Dirt ad Trail Online Nov 2020

We hurriedly start packing our things. I’m
frantically throwing bike kit and clothing
into bags while Johan carefully goes over
our adventurized KTM 500s to make sure
they are ready to roll. We also call up our
good friend Dave and the conversation
goes something like this: “Dave, would
you like to join us on a ride in Limpopo?”
“Hmmm, when are we leaving?” “Uh,
tomorrow morning…” “Wait, let me check
with the missus”… A brief moment of
silence ensues and then Dave gets back
to us “OK”. And so without much tactical
precision our plans for the weekend fall
into place.
With the trailers loaded and vehicles
packed, we left early on Friday morning
and headed north along the N1, eventually
making our way towards Tzaneen and
then past the village of Ofcolaco, reaching
the park in the late afternoon. The staff
sincerely apologized for the phone not
working. The manager jumped into his
cruiser and showed us to our cottages
which were located near an old farmhouse
deep in the reserve. Lekgalameetse translates
to “a place of water” in the Sepedi
language, an apt name for this paradise.
The mountains here are all a part of the
majestic Drakensberg mountain range,
the park is located amongst rolling grassy
hills, waterfalls, lush valleys, rivers, ponds,
indigenous forests and some of the best
bike trails you’ll ever feast your eyes
upon. As they are also one of the few
nature reserves that actually welcome
bikers with open arms I believe it is of
utmost importance to show respect by
staying on the tracks, being considerate
of noise pollution and generally just not
being arses.
We round off the evening with the fire
roaring and lekker food on the braai.
Tomorrow we will spread our wings and
touch the sky.
We head out on the tarred section of the
Orrie Baragwanath pass early on Saturday
morning, the plan is to see some of
the tourist attractions first before heading
off to the tough stuff. We are familiar with
the Orrie pass, having ridden it numerous
times before, the route we had planned
for today we haven’t ridden before. We
overtake a number of surprised cyclists
and pull off the road to look at a place
marked as “The Forest Church” on the
GPS, which turns out to be a mysterious
and almost haunting clearing between
the trees. As we climb to the summit of
the pass, the morning mist is so thick we
literally can’t see ahead of us. We decide
to change our plans and head through
the forest towards the southern gate of
the reserve first.
The trail starts just past the cobblestone
bridge at the Makhutsi camp and crosses
the river numerous times. I confidently
storm the first water crossing, hit a submerged
boulder, get the front wheel stuck
and lose my balance. Great, now I have
to ride with wet boots all day…
Nothing can dampen my mood with
the exhilarating beauty of the forest
all around us and we soon reach the
southern gate. Following the tweespoor
road we find the African Ivory 4x4 Route
marker pointing us towards Mafefe camp.
The name of the route has its origins in
the exploits of hunter/poacher/adventurer
SC ‘Bvekenya’ Barnard, who famously
hunted for Ivory in the Limpopo region,
especially in the Crooks corner area near
Pafuri.
The roads along the Ivory Route are fairly
rough and rocky, but with the most beautiful
mountain landscapes to compensate. As
we head past Mafefe camp we get onto the
track heading towards Penge Pass. You
will not find this pass on Mountain Passes
SA website and it is reserved for only the
most adventurous of travellers, especially if
you wish to traverse it on a bigger bike. The
pass basically comprises of unrelenting, big
loose rocks, with extremely steep descents,
and then more and more rocky switchbacks
as you travel down the mountain
(ridden north to south). As I descend into
the belly of the beast - I shalt have no fear,
for I trust in my 500 to get me through this
rocky monster.
Teeth gritting, butterflies flying rapidly and
that dreaded rollercoaster feeling in my
stomach I ride down. It feels like the pass
will never end and I keep on reminding
myself to loosen my grip on the handlebars
and just relax. When we finally make
it to the bottom, we stop under a beautiful
tree, part of a fruit orchard of old. I
immediately announce brunch break, and
we sit and eat our energy bars in the cool
shade. I’m glad we took a short break,
as we still had to cover the last rocky
section of this unrelenting pass before
we reached the bridge over the Olifants
River.
The road eventually leads us to Penge,
an old mining village situated near the
banks of the great Olifants River. There
is a small Total garage here and we grab
something cold to drink from the local
spaza shop. The area was always known
for its Andalusite, gold and platinum mining,
but most of these operations have
come to a standstill in recent years. We
actually pass one of these large opencast
mines on our way. It is apparent that it is
not in use any longer as the road next to
the mine is in terrible condition and there
isn’t a soul to be found.
Here we find ourselves riding even more
big boulders, any moment of hesitation
sure to result in a fall. At the end of this
treacherous path we come across a gate
leading towards some old mine buildings.
A moment of dread hits me, what if it’s
locked? We’ll have to retrace our tracks
for quite a distance and time is ticking.
Johan gets off his bike to look - and by
the devil’s own luck the heavy old iron
gate is unlocked and we simply push
it open and we make our way through.
Soon we cross the Olifants River again
following the scenic dirt road winding
all along the river past the village of
Ga-Mokgotho where we are met with
waves from curious children and local
people who probably aren’t used to
seeing many motorbikes coming through
the area.
From here on we ascend up another
rocky pass, only slightly less challenging
than the one near Penge we did earlier.
Going up the rocky track leaves no room
for error and I try my best not to stop or
lose momentum. Though these routes
have been traversed on bigger adventure
bikes before, I really do not recommend
tackling these trails unless you are a
VERY experienced rider. We enjoy the
simplicity and lightness of the smaller
adventure bikes on technical terrain,
and also the ease of getting out of sticky
situations.
With a lighter adv bike there is much
more room for error and even if you do
suffer a fall, at least you only have 100kg
falling on your leg, instead of 200kg
plus. I tried to find the name of this pass
(which forms part of the African Ivory
Route) without success and asked a
fellow adventurer who has travelled the
area before whether he knows the name.
He didn’t, but subsequently dubbed it,
“No-name Pass”, or the “Pass name of
which shall not be spoken”. Is it nearly
as eerie as it sounds, well maybe a little
bit? We stop often for photographs on
our way up, constantly being greeted with
seemingly endless mountains and even
more stunning landscapes.
When we reach the southern Lekgalameetse
Reserve gate again we turn
west, in the opposite direction of the river
road we came from in the morning. We
rode under the canopy of the lush green
trees down a fairly overgrown track with a
couple of rocky surprises.
Once we climb up from the canopies of
the trees we ascend the rolling green
hills going towards an area of the reserve
named The Downs. Though the loop I
traced on the GPS only came down to
around 140km, it was by no means a
short day. Most of the terrain kept us
quite busy and there were still a few
challenges left. More unnamed passes
cut into the green hills were ascended
and all of us started to feel we’d worked
quite hard, our concentration levels were
slowly dwindling.
When waiting on a rocky hill Johan was
nowhere to be seen, just when we wanted
to turn around to see if everything is
ok we heard his 500’s motor grumbling
along. Johan had lost focus on the road
for just one moment, and nearly went
over the ledge, a rude awakening which
just shows there is no room for error
when exploring remote trails such as
these. After all, no one said climbing the
staircase to heaven would be easy and
we carefully navigated some of the last
remaining obstacles on our path.
Near the end of our route we stop at
the ruins of “Orrie’s” son, Paul Baragwanath’s
homestead and ruminated at
how amazing it must have been living in
this glamorous Garden of Eden. We also
visited the Baragwanath family burial site
located on top of a hill near the summit of
the Orrie Baragwanath Pass.
Mr Orlando “Orrie” Baragwanath made
his riches prospecting in Rhodesia and
Zambia where he was known as the Copper
King. Upon his return he settled down
and farmed in the part of Lekgalameetse
known as The Downs, where he built
most of the roads, the well-known Orrie
Baragwanath pass being named in his
honour. Mr Baragwanath lived in the area
until he passed away at the ripe old age
of 101 in 1973.