Second Report-back

Here are this week’s NEW INPUTS ... in the order received:

Strydom’s Path

First, a Fabulous Fax from Alex Basson, a genuine Cederberg old-timer who has been stomping the ’berg since he was twelve .... which was in 1943! Alex has info about names, places, stories etc etc that will all be available for the new map. I asked him about the ‘built path’ up Uilsgat – he tells me it was built as a pure folly by a long-gone forester, possibly a Mr Strydom, whom Alex described as a ‘frustrated road builder’. I will call that path ‘Strydom’s Path’ on the map, unless a different name comes to light. ‘Strydom’ also rebuilt the Eikeboom-Sneeuberg jeep track and the Pakhuis-Heuningvlei road that is still in regular use by donkey-carts, hikers and boulderers. Basson se Klip is named after Alex – see photo below.

The Pup – pic by Graham Bellairs

Graham Bellairs sent some valuable info about the path confusion around The Pup. Thanks, Graham, we had already found that the path on the south side of The Pup no longer exists. 
Graham also had more info about the old path up Protea Peak that Rudolf had mentioned to us. After a careful study of GoogleEarth and Bing maps I’ve managed to locate most of it – we’ll probably show it as a ‘way to go’ rather than a marked path.
Graham also suggested that we should not neglect the Klipbokkop and other paths in the Nuwerust area; we’ll certainly show all the routes that fall on the map, but we’ll need some GPS tracks.


Julyan Symons confirmed the pic of Welbedacht Cave, but still no names for the nearby rock-pillars – for some good news see below, Julyan.


Galeo Saintz asked that we include a link for the Rim of Africa trail – see www.rimofafrica.co.za 

Meidegat Falls near Sevilla

Paul la Grange named the falls at Riempie se Gat as Riempie’s Falls; he also pointed out that the Eselbank Falls are higher and even more impressive [how do these compare with the Meidegat Falls near Sevilla, by the way?]. 


Laurence Elton wrote about his recent [November] trip down the Heks River valley. Just as we did, his party found the Kruisrivier kloof path over to Algeria impassably blocked by fallen trees. His party bailed out to Klein-Jongenskraal and copied us their letter of complaint to CapeNature about the state of a path that is shown so prominently on their map. 
Hmmm. I can see the mapmaker’s biggest hazard rearing its ugly head here – ground features that change and render the map info incorrect ...
Laurence also asked for the inclusion of a UTM grid ... more on this later. He asked for True North to be at the top of the map: it will be.

Basson se Klip? Maybe. Pic by Mike Scott.

Mike Scott sent a couple of great photos and valuable info. He confirmed our pics of The Anvil, the correct position for Vogelgesang-vallei [Ralph Taylor was right, of course], and the Knobless Robot. Mike’s pic of Basson se Klip is included here, though I’ll have to get Alex Basson’s confirmation that this really is his klip! Mike confirmed the location of several other features, sent me off to revise my ‘Vanzylsklip’ with a new pic of the real thing, and he named one of your ‘unnamed pinnacles’, Julyan Symons – the one to the east of the Welbedacht path is the ‘Pepper Pot’ and was first climbed in 1969. [our pic 75]

Pepper Pot: climbed in 1969

Finally, Peter Hart of the Cederberg Heritage Route provided a couple of gps tracks for the Route’s great new 4-day trail from Driehoek to Wupperthal, via Gabriël’s Pass and Eselbank/ Kleinvlei [opening January 2012]. Peter was great source of info, with several new names and some great – and previously unknown to us – waterfalls.
See www.cedheroute.co.za 

And, to end, the Formal Stuff ...



Mapping: completed geo-referencing & correct setting for the northern section; adding info about bouldering in the Pakhuis area.
Response to webpage: 413 individuals visited the website-page since 14 November. 82 Algeria maps, 112 books and 47 GoogleEarth photo-tracks were downloaded.
Links on other websites: These orgs kindly notified their members of our quest, though their websites:
Meridian Hiking Club  – http://www.meridian.org.za/news.htm 
Climb ZA – http://www.climb.co.za/2011/11/new-cederberg-hiking-map-can-you-help/ 
as well as the MCSA – http://mcsa.briefyourmarket.com/Newsletters/Mountain-Ears-December-2011/Help-make-a-new-Cederberg-hiking-map-.aspx 
Info already in: 
Already acknowledged: Rudolf Andrag, Quinton Martins, Ronnie Hazell, Charles Merry, Wim Morris.

Keep ’em coming!

Kaartman 2011-12-02