What's inside?

* Trips, Tours & Training

* Seven Sisters - An action packed weekend awaits

* Ben 10 in December - Will it be a wet and muddy challenge?

* Garden Route Tour (Day 3)

* Murder on Montagu Pass

* Pass of the week


Trips, Tours & Training

Seven Sisters Tour (Fully Booked) - It's happening this weekend and the weather forecast is looking perfect. We will report back on this 1 night / 2 day tour next week. This is the first running of this tour and we are looking forward meeting up with old friends as well as meeting the new first timers. The tour includes a traverse of the Jan Phillips Mountain Road, a drive through the service tunnel with a Tolcon manager chatting to us as we proceed; a drive up the Seven Sisters Pass, lunch on a mountain top farm, the old Du Toitskloof Pass, Slanghoek Valley, the newly opened Bains Kloof Pass, an overnight stay at Diemersfontein Wine Estate, a traverse of the Cape Nature track along the source of the Witte River to Happy Valley and some serious gin and grappa tasting at a 200 year old distillery. All that packed into 2 days. The anticipation is palpable.

Grabouw 4x4 Novice Training (30th Oct). We have just had a cancellation this morning, so there is one place up for grabs.

Kouga-Baviaans Tour (15th - 19th November) - This popular tour is fully booked. You can put your name down on the cancellation list if interested.

Ben 10 Eco Challenge Official Tour (10th - 15th December) - An exciting tour for the intermediate to experienced 4x4 driver, which is likely to be on the wet side. Experience the finest high altitude scenery over the 10 challenge passes and several other excursions like vulture watching and a drive up the very steep Dawid se Kop (2500m). We have 2 spaces open.

Mountain Kingdom (Lesotho) Tour (12th - 18th March 2023) - Fully booked. Cancellation list available.

Wild Coast V6 Tour (9th - 20th May 2023) - Fully booked. Cancellation list available.

To be put down on the cancellation list, simply drop us an email with your preferences to: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.


Garden Route Tour (Day 2)

It rained hard all night, but the morning dawned crisp and clear. Perfect weather for touring gravel roads, which received a good damping down from the rain and in the process reduced dust levels to almost zero. Our first pass of the day started less than 100m from our hotel in Wilderness.

Whites Road is a lovely meandering mountain road with a mix of tar and gravel offering glimpses between the dense vegetation of the ocean, beaches, lagoon and the Touw and Serpentine Rivers as it winds gently up to Wilderness Heights. The road is popular with walkers, runners and cyclists as the gradients are very comfortable at around 1:16 most of the time.

In approximately 1909 White's Road was commissioned and funded by Ernst Montagu White, businessman, philanthropist and the son of Henry Fancourt White who was the surveyor and Road Inspector for the Montagu Pass between George and Oudtshoorn. When he ran into financial dire straits, his son took over the loving restoration of his father's house, 'Fancourt' - now a National Monument - at the foot of Wilderness Heights. Tragically, he and his sister died suddenly after a meal of poisonous mushrooms in 1916.

Adam de Smidt (an unsung hero)

Our convoy was driving too slowly for this local cyclist on the Silver River Pass / MPSA Tour Group

Soon we connected with the 7 Passes Road, where we turned left, heading back towards George via the back to back passes of Silver River and Kaaimansgat. These two passes traverse the densely wooded valleys with their tumbling rivers of amber coloured water. Both passes were tarred in the 1950's but still follow the original lines as laid out by Thomas Bain's brother in law, Adam De Smidt. The latter was an excellent road builder in his own right but never quite achieved anywhere near the fame of Bain.

The 7 Passes Road passes the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University (NMMU) at Saasveld, then swings towards George over the Swartrivier, which is the main feeder river for the George Dam (or Garden Route Dam). Once again we got our convoy unscathed through the many traffic lights and circles of George as we turned off the tar onto gravel to commence the first of the two highlights of the day, the fabulous Montagu Pass.

Montagu Pass

Charles Michell

This was the first road between George and Oudtshoorn. The Montagu Pass was opened in 1848, having taken 3 years to build by some 250 convicts at a cost of 36,000 Pounds Sterling. It lays claim to being the oldest, unaltered pass still in use in South Africa and covers 17,1 km of magnificently scenic narrow, gravel road driving. The pass was built to replace the highly dangerous and extremely difficult Cradock Pass, which still exists today, but as a tough hiking trail. The pass was named after John Montagu, who was the colonial secretary of the Cape at the time.

The location of the pass was first done by Charles Michell, with the actual survey work being done by Dr. W.Stanger. Construction of the pass commenced in 1844 under the supervision of Mr.H.O.Farrell. 

In 1845, Mr. Henry Fancourt White, who was born in Covent Garden in 1811, went to Australia (aged 17) to visit his father, who had been deported. In the process Henry gained valuable road building experience whilst in Australia. He later moved to South Africa and took over the project from Farrell and completed the job by 1848. He also completed the southern section of the road to the Gouritz River as well as the road down the Langkloof to Port Elizabeth.

This was the first pass ever to be built using convict labour exclusively. Between White and Montagu (both of them staunch Anglicans) they put the prisoners to good work - in the process allowing them to serve their time productively to society and simultaneously saving the state commercial costs of labour.

Blanco

It was clever thinking back then and it does seem a pity that this practice no longer exists. The nearby village of Blanco, was originally called White's Village, but the slightly embarrassed White, requested that the name be changed to the more socially acceptable Latin version of Blanco.

After a few kilometres of descending, the road widens and levels off at the Keur River Bridge, which was designed in 1847 by one of South Africa's most acclaimed and prolific road builders, Charles Michell. He was the chief surveyor of the Cape Colony and has many great works credited to his name. Michells Pass south of Ceres in the Western Cape was named after him.

The Keur River Bridge designed by Charles Michell / Photo: MPSA

This lovely old stone bridge has seen life pass by under it and over it for 170 years and there are countless stories attached to this bridge. Some of them are romantic and others gruesome. One of these stories dates back to 1915 and was reported in the George & Knysna Herald of the 18th August, 1915.

Murder and mayhem on the Montagu Pass

John Cooper of Oudtshoorn was in love with Alice Lee of Somerset East (both had spouses and children). After a three day lover's tryst at the George Hotel, they set out for Oudtshoorn. Their journey ended at the Keur River bridge. Mrs. Lee was found with her long hair down and in disarray, one arm of her coat was almost ripped off. Near her lay John Cooper. Within reach of his hand was a recently fired revolver. In Cooper's car were letters for his wife and eldest son.

Witnesses recounted that some nights when young men raced down the pass on their bicycles, they saw Cooper and his mistress gliding half a meter above the road. Theunis Muller and Izak Theron were two Georgians who swore that they saw the ghosts more than once. The newspaper reported that Mr Cooper shot Mrs Lee and then shot himself.

We stopped several times taking in all the historical and scenic points of interest and mercifully encountered no descending vehicles. Some of the stone parapets are busy breaking up in places and we hope that the George Municipality will do some repair work and treat the pass in accordance with its status of a national monument. Some ugly graffiti spoils the otherwise attractive spot under the arched railway bridge. We have addressed both these issues with George Tourism (who are very proactive) and hope to see some improvement on our next visit.

Once over the summit we drove past Herold and on to the junction of the R62/N9, where we turned right, heading east to our next stop - Louvain farm.

Next week we will take you over the Old Voortrekker Pass from Louvain to Woodville.


PASS OF THE WEEK

Tying in nicely with our main story this week, our featured pass this week, is the Montagu Pass. There are 4 x 5 min videos covering the entire ascent, so allow about 30 minutes to watch them all.

 

* *   M O N T A G U   P A S S   * *

 

 

"Whatever you do always give 100%, unless you're donating blood"