribal authority could send one person up there with a shovel on a daily basis to build little bumps and outlets similar to that of a well maintaned gravel road.

On the topic of the Mashai Pass...

A pair of us went up there to visit the Rhino Peak on the 30thDec 09.
The pass was in good shape, however there was a rock fall near the very top.
The path went left of this and was a little vague at times.

We met a small pose of Basutho who seemed happy to play their 5L oil can guitar and watch their cattle. We met another 2 on the way down, they were heading back to Lesotho...I wonder what they were up to...

I took 4hrs up and 3,5hrs down so we were back in time for lunch