The Beautiful Mountains

I finally hiked to the top of Sentinel- something I doubted I ever would do. Although the hike is not that difficult and not supposed to take that long, hiking to the ‘summit’ of any mountain is a daunting task. My brother and I set out early to drive the hour and a half to the start of the hike. Little did we know, the last stretch of road to get to the car park is horrible and covered in jagged rocks that were just waiting to puncture our tire. Now it was a an impressive feat in itself that my brother and I had made it there, seeing as how neither one of us really knew how to drive a manual, especially on the wrong side of the road and the wrong side of the car. But somehow, we managed to make it to the start of the road from hell, and at that point nothing was going to deter us. As we inched along, wondering the whole time whether or not we were on the right road, we climbed higher and higher. The view from there was spectacular. When we finally made it to the car park, we got the first glimpse of the trail that was ahead of us and the peak we were meant to reach.

At 8am we started the trek up the mountain. The path wasn’t too steep but did have tons of rocks and obstacles to maneuver. After about 2 hours of hiking, we stopped to take a quick water break and decided to eat some peanuts. Unfortunately for me, the break lasted a bit too long and when we got moving again, I felt funny. I was all of a sudden really dizzy and tired, and easily could have lied down to take a nap. I pushed forward, but stumbled a bit as we rounded the corner to the chain ladders.

After watching three others climb the two ladders up the side of the cliff (and taking a little snooze on the rocks), I pulled myself together enough to start my climb. Once I was up, I called down for my brother to join me and the two of us successfully made it to the top of the peak (which was really a plateau). You could see for miles and miles and the view was amazing. All around us there were mountains and hills and lakes. We decided to continue on, climbing up one last set of rocks to start the 30 min walk across the plateau to see Tugela Falls, the second tallest waterfall in the world. I slowly made my way across the flat rocky surface until we made it to the edge on the other side. The waterfall wasn’t spectacular, but we had made it and that was exciting. We sat and had lunch and the break seemed to help my body recover from the altitude, which was the only thing that I could think of that was causing me to feel sick.

We took in the view, had a mini photo shoot, and then decided that we needed to get on back down the mountain we just climbed. Of course, as soon as we got moving, it started to rain (you could call it the theme of our vacation). This wasn’t too big of a deal except we had to climb back down the very long chain ladders. The metal was slippery and the task was daunting, but I managed to make it down one and then the other. If I would have slipped, I would have died, it was that high up. My brother, who was the second one down, had trouble keeping his body from shaking and said it was one of the scariest things he had ever done. Once safely back on the lower mountain, we started our trek back down the mountain, going back and forth, back and forth across the side. I was exhausted and sore, but seeing as how my brother had a flight to catch the next day, I kept moving. The rain came and went, leaving us wet and with puddles that we had to dodge. When we finally made it back down, it was 2:45 and almost 7 hours had passed. I was tired but happy, and I think both of us were glad that we did the hike. We then started the long drive back to Bergville that would lead to the end of my brother’s time in South Africa. It was a fitting ending, seeing the whole country from the top of the mountain. I just wish I wouldn’t have gotten a horrible fever from the altitude and have to spend my brother’s last night in bed, trying to recover.