Friday 21 September 2012

Drakensberg - Injisuthi day 3 & 4

Day 3 - had me all puffy eyed from the lack of sleep. All I wanted to do was relax in my sleeping bag & try remain comfy which was a mission with all the straw around. If you ever plan to do an overnight stay anywhere, I suggest you take a ground sheet with you. Not only will this stop the straw from irritating you, it will also help provide as an insulator away from the cold ground floor.

Eventually everyone was awake & coffee was being enjoyed by all, the other happy hikers were preparing for their next stage of hiking to MARBLE BATHS. Before we knew it, they were all packed & ready to go. We all said our goodbye's & nice to meet ya's & poof they were gone. They were a very nice bunch of people who are very passionate about hiking.

After breakfast, we headed down to our "kitchen" which was also our "swimming pool" to wash the dishes & got ourselves all cleaned up & then the adventure began...
We went to this overhang near the pool which has some rock paintings on it. Its very hard to see but if you just give it some time & patience you'll soon see it. The rocks are very old & crumbly so I was very careful. We also discovered an old rusted tin which we left hidden as we thought it was left by someone who used it for cooking.

Further up the river, bouncing from rock to rock, just seeing where the river would take us & what else we would find, we stumbled upon a bone quite deep in a pool of water. We managed to get this bone out & it was quite a big bone which had a few cracks on it & yes, it stank. We ended up tossing it back in & continued further up. With the sun shining so gracefully, it just gave us the perfect photo for this incredible view but alas NO CAMERA!!!!!!!
On the way back down, we searched for agates which I collected for my lady who was waiting back at base camp. Although the water was super cold, it never stopped us from jumping in & feeling the cold to the bone literally & very awakening.

As we tried to make dinner we had an ufortunate problem,the Mathias's primus burner decided to pack up which did them proud as it was their grandfathers. We also had another type of pot cooker thingy (we didn't know how to use it) so it got us creative, trying to regulate gas flow which quite didn't work.The wind just made matters worse but we eventually got dinner cooked.
The wind created a kak updraft in the cave & gees we were getting dusted. The wind ended up swirling & it ended up coming from both sides of the cave!
Eventually after full bellies & desert in our hands, we crawled into our sleeping bags to keep warm & just chilled, chatting about future hikes & I hope in the distant future of doing the "GRAND TRAVERSE".

Day 4 - I managed to get some sleep, much better than the previous night but my bags under my eyes showed all that.I had a cold nights sleep & when I got up to go to the toilet, everything just fell into place & explained everything.It was unbelievably snowing, the very first time I have seen snow fall even though I have played in it.I woke everyone up, got the coffee going & then the packing started. We didn't want to get trapped here in the snow so our journey back began. With some strong winds & lots of snowfall we managed to get a few photos & we got to our base camp rather quickly which always seems to be the case.


At base camp, everyone welcomed us back & they were already packing. A very nice hot shower was in my agenda & some left over breakfast. Once we were all packed, we were on the road back to Durbs. But just before we left, I had to take one last photo of this beautiful place & created an awesome panoramic landscape picture.

I hope that I will be hiking here again someday as I have luckily done this hike before in February of which I'll post up soon.