The Drakensberg Mountains
After going back to Botswana for another month my visa was about to expire to my friends Luisa and Scott told me that they were planning to go hiking in the Drakensberg mountains. Its one of a few major areas of South Africa that I have yet to see and have heard much about the epic nature of this area from friends in the past.
The Drakensberg, “the Dragon Mountains“) is the highest mountain range in Southern Africa, rising to 3,482 metres (11,424 ft) in height.
The great thing about where Luisa and Scott live in Pretoria is that the drive to part of the Drakensberg is only a 4 hour drive to be in a place of great beauty.
We were all booked in over the weekend to the Swiss like village called Clarens that sits at the foot of one of the mountains.
We went on a hike which would lead to a prehistoric cave (including rock art) that we were able to sleep in that night. The cave itself was magnificent and quite breathtaking once you were standing inside it’s mouth and looking out to what the same view cavemen that inhabited this place would have done possibly 10,000 years ago.
Things had changed slightly since then including the fact that we didn’t have to hunt for our meal that evening and warmth was provided by cut pieces of wood that would last most of the whole night, but apart from that we were back to basics! A highly recommended place to get away for the weekend and the hike that we did was varied and takes you to another cave along the way which has cave art.