A Trek in the Drakensberg

If you're looking for the video of Julie's bungee jump, it's on YouTube.

Ever since we had decided to visit South Africa, I had known that the highlight of the trip was, for me, to be an expedition into the Drakensberg Mountains. I had seen pictures of the soaring spires of basalt rock, deep, forested valleys and abundant wildlife. I'd read of the difficulties of climbing here; long, multi-day walk-ins, loose, chossy rock and the altitude. This was to be my first real wilderness experience, totally self-reliant, taking with us everything we needed for 4-5 days out. I was not disappointed!

We travelled as a team of 6; The Malan Clan, consisting of Marnus, our leader; Lukas, who had proposed the trip, having gained a great deal of experience in these ranges over a short period of time; Erik, who has trekked widely in the Drakensberg; Zoné, Marnus's wife and better half :-); Julie, my partner and me. Julie and I were the least fit of the team, and carried the lightest sacks; even so, it was a startling amount of gear we took with us.

Our objective was an ascent of Hilton's Pass, starting from Injisuthi Camp, hiking up the valley towards the Red Wall area before branching off into the pass and finally ascending the Upper Injisuthi Buttress, a snip at just over 3200m, before traversing the plateau to Corner Pass for a return involving a rocky descent with a single abseil followed by an easy hiking descent back to the camp.

Lukas had tried to find beta on the route, and had found that some had considered it to be a rock climb, while some said it was no more than a scramble with no gear required. We averaged these responses out and took a small rack and a 30m rope, in case of difficulty and for the abseil descent of Corner Pass.

The plan was;

Day 1 - Injisuthi Camp to Upper reaches of Injisuthi Valley.

Day 2 - Enter pass to top, start traverse to Corner Pass

Day 3 - Descend Corner Pass

Day 4 - Return to camp

One extra day was built in as back-up should any stage prove problematic, and we had food for 5 days.