Trials and Tribulations of Ntonjelane

This past weekend, 8 of us VE'ers had planned a hike in the Mnweni area. Our plans were to start from Mnweni CHC with a lift to the end of the Ntonjelane Rockeries road as early as possible, ascend Ntonjelane Pass, camp near the top of Nquza for night 1. Day 2 should have seen us descending Rockeries, and overnighting at Sunshine Cave, or camping in the area, and day3 walk out for the lift back.

There were 2 cars coming from Durban, and 1 from GP.
Our first bit of misfortune struck on the N3 near Balgowan, 2 trucks were burning on the road, and we were at a standstill for 2 hours.
Anyway, we left MCHC in good spirits, catching a ride in a Toyata Condor with traditional music blaring!!
We were on our way just after 11am..

VE'ers fltr SingleSpeed, Papa Dragon, Smurfatefrog, WesleyB, Ocon, JonWells, Fitness and JulieMK


In spite of the late start, we started off well on the flattish walk in, up the pleasant Ntonjelane Ephumalanga Valley.



However, not long after turning away from the valley and starting the ascent, I realised that the boots that I was wearing, that had hurt my feet before, were not going to be comfortable, and after a while my feet and legs were really in pain. there were also one or two others taking a bit of strain, it was getting late, and the weather was building up. At about 1900m, maybe a bit more, we were undecided about whether to pitch camp, but after a bit of discussion decided to push on. The weather started getting a bit worse, along with the pain in my legs and feet, I contemplated swopping out for one of the solo tents and pitching, and going down the next day..





When we got to about 2450m, the storm broke. Thunder, lightning, driving rain, then hail, saw all of us take cover under our packs, foamies, groundsheets, tent flies or whatever. I have no idea how long this lasted, but it felt like ages...
Then the storm passed, but the rain continued, and we re-grouped. After a bit of discussion again, it was decided to descend to a "flattish spot" and pitch camp, as it was already about 5ish, (or later), we still had a way to go, and it was still raining with lightning around.
We descended to about 2070m, and pitched camp in the rain...

Although it cleared, it was not a very comfortable night, with the slope and rough ground, but better than being stuck on the pass..
We woke up to beautiful views of the Cathedral range..


Because some of us were still keen to summit, and others not, 4 of the party were going to continue up the pass, and 4 go down and camp for the night, and join up at the bottom of Rockeries the following day. A couple of minutes before departure though, one of the summiters decided not to go up, and with that we resolved that we should all go down, camp for the night, and have an easy walk out the next day.

Along the way, we detoured a couple of hundred metres to Waterfall Cave, where we had a snack break. Some of us were quite keen to stay the night there, some were not. I was in the latter lot, reckoning that it was very dusty and dirty, and noisy..


After a while we left, to make our way to the "lawn campsite next to the river...." walking along the path from the cave towards the main path, Julie was behind me, I heard a crack, a stifled scream, turned round and she was tumbling down the slope, in a flash Wes was down and stopped her about 5m below the path... whew! But she was in terrible pai, and actually passed out, white as a sheet. After getting her round we got her back to the path, and our medic Fitness attended to her. We split up her kit amongst us, and carried on until about 3k's from the road.. where we st up camp, on the lawn next to the river. It was still fairly early in the day, and we had expected a storm again in the afternoon, but this didn't materialise..it was a very hot afternoon, and a beautiful evening...


A bit later we heard 2 shots somewhere in the valley, which had some of the group's nerves on edge, and later on some of us heard a couple more volleys of shots, though much further away. The night passed without incident, was a beautiful night as I said before, and I slept outside the tent till the full moon was about 3/4 of the way through the sky, when the dew got fairly heavy on my sleeping bag..

We woke to a clear morning, which soon became very hot, packed up, and started what we thought was the last 3 k's of the hike. Julie's kit again shared out, and she walking out under her own steam with 2 borrowed trekking poles. A big hats off and respect to her.. turns out she has snapped 3 ligaments in her left ankle.

On Friday I had said "no need to organise a lift out for Sunday, there's plenty of guys with bakkies on the road". There are, but turns out that they had all gone to church, or to town... seeing as we were there just after 9 on Sunday morning, so we just walked out on the road anyway..
Cattle on the road on the way back


We got back to the Hiking Centre late morning, then went for our customary burger and refreshments.. and then home.

Our last bit of misfortune struck just before getting to SingleSpeed's home in Hilton, first we started smelling rubber, and then the car started smoking.. turns out his cooling system has malfunctioned..

But.. again, thanks and well done to the team, we pulled together and things turned out ok, except for Julie... wishing her a speedy healing.

Wow...lots of adventure. Glad you all made it up and down in one piece. I hope Julie's ankle recovers soon, tendons can be a problem.

Was a very different but enjoyable hike, in the words of Wes " it's all part of the adventure"

Thanks for the writeup!

That was hectic - very fortunate that Julie's injury was not on top or on the pass, could have made things very difficult.

@Julie: wishing you a speedy recovery.

Neil, Bernard and I were going to meet the group of 8 from Durban at the top of the mountain near Nguza Pass to camp together. We already left the Cultural Centre on Thursday afternoon late to walk 5km and then camp.

This gave us the advantage of getting up the pass and to the designated campsite in time to set up tents, have a swim and see the storm coming closer at an alarming rate,

We jumped into our tents and the hail came down. It lasted 40min and the rain carried on into the night.


The hail caused the temperature to drop dramatically and stayed the whole night. There was still lots of hail the next morning.



We were back at the cultural centre and about to leave, when the Durban group arrived and told us of their ordeal.