Hiya all. I'm guessing that the area has been looked at, but every time I drive over Ou Kaapse Weg I wonder about this. There is a nice looking section of Rock band very high up on the escarpment, if you are driving out of Komm / Noordhoek towards Silvermine main entrance, its about half way along the road towards the top of Ou Kaapse weg, on the right, kind of across a big valley.

It looks like a big walk, but think the wall may be a very decent size once you are there? Has anyone else looked at this? Or maybe its even been worked on??

Hey Jeff,

Yes, Leo Rust and Gareth Austin went to go check it out years ago. Big walk-in but I do recall Gareth saying the climbing was good.
I'll drop Leo a mail and ask him to comment here.

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If it's Klein Tuin Kop that you mean, then it's well worth the walk in Jeff. I've been up there a few times and really like it. The obvious band facing the road is mostly about a half rope length and gets hot in summer. Further to the right is both longer and cooler. Undoubtedly been worked before. I know Hilton did about 4 routes in the 20ish range just to the right of Porcupine cave and the obvious large blocky roof. Not aware of any write ups. There's even an old peg up there.
Quite a range of grades from 10 to 20's. The path over the top passes some neat labarynths.

i have ogled that same rock band many times - looks really good but the walk-in will be a bummer. from a distance it looks like it should be a sport crag though......

Great little crag. It is a little less impressive up close but def worth a visit. I recall a cool wall with a super easy angle and a cave. pretty good views too. The walk in is long but quite flat for most of it. You just start from the Silvermine gate and walk along the dirt road, past the waterfall to below the cliff. then head straight up. enjoy.

Hi Jeff

Alan Ross and I did three routes on the best-looking steep white wall. They're very nice one pitch routes of around 20 or so. They are spicy leads as the first gear is quite high up. I remember fruity band names - Red Hot Chilli Peppers, Black Eyed Peas and Smashing Pumpkins.

A bit further right I went through the biggest roof in that area to come out left and up a steep white wall.

The walk-in is minor and nice. But the crag does shrink a bit as you approach it.
H.

I guess those routes have been opened many times. Sometime around 1988 we did the easy slab and one or two of the routes between the cave and the slab. We also tried something through the main roof but didn't do it (although Jono Fisher might have). I went back a decade later and tried the routes left of the cave but they are much harder.

A word of warning, while soloing one of the routes I actually touched a large rinkhals that was sleeping in one of the rails.

As for the walk-in, it's 2/3 the length of most Topside bouldering walks - bloody wussy trad climbers...

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There's no point being pessimistic, because it probably won't work

Awesome, thanks for the info guys! Particularly psyched to climb again and kinda looking around for a project to keep me inspired for the summer. :-) @ Guy, laughed at yr post buddy, if there's a snake at the crags, you'll find it!

Hi Guy...are you aware of the research that is ongoing regarding the rinkhals?

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While on the subject of whether crags have been checked out, whenever I drive from Fish Hoek towards Kalk Bay I wonder why the crags on the Fish Hoek side of the buttress which has the Kalk Bay Crags on it, have not been developed. Especially the bottom one, fairly close to the road and overlooking Clovelly Corner, looks pretty good as a sport climbing crag. Has anyone checked these up close? And why have they never been developed?

Also did a route next to that cave a few years ago - and also came across a snake enjoying the sun on one of the ledges. Thought it was a Cape cobra at the time.

I think we walked in for just over 30 minutes.

They certainly seem to like them ledges. What did it look like?

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I bolted an easy (20) route on that crag a while back. Anyone try it, enjoy it?

Many, many years ago I climbed routes on both those walls overlooking Clovelly Corner. I don't recall much now but clearly it can't have been the most captivating climbing around. We also did various single pitch things on a number of the walls further left. Lots of bush. Lots of snakes. Like Guy, I lived in Fish Hoek for most of my early climbing days and we did a lot of exploring of all likely looking rock. The Kleintuinkop stuff is OK, not brilliant. Trappieskop, on the Clovelly side, is nowhere near as good as the sunnier, drier Kalk Bay Crags side.

@johannlanz, I recently put up this post regarding those crags at Kalk Bay: http://www.climb.co.za/forum/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=8067&sid=4c293bf813f5597a37704f3d5d9b85ea
Been exploring and climbing there a bit. Found some bolts and asked about it (see post), but no reply yet.
The bolts are not rusted on the outside (apart from the U-shackle on one of them), so can not be too old.
Richard or Stu, maybe you can shed some light?

Looks nice, Lelikegogga. I'm sure the lower one is worth exploring as well.

There were no bolts on the crags overlooking Clovelly last time I was up there so I'm afraid that I can't shed any light on that matter. We were exploring in a more traditional style.