Mini Hike Reports

So attempt #2 at solo hiking went a bit better than the first try. I decided to stick with what I know, and went back to my old hunting ground - Giants Castle.

I drove up on Sunday morning, and was walking around 8:30AM. This late start was not pleasant as it was a very hot day. I set myself a target of 7h30 - not because of the desired speed of hike, but simply to facilitate a 4PM finish and a drive back in daylight.

Key points (approximate times):
Bannerman Hut 2h15
Spare Rib Cave 3h25
Top of Bannerman Pass 4h14
Top of Sanqebethu 4h48
Top of Langies 5h32
Time from Langies to car park (a personal best) 1h55
Total time 7h27

Total distance 26km (or 29km, depending on which reading you take from my GPS)
Altitude gain 1 745m

Random fact: I have no completed the Khulu Challenge twice. Sanqebethu was the only khulu above 3300m that I hadn't repeated since first bagging it in 2013.

Very good and interesting reports here (at least for me). Please post your GPX tracks too, if you don’t mind.

I was expecting another solo trip on Saturday - so the plan was to head up Organ Pipes Pass and do Cleft. But Mike/Hobbit became available, so I fortunately didn't have to complete the hat-trick of solo trips.

Seeing as I was coming from Ladysmith, but would have to give Mike a lift, I wasn't keen on anything north of Giants - I was not up for driving that road twice in a day. So we settled on Thabana Ntlenyana in a day from Giants. On my way to PMB, I spent an hour getting from the Balgowan offramp to the Curry's Post offramp courtesy of the combined effects of an accident and road works - rendering most traffic basically immobile. Seeing as traffic was blocked both ways, Giants wasn't an option, so we agreed to go for Makoaneng from Bushman's Nek. 10km short of Bushman's Nek we found a vehicle being towed out of deep mud, so we turned around and drove to Swiman Hut. Fortunately the gate to Garden Castle was not locked, but Swiman Hut was, so we drove to the camp and finally had a place to stay - albeit at 11PM.

With a late night, a big day hike wasn't on the cards, so we aimed to get permits at 8AM and start walking around then. Well, at 9AM we were ready to go, when Welcome asked us to accompany a Canadian lady named Zuzka up Rhino as he was worried about her hiking alone with security issues in the past.

She was a very fast hiker, being a geologist, she spends a lot of her time on mountains - so we got up to the top pretty fast. We had a look at the ledge where Mike and I had bailed from Eastern Arete a few months ago - we were practically on the summit when we bailed.

We accompanied her back to the top of the pass before parting ways.


We had an interesting chat with some shepherds along the way. They told us that Rhino is called Mchachaben (no clue how to spell that).

By the point where we left the river to climb, there was a storm coming in, so we decided to just pitch the tent and wait it out. The storm never arrived, but a clearly exhausted Mike was lights out in minutes!

At 7AM, Mike complained about me waking him - in my defense, he had been sleeping for 15 hours!

We had another apathetic start, this time emerging into a cold wind on a cloudy day.

We took an age to get up Tsepeng, and checked out the cliffs before summiting it. The rock seems very solid, although not much in gear. While it would be arb, I suspect it is the highest (in altitude) proper crag in Southern Africa - so worth opening a few routes on it. It would require two pitches in the middle, and the easier lines would be fairly difficult.

We bagged the mountain - the 3rd highest on Andrew's list, and then followed the ridge down towards Tsepeng Pass.

We had planned to bag Morake, Mankoaneng and Macacaceng as well - but that ship sailed around the time that we were only below Tsepeng at 4PM.

With the recent floods in the area, both Mashai Pass and Tsepeng pass have suffered damage and have become very loose in places. Tsepeng Pass required some scrambling, before a foot-killer traverse to the Mashai River.

The section between Sleeping Beauty Cave and the car park has been so badly flooded that the trail is fairly difficult to follow in places. The river crossings are also fairly tricky with banks having been undercut in places.

We managed to get from the cave to the mountain register (in pouring rain) in 46 minutes - with some running, and a lot of sliding.

The hike was only about 35km in the end, and our altitude will be about 2km up and down - so nothing particularly challenging. We somehow managed to keep our packs rather light despite carrying a tent. I think it had something to do with the fact that we barely had any food, seeing as we packed for a day hike!

Next weekend is a recovery weekend - then back into the mountains. Bring on the 6 peaks challenge!

Interesting that you took the true left slope out of Tsepeng: that looked mega steep to me when I attempted the pass. Did the flood damage to the Sleeping Beauty valley occur between now and last November?

When I did this pass about 5 years ago, we also stayed true right. This time we stayed in the gully and left the gully true left to hit Sleeping Beauty.

The damage would presumably be a few weeks ago when - but it has been a while since I last walked that way.

On a side note - great to see the Leqooa River Valley again. Unquestionably my favourite escarpment valley.

Vaughan and I spent 3 days in the Mnweni area this past weekend, with the main objective being Manxome Pass. WarrenM from VE and his wife Ruth, were also in the area so we arranged to meet up at the caves each night. The weather forecast was rather rainy, but improving from the Sunday afternoon onwards so we hoped it would start clearing early enough to appreciate the glorious views on from Manxome Pass!

The first day up to 5-Star Cave was still pretty wet and with the rivers being really full, crossing the Mnweni River proved to be quite a challenge (waist-deep and flowing strongly). Thereafter, the long wet grass tried its best to give us multiple showers as we waded through the stuff on the way up to the cave. We found Warren & Ruth well settled in there, the weather unfortunately having curtailed their ambitious pass-bagging plans. They were keen to join us for Manxome so we were a soggy bunch of 4 (more long grass, more showers) heading up the Mnweni Valley the next morining. The weather actually got worse as we were approaching the base of the pass and it was so misty that it was difficult to tell where to scramble up and around the waterfall on the steep grass slopes. The rest of the group just had to believe me when I pointed out where Manxome was supposed to be rising steeply out of the mist in front of us. Thankfully the clouds did part and give us the views we were hoping for a few hundred metres up the pass. We were even able to enjoy one of the best lunch spots around on that grassy ridge spot at 2700m. The rest of the pass was steep but uneventful and we spent the rest of the afternoon traversing around the cutback through intermittent rain showers to Mponjwane Cave. Sunrise was spectacular in the morning, with a clear, sunny and hot day to enjoy down the usual Rockeries Pass exit.

Thanks for the great hike Warren & Ruth!

Video here: quik.gopro.com/v/OEbJyOU0iN/

Thanks for the write up Stijn, was great to be with you guys.

Here are a few pics from my side.

View from the upper 5 star cave, I thought it looked like a face


Crossing Mnweni close to the turn off to Rwanqa pass


Treking through the river after the turnoff to Mnweni pass


Heading up Manxome


View from Manxome as the mist cleared


Settling into Mponjwane cave for the night