The 3 highest peaks in Southern Africa.
I must admit that I hadn’t given much thought to sumitting the 3 highest peaks in Southern Africa. But then Stuart from the UK emailed me and asked “what were the chances of organizing this trip?” What a great idea. I hadn’t gone to Emlembe in Swaziland/Eswatini the country is now called.
Unfortunately I still haven’t gone to Emlembe as my good friend Geoff of Pizzology fame got to go. Oh well there will be a next time.
So to do the 3 highest peaks in Southern Africa we hikes up Thabana Ntlenyana, Mafadi and Emlembe.
Thabana Ntlenyana and Mafadi are fairly impressive at 3482m and 3450m respectively but Emlembe is only 1862m above sea level. However it is the oldest mountain in the world. So there! Eswatini/Swaziland also boasts the 2nd biggest solid rock in the world after that other one in Australia.
So after picking Stuart up at Durban airport Geoff headed up Sani pass into Lesotho. Jeffery porter for Drakensberg hiker also joined the hike just to keep everything on track. The next day was a hike to Thabana Ntlenyana, the highest peak in Lesotho. All was good and they had some local Basotho shepherds for company. I am sure they were wondering what these 3 mad chaps were doing. If you would like to join us for a 4×4 tour of Lesotho click here.
Now that Thabana Ntlenyana could be ticked off it was time for Mafadi.
So back down Sani pass and into South Africa with a lovely drive around the foothills of the Drakensberg. Destination, Injasuthi the home to Mafadi. This evening was spent relaxing at the Injasuthi camp while apparently solving the problems of the world. Yup.
Okay now it’s Mafadi’s turn. The guys headed up the valley to camp at Centenery hut. The clouds put on a great show with the sun shining on them. A lovely evening. The next day was a short but steep climb up Corner pass.
Once on top of the escarpment it was plain sailing to the overnight stop in Upper Injasuthi cave.
This cave is at 3300m altitude and the highest cave in the Drakensberg.
From here it is a short stroll over to summit Mafadi. After being the highest people in South Africa it is a really great walk to the top of Leslie’s pass. This is the pass we use to get back down off the escarpment. A lovely pool called the Marble baths is waiting down there. Anyway after 4 days they arrived back at the landy. After dropping Jeffery off the 2 set off for Eswatini.
