Giant's Pass - Langalibalele Pass - 19 Feb 2016

Although myself and Smurfatefrog had already ticked off both Giant’s and Langalibalele passes, neither of us had ever been along the escarpment section that links the two. Simon (Fitness) was also eager to visit the area and have a crack at some new passes and peaks, so the three of us together with Nolan and his friend Andrew drove up to Giant’s Castle early on Friday morning to begin the 3 day loop.

By 8.30am we were on the trail, and before long we had taken the turnoff to begin the long steady climb up Giants Ridge. Those of us who had hiked this Ridge before had never actually seen it. Previous hikes here had been either in darkness or in mist. This day however was warm clear and sunny, offering us magnificent views of the escarpment and of the challenges we would be facing in the coming hours and days.



Giant's Ridge


Almost at the contour path

We made steady progress up the ridge, and after two and a half hours we had reached the contour path, where we had a break and a bite to eat. After we had re-energized, we packed up and made our way along the contour path towards the pass. After a few hundred meters we came across an epic little Berg Adder that was sunning itself in the middle of the trail.



Young Berg Adder

After another brief break at the base, we began the long slog up Giant’s Pass. The climb up was fairly uneventful, just long and tough as always, especially through the tricky scree-filled section where you can be taking steps, but not actually moving forward at all.



Approaching the start of Giant's Pass


Looking down Giant's Pass

At around 3pm we were relieved to finally have made it to the top. We were greeted by a large group of hikers, around 15 or so. After chatting to them, we found out they were all members of the Scottish military who had signed up for some sort of government sponsored adventure holiday in the Drakensberg. A bit of a surprise encounter, but interesting nonetheless!

It was now time for Simons big moment! Having been unable to take part in this years Daredevil Speedo Run (which is in aid of cancer), Simon did the next best thing, have his photo taken at the top of Giant’s Pass, wearing the appropriate Daredevil attire! Sensitive viewers should look away now!








Our plan was to spend the night directly above Makhaza, but when we arrived there, we found nothing but marshy swamp land, far too wet to camp on. So we climbed up the hill until we found enough dry ground to set up a campsite. The ground was very rocky, but it was better than being in a swamp so we put up our tents, and enjoyed a pleasant warm afternoon.



Looking South into Lotheni


Camped near Makhaza

When evening arrived, we felt a few drops of rain falling, so we settled into the small rock shelter to enjoy some well-deserved whiskeys. Our time there was however cut short, as a nasty wind began to pick up, with heavier and heavier rain starting to fall.



Wind battering our tents

“No problem” We thought.
“Just a normal afternoon storm, it’ll be over soon”

Well… What followed was unarguably the roughest and most miserable night any of us had ever spent in the Berg! For the entire duration of the night, our tents were buffeted by insanely strong winds, combined with waves and waves of torrential downpours. My trusty 360 Degree Lightweight 2 tent, which had never let in a drop of rain in over 8 years of service was now leaking like a sieve! It simply couldn’t handle the force of the wind-driven raindrops hitting the flysheet at such speed, and the drops were exploding into the tent, making everything wet inside. I had no choice but to cower under my sleeping bag to try and keep my face dry. Every few minutes I would have to tip my inflatable mattress to pour out the water that would begin forming puddles underneath me. The rocky ground had made securing the pegs rather difficult, and so a number of them began to get ripped out the ground. Both myself and Smurf had to venture out to try and resecure our flapping flysheets as best we could. That was one long, unforgettably awful night! In the morning, it took quite a considerable effort to bend my crooked tent poles back into shape, such was the power of that wind!

The next morning was still rather gusty, but at least the rain had mostly stopped, so we began discussing our plans to summit Giant’s Castle peak. We had some breakfast, stashed our backpacks inside the rock shelter, and began climbing up the grassy bank towards the peak. When we arrived at the final scramble, conditions were still not great. The wind was howling, it was drizzling, misty and rather cold. We made it to the top ok, and were glad to have finally conquered the Giant.












The final scramble to the summit

Nolan next to the summit cairn

I was surprised at how small the top of this peak was, not much space to move around like on most other peaks. It also felt rather exposed and fairly unsafe, and I was pretty eager to get down as soon as I could, especially with it being so windy with wet slippery rock all around us. I wanted to avoid downclimbing the wet rock scramble so decided to rather traverse the northern ledge of the peak to get back down. I’ve never had a particularly good head for heights, so although this section had less of a climb, the psychological aspect of traversing that wet ledge, knowing that there was an enormous drop off below it rattled me good and proper. It was all good in the end, and we all were all safely off the peak, and made our way back down to collect our backpacks.

Now we’ve all experienced some pesky critters in the Berg. Mainly baboons and crows. We never expected what we found when we arrived back our packs. Cows! In the rock shelter! CHEWING on our backpacks! After angrily shooing them away, we inspected the damage. This had clearly been a very targeted attack. They were after one thing, and one thing only – the sweat-soaked hip belt straps of our packs. Clearly these are tasty treats for salt-deprived bovines! Most of us just had to wipe off a lot of slobber, but on both Simon and Smurf’s packs, the excess strap lengths had been chewed right off!

After cleaning up our backpacks, we set off to the North. Our first obstacle was the ridge immediately to the North of Giant’s Pass. We managed up here without too much difficulty, explored the top of the Long Wall, and made our way down into the next valley towards Jarateng Pass.





We stopped for a rest next to the river, and were approached by 2 young Basothos. They were polite at first, saying “Hello, how are you?”

With the pleasantries out of the way, they soon got down to business.
“Give me sweets!”
“We don’t have any sweets…” we said.
This only seemed to agitate them, and they began to, with a surprising element of hostility, demand
“GIVE! ME! SWEETS!”

Eventually Simon agreed to give them some biscuits in exchange for a photograph. They suddenly seemed to remember their manners, and thanked him before posing for their photograph.





We encountered another 2 youngsters with their dog above Jarateng pass a short while later. We weren’t too eager to stop, so just kept climbing whilst they chanted the familiar line of “Give me sweets!” One of them would not leave me alone, and kept pointing at my water bottle saying “Give me water! Give me water!” as we gained more and more altitude up the ridge. I pointed to the large river he had just been sitting next to before he had started harassing us. He wasn’t interested, he seemed to want my specific water. I wasn’t in the mood to start explaining that he had a whole river, and I was climbing Durnford Ridge with only 500ml… He eventually angrily gave up on following me and made his way back down the hill.



Giant's Castle Peak in the background

We continued making our way up the ridge, and it began taking it’s toll on us. Our legs were really feeling the large amount of altitude we had already gained over the past day or so. Durnford Ridge really is a monster, not to be underestimated! The wind was also still howling, trying its best to blow us over. Real spirit breaking stuff. We were more than relieved to finally reach the top and know that all of the major uphills were now behind us.

Around 3km of easy downhill later, we arrived at our campsite above Langalibalele Pass. We always enjoy camping in this area, as it’s always fairly easy to find some flat sections of lush, pristine lawn. The wind had also started to die down, and the clouds were slowly clearing. It looked like the Dragon was going to give us a break tonight. We ended up enjoying a fantastic evening of whiskey consumption under the bright light of the full moon. Conditions were comparatively heavenly compared to the night before, so it was great to get a break from the weather, although the temperature did drop to 4.8°C in the early hours of the morning.







JonWells, Smurfatefrog, Nolan, Andrew, Fitness

When we awoke on Sunday, we had breakfast, packed up, and headed up the hill to the top of Langalibalele Pass. It’s amazing how many times for us, the top of the pass has been a weather border line for blue skies and drizzle. As soon as we were descending, it was on with the rain gear, and a wet slippery hike down.






The waterfall that marks the end of the actual pass (2485m)


When we reached the bottom of Langalibalele Ridge, we bumped into the Scots again. It appears they had camped near the base of the pass, and were rained on all night. They were rather frustrated to hear that we had a bone dry night with stars and a full moon, probably a mere 3km from where they were!

Not long after that, we were back at the carpark all enjoying a celebratory beer to round off another memorable adventure. Total distance 43.9km with an altitude gain of around 2400m. A special mention must be made of Andrew, as this turned out to be his first ever hike! Talk about being thrown in the deep end, but he has already been asking us when the next one is! We joked that it is only fitting now that his second ever hike should be a GT!