Limpopo Mountain Passes

This true offroad pass covers almost 30 km of rough dirt road and jeep tracks as it traverses the Drakensberg through the Lekgamaleetse Provincial Nature Reserve. Due to the technical nature of this pass, we have broken it up into two sections - Part 1 West and Part 2 East. This road is only suitable for high clearance 4x4 vehicles and adventure motor cyclists.

IMPORTANT NOTICE: April, 2021

Driving from west to east it now takes 6 hours to reach the summit.
From the start to the reserve gate: 2.5 hours as the road is in extremely poor condition and very rocky and overgrown. Take a panga or bush cutter with you. The scenery is magnificent, but you will need to be in 1st and 2nd gear Low Range the entire distance.

From the reserve gate to the summit things are sketchy. The duty ranger reprts that no vehicle had passed his control point in the last 4 months. Inside the reserve there is almost no road left. The recent heavy rain took away the road and you had to drive and push the bush out of the way till you reach the switchbacks. The grass is very tall and you will need a seed-net.

The last 2 km before the summit you will cross some very deep ruts between 1.0 and 1.5m deep. These require some road building, so make sure you have a spade or two handy.

(This notice information was submitted by Jacques Booyse who drove the route over the Easter Weekend 2021.)

Papstraat, which translates as “Porridge Street”, no doubt got its name from the earliest users of this road, who would have camped with their oxwagons nearby and had breakfast here before tackling the daunting Tarentaalstraat, which follows directly after this small pass and which is in essence just a river crossing. The modern day road, although gravel, is in a good condition, but as you will have to traverse Tarentaalstraat as well, make sure that you are driving a high clearance vehicle or riding an adventure motorcycle. The pass is just 2.9 kilometres long, and has a height gain/loss of only 92 metres.

This short tarred pass connects the towns of Elim in the north with Mbhokota and Chavani in the south. It is located 27 km south east of Louis Trichardt (Makhado) in Limpopo Province. It's a fairly minor pass exhibiting an altitude variance of 211m over just 2.4 km. There are only six bends and all (but one) of those are less than 90 degrees. Although old, the road is well engineered with concrete stabilising walls and safety barriers. Overtaking lanes are provided for ascending vehicles.

There is a large township on the ridge of the mountain to the east known as Patwini, which is more than likely where the pass took its name from.

The Pelangwe Pass is an obscure, but extremely well engineered, tar pass situated near Ga-Nkoana in the centre of the Limpopo province. To get to the pass from the south involves some complicated routing through a densely populated rural area, so travel is slow and you will need to be extra vigilant, because of traffic, pedestrians and livestock. The approach from the north is on a gravel road which is poorly maintained, but a 4x4 is not required. The landscape surrounding the pass is very unusual, with the predominant colour of the rocks and ground being white. The pass and the small town at the northern end are named after the Pelangwe Mountain, which is in the immediate vicinity.

Rankins Pass lies in the heart of the Waterberg Conservancy and is rich in game reserves. It lies approximately 180 km North of Pretoria. The road links Thabazimbi in the West with Modimolle (previously Nylstroom) in the south east. The small settlement of Alma lies near the start of the pass. Rankins Pass is not actually a true mountain pass but more of an outpost or toll point as there is no sign of any proper climbing or bends. It is nothing more than a small police station close to the Rhenosterfontein farm. This "pass" will make our unusual and bizarre stats page in that it is the only official pass in South Africa, that is not actually a pass. We have decided to include it on our website for sake of clarification.

This minor poort is located on the N1 national route between Polokwane (previously Pietersburg) in the south and Makhado (Louis Trichardt) in the north.

Everything about the poort is conservative with only one gentle bend and just 18m of altitude gain over 4.1 km. An attractive arched  bridge can be seen halfway along the poort, close to the road on the right. This was the old bridge and has since been decommissioned. 

The area is all about the Bushveld experience and hunting. You will have no problem finding a decent lodge to stay at. There is a lodge directly accessible from the poort  known as the Zaandrivier Country Estate.

With a height gain/loss of just 14 metres, Sandrivierspoort is one of the flattest passes in our database. Located near Thabazimbi, in the north-western region of the Limpopo province, the poort is situated in a wide valley at the confluence of the Sondagsrivier and the Sandrivier. Once referred to as a “remote and pestilent corner of Africa”, the region went through a boom period after the disappearance of the Tsetse and the discovery of iron ore deposits. This gravel poort is just 3.8 kilometres long, and can be driven in any vehicle, weather dependent.

This magnificent poort should not be confused with the minor gravel road poort of the same name which is situated near Thabazimbi. The name is in fact technically incorrect, as the river which flows past the southern end of the poort is the Klein-Sandrivier. This is one of the five famous poorts and passes which allowed early explorers and settlers passage to the Limpopo Plateau, the others being Bakker’s Pass to the west and Tarentaalstraat, Bokpoort and Kloof Pass to the east. The much-photographed escarpment made up by the hills and mountains known as the “Seven Sisters” is clearly visible to the front and left as you approach from the southern side.

Sefateng Sa Mokgoba, which means “Place of Mokgoba” or more literally “Tree of Mokgoba”, is a long gravel road poort near Marken on the Limpopo plateau. It is one of the very few official passes in South Africa which does not have an English or an Afrikaans name. The pass bisects the eastern part of the Masebe Nature Reserve in a north-south direction, but access is not restricted as this is a public thoroughfare. The road is in a reasonable condition, but is plagued by washboard corrugations, soft sand sections and a loose surface, which would make this a nightmare for adventure motorcyclists.

The village situated near this pass is called Skrikfontein (“Fright Fountain”), so it is quite possible that the name of the pass has been misspelt, and should be in fact be “Skrikfontein Se Nek”, but all official sources use the given name. “Strik” translates as “snare”, and given the high wildlife population in the area, this could just as easily be correct. The road, which bisects the Masebe Nature Reserve, is in a fairly good condition, but there are one or two sections near the summit which have been heavily eroded, therefore necessitating the use of a high clearance vehicle.