What's inside?
* Pass of the week
* Garden Route Tour (Day 3)
* Seven Sisters Tour (Witrivier Disaster)
* Grabouw Training Day (Final)
* Ben 10 - Last opportunity.
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Pass of the Week
The Potjiesberg Pass is a long pass on the N9 south of Uniondale. It descends from the Karoo plateau to the valley that hosts the R62 route. There are some big descents and motorists should exercise caution on this pass - especially heavy trucks can have braking issues here. The pass is broken up into two distinct sections, with a valley separating the two.
* * Potjiesberg Pass * *
Garden Route Tour
From De Vlugt we crossed the Keurbooms River to enter the Langkloof (not to be confused with the much bigger Langkloof on the R62). It is this final section of Prince Alfred's Pass that is without doubt the most charming. The width of the road decreases to mostly just wide enough for a single vehicle. If you meet an oncoming vehicle, one of you is going to have reverse to a point where the road permits passing. Surprisingly there are very few accidents here as the road has to be driven slowly by necessity.
The bends come thick and fast as the road follows the stream into a narrow gorge, where at times it becomes so narrow that Bain had to build stout walls into the river itself, to make space for the road. Bain was in many respects a self-taught man, who possessed a range of skills including engineering, geology, cartography, art, writing and accounting. He was the son of Andrew Geddes Bain, a Scottish immigrant, from whom he first learned pass building techniques. He drew his own maps and plotted his own lines - either on foot or on horseback.
Over time he earned himself the nickname of "The man with the theodolite eye" due to his uncanny ability to visualise the line a pass should take with his naked eye. His famous dry-walling method of construction to support roads on mountain faces, involved breaking large rocks up by means of fire, followed by cold water, to create manageable triangular pieces. These would then be stacked up at an inward tilting angle of 15 degrees and backfilled from the top to form an extremely strong road..
The more backfill that was added, the stronger the retaining walls became, utilising the scientific principles of friction and cohesion. There are many kilometres of his original walling still supporting this road. Many sections of this pass have been declared a national monument. Bain's contribution to South Africa as a developing nation was profound.
Keurbooms River near De Vlugt
The first landmark is Bain's Pillar, a rock monolith easily identifiable on the right and well signposted. Bain and his team of 250 convicts toiled hard along this section, which at times exasperated Bain with the complexities of construction he had to deal with. Next up is a small cave called Tata Riet se Gat. It is apparently so named after an elderly local man who took care of Bain's children during the construction phase.
The road then enters the narrowest part of the gorge, where it has to cross the river. There are substantial stone retaining walls here where one crosses via a concrete single span bridge, which replaced Bain's original stinkwood bridge. Attractive rock pools and small waterfalls create a perfectly charming setting, but drivers have to stay focused and as a reminder of that, there's a large hand painted sign on one of rocks "JY LOER NOG!" (You're still peeping!) The sign is more obvious to descending traffic and appears at a razor sharp bend. The sign has been on the rock for over 40 years. There are even T-Shirts for sale in De Vlugt with the words "Jy loer nog"
One of the best unofficial road signs in SA / Photo: MPSA GRT Group
Other landmarks are Die Kerf (The Notch) and Hangkrans (Hanging Cliff) which leans ominously over the road. One or two farms are traversed as the kloof opens up into the foothills of the final set of mountains. The climb gradient increases to around 1:9 as the road winds its way through forests and ravines to summit at 1035m.
Many of the bands had signs indicating their names, which have been stolen. One of them is "Tiekielief Corner". A strange name with a most interesting explanation which relates to the convicts receiving their "ticket of leave" on completion of doing their time. With most of the convicts being illiterate and struggling with the English language, this ticket of leave morphed into 'Tiekielief'. Several of them received their release from duty at that particular point of the pass.
Before long we were in Avontuur - a small farming village along the R62, where we turned left, descending down the Potjiesberg Pass on the N9 and then another left onto the P1660 - a long and pleasant gravel road that follows the Keurbooms River all the way back to De Vlugt.
There are fruit farms, misty mountains, tree filled kloofs and dozens of small streams. Whilst it cannot be compared to the Langkloof section of the Prince Alfred's Pass, it offers a wonderful alternative and in some instances, a substantial shortcut and saving in time.
It's a fairly long drive at 25.3 km and displays an altitude variance of 254m with the higher elevation being at its western end. The primary point of interest along this road is Burchell's Oxwagon Route.
Next week: De Vlugt, Paardekop Pass, Plettenberg Bay.
Seven Sisters Tour (Day 2)
After a night at the Diemersfontein Wine Estate, we made an elegantly late departure after breakfast at 09.30 heading back up Bain's Kloof Pass on a perfect blue sky day, with no sign of the rain from the previous day. We stopped at the main view site for some photos or just to enjoy the grand vistas and fresh air. We sent Kuba ahead to unlock the boom to the two spoor track into the reserve.
A good perspective of the northern section of the pass with the Witrivier on the right
The track is off to the right, which meant we had to get our rather large convoy of vehicles crossing the face of oncoming traffic - a high risk manoeuvre, so instead we drove into Bain's Kloof Village (Eerste Tol) and drove around the back of the village, where we first had to deal with some obstinate taxi drivers who had blocked the narrow road to collect children from the youth camp. It took considerable friendly persuasion to get them to move out of the way. Together with the 3 taxis, we were 17 vehicles one behind the other, taking up enough space to cover almost half of the length of the street.
With the taxis ahead, we came across a distinctly unfriendly lady standing in the middle of the road who was clearly in a state of unreasonable anger. She flagged us down in the lead vehicle, demanding to know what we were doing there. I politely told her it was a public road and I didn't need to explain what we were doing. This escalated quickly into a Karen like episode, so I just asked her to move and off we drove to rejoin the southbound traffic on the pass and safely exit the tar onto the track, where Kuba was waiting for us - with a big grin on his face as usual. Later in this story, that grin turned into a grimace.
Once we had the whole convoy on the gravel, Kuba locked the boom behind us and we headed along the gentle contours of the mountain, destination Witrivier Disaster Monument. We took a break at the monument and a group photo opportunity as Kuba talked us through the details of the event, which took place in 1895.
The 7 Sisters Tour Group at the Witrivier Disaster Monument
Seven Sisters Tour Our tour guests paying our respects at the memorial stone of the four hikers that drowned in the Witrivier in 1895. It’s one thing reading the story of the Witrivier Disaster but another mood altogether when you’re standing on the exact spot and there is nothing around you but mountains and complete silence.
The Witrivier in summer is a place of absolute beauty and relaxation as visitors swim in the crystal clear rock pools, but in the winter it can change its mood into a treacherous torrent of white water. The story took place on the 23rd May, 1895.Piet van der Merwe and Carl Pauw set out to guide a party of students and teachers from the Huguenot Seminary for a mountaineering experience to the lower Sneeukop region above the town of Wellington.
The crossing of the river was easy enough and the climbing party reached the summit at 14h00. Things went slower on the return leg with some of the students experiencing sore feet, plus the weather had turned bad with soaking rains up in the mountains. It was decided to split the party in two with van der Merwe leading the fitter group and Pauw bringing up the weaker group. By the time the first group reached the river crossing it had increased considerably in volume, but the group all managed to get across the river and safely back to Wellington, where concern was raised over the safety of the Pauw group.
By midnight there was still no sign of the missing hikers, so a search party was sent up the mountain with blankets, food, lanterns, rope and brandy. It was raining heavily and by 02.00 the search party reached the crossing point which was at that time a raging torrent. It was also bitterly cold. That night two feet of snow fell on Table Mountain.
The search party sounded a bugle and were relieved to hear shouts from the far side of the torrent. Pauw's group was alive! It was decided to wait till daylight before attempting to rescue the stranded hikers. At first light a rope was thrown across the river to the hikers. At that stage hypothermia had set in and the hikers hands were unable to hold on to the rope. Christiaan Krynauw then braved the icy waters and swam across with the rope. A thicker rope was attached and secured to a large rock. More of the rescue team crossed with food and liquid refreshments (brandy).
Once their spirits had lifted it was decided to take one girl at a time across. Lettie de Jager (18) was the first to attempt the crossing. Christian Krynauw and Francois van Dyk met her halfway across the icy water and assisted her along the rope through the fierce rapids. Things then started going horribly wrong when the three lost their footing and were swept away but landed on a rock. Seeing his brother and Lettie in danger, Francois van Dyk went to their rescue. He too was swept away ending up in a bush next to the river.
Due to shock and the freezing temperatures, Lettie eventually lost consciousness and was swept downstream off the rock. As she disappeared downstream, Lourens and Krynauw tried to reach her, but both drowned. A rope was thrown to Francois, but because of the cold, his hands had become numb and he was unable to hold on. He also lost consciousness and was swept away by the raging river. The remaining rescuers moved the rope further upstream, where they were able to rescue the rest of the party. Another search party was organised who recovered the four bodies from the river. Today a monument stands along the scenic route that the youngsters took that on that fateful day, bearing the words: "In memory of the daring and heroism of L van Dyk, F van Dyk, C.Krynauw and Lettie de Jager
Next week: Unravelling the story behind Gawie se Water and the old ruins on the mountain.
Grabouw Novice 4x4 Training Day ...continued...
The very first requirement when driving a 4WD vehicle is to know how the various traction buttons function and especially how to engage low range. The group was asked to engage low range about 1 km into the route where a variety of axle twisters lay in wait, becoming increasingly difficult as the gradient increased. We had slotted the Renault Duster in behind the lead vehicle in case a recovery was needed as it doesn't have low range. That proved to be a wise decision as the Duster just couldn't make it up the final climb. We connected a double tow-strap to the back of the Land Cruiser and soon had the Duster out of trouble.
It takes time and patience guiding 12 novice drivers over the various obstacles. Here the Renault Duster is being recovered.
The rest of the route provided a multitude of moderate challenges including some solid and loose rock work, some off-camber driving as well as steep ascents and descents. Early on in the course the Porsche Cayenne picked up a sidewall cut, which required a tyre change, which was ably overseen by our resident sweep, Philip Wantling. His son, Tyler spent the day taking hundreds of photos and short videos of the action. These were downloaded onto Google Drive after the tour, for guests to download whatever material they wanted.
We chose a dead-end loop next to a small mountain dam as our lunch stop, where Tyler had his drone up filming the peaceful scene. At this stage all the drivers had gone through a very quick learning curve, moving from rank novice to intermediate in the space of a few hours.
The afternoon route allowed drivers to put their new found skills to the test as we drove a very scenic mountain route with multiple obstacles and plenty of hairpin pins to arrive back at the starting point by 16h00. A short closing function was held as all the drivers received their course completion certificates.
This was a highly successful day and will be repeated in the same format during 2023.
TRIPS & TOURS
- There's still one spot going begging on this year's Ben 10 Eco Challenge Official Tour. Be a bok and come and have some pre-Christmas fun!
Trygve Roberts
Editor
"All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make, the better" ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson