Hiking in the Drakensberg

This weekend was AMAZING! Christina and I (Laura) ventured into the wilderness that is the Drakensberg mountain range. Drakensberg is Afrikaans for "dragon's tooth" and this range forms the border between the South African province of KwaZulu-Natal (where we currently live) and the "mountain kingdom" that is the country of Lesotho.

We hit the road on saturday afternoon, heading for the Central part of the Drakensberg range because we'd been recommended a hostel out there by a random woman who we'd met rock-climbing. The closer we got to our destination, the more apparent it became that the weather was working against us. Neither of us mentioned it, but we were both definitely praying for sunshine the next day because running shoes and rain jackets are the extent of our hiking gear. When we got to the hostel, the weather forecast was bleak: we found out that it had been raining for the past 6 days straight, and that rain was predicted for the next week. Our brilliant plan: keep our fingers crossed. That night the sky opened up and DUMPED rain all over the valley. Lightning lit up the entire sky and one bolt landed pretty much in the hostel's backyard. A few hours later, I was shaken awake by Christina imploring me to come outside and look at the sky. It was breath-taking. There were stars EVERYWHERE. That night was the first time since we've arrived that we've been able to see the stars! We even found the Southern Cross and Orion's Belt. Which leads us to put a question out to any and all astrophysicists who might read this blog: why can we see Orion's Belt from down here and from up there? Let the comments begin :)

Dawn broke with the mountains all around us being finally visible and glowing pink. Our excursion had somehow managed to coincide with the only sunny day the area was expecting for 2 weeks. With a breakfast of sausages, toast, maize and eggs with pineapple (don't try that at home - or anywhere else) provided by the hostel, we set out to conquer the mountains. Well, not so much conquer as get kind of close to the beginning of where some of them start to jut straight up. Actual conquering would have required more than our running shoes could handle, as the photos will attest to.

We spent a few hours hiking up the mountain until we found ourselves on a plateau covered in green meadow. This meadow stretched all the way to the bases of the peaks in front of us, which rose up green until they turned to sheer rock faces at the top. It was very Sound-of-Music-eque, and I must admit that it prompted us to belt out "the HILLS are aliiiiive with the sound of muuuuusiiiic". (You may think that we're dorks, but I'll bet you would've done the same thing. It was like we were IN the movie! The mountains might have well have started shaking.) We got near the base of the mountain in front of us, but rather than continue on to a lookout point 4 km away, we opted to hike the loop that would take us to some pools where we could go swimming.

Little did we know, that loop would be killer! It seemed like we were hiking down FOREVER, which, in the blazing sun, was difficult at best. When we got to a split in the trail where we could either head up to check out another waterfall or go straight down to the pools, Christina opted for the pools while I headed out to the waterfall. Right before the waterfall, the path suddenly split into a bunch of smaller paths. Figuring that they all ended up in the same place, I picked my way towards the sound of the falls. However, once I got there, I couldn't remember my way back. It seemed that while all the paths led me TO the waterfalls, they did not all lead me back to where I had come from. Luckily, on take 3 I ran in to a couple that pointed me in the right direction. Suddenly invigorated with new energy, I ran the 20 minutes down the path to find Christina at the pools.

Having never been to the pools before, we hadn't made an exact meeting spot. I guess we just figured that we would find each other there. As I was hiking down, I came upon one turn-off to the pools, but when I peeked over there I couldn't see Christina, so I continued on to the second turn-off. I hiked all the way to the bottom to where the second pool was located, but Christina was still nowhere to be found. At this point I decided to stay put while I waited for her to show up, so I got to swimming around. I waded out into the river and 'lo and behold, I see Christina's red Nalgene bottle floating amongst some weeds, all by itself. It looked so sinister, just floating there in all its redness, that my mind immediately jumped to the conclusion that she had either washed downstream (which at that point in the river was pretty much impossible), been captured by baboons, or been kidnapped by a rogue gang (of which none exist in the Drakensberg). Funnily enough, just as I got out of the water to start hiking back up the trail to find her, down she comes from the first pool! I was SO happy to see her, and she was SO happy to see her Nalgene bottle! Funny how things work out sometimes.

Another hour of hiking brought us to the end of our adventure, which both of us were pretty happy about considering neither one of us could really use our legs anymore. With good tunes in the stereo and a beautiful sun setting behind us, we headed home to Durban. But not before getting some good pictures of the South African countryside, so be sure to check out the latest photo album! Hope you all had wonderful weekends and best of luck to you guys who are studying.

Much love,
Laura