Mhlabatini (trad)
Access
This is also an MCSA owned kloof and permits should be obtained - see the main page for details. Parking is not on MCSA property but on a neighbour’s property and a parking fee applies. An access an parking fee register is located at the parking. Contact the MCSA for more access details.
Visitors are not allowed to enter or leave the kloof after dark - allow enough time to get into and out of the kloof from the parking. There have been thefts from the standard parking spot. You MUST however contact the MCSA for the latest arrangements.
Approach
The walk in is uphill and moving through the kloof can be challenging at times (wading and scrambling required). A camp site is located at the entrance to the kloof. Note that it is not permissible to follow the river to gain access to the kloof as this are is located on private property.
Routes/ Gradings
A truly beautiful kloof famous for its many crack climbs. The 136 routes are mostly multi-pitch natural routes, grades vary from 5 to 27 with many at each grade above 15 until 25.
Aspect
With plenty of water and nice shade all day it is a very pleasant kloof all year round.
PDF Topo Download
http://www.climbing.co.za/topo/download/50167/
New Routes
Spaced Out (21) ****
P1 (19) 25m Climb the first pitch of Good Dog to a semi-hanging stance just above the roof.
P2 (21) 30m. Continue up Good Dog to a ledge just below and left of the prominent prow in the middle of the crag. Good Dog traverses right from here. Step up and left onto the smooth wall. Climb up and left past rails, then straight up to the biggest square roof. Pull through to a good rail on the lip of the roof. Rail left to the arête and then climb crystalized (and runout) rock just left of the arête to the top.
Hector Pringle and Nic Grech-Cumbo, 2013
Space Jump (25) ****
A wild line that takes on the full steepness of the Space Walk buttress.
P2 (25) 30m. Climb Spaced Out to the rail on the lip of the roof. Instead of railing left, commit to the air up and right to get to the massive juggy block in the middle of the roof. Rail right to clip the Spacewalk peg then finish up the last few moves of Spacewalk.
FA (with aid): Hector Pringle and Craig de Villiers, 2014-01-18
FFA: Hector Pringle, April 2017
The Action Vacuum (25) ***
A fun roped boulder problem through the obvious break in the roof upstream of Forever Young. Start in a hollow formed between a boulder, the wall and the big Forever Young tree. I.e. immediately right of Yahoo.
P1 (25) 20m. Climb the clean face then reach high to sling the lower branch of the weird tree growing down from the left edge of the roof. Climb up and right to Yahoo's rail (Yahoo exits right) where a #5 cam is useful but not essential. There is also good gear in the roof crack. Its runout grade 20 to here. The action is leftwards through the roof then easily to the top.
FA: Hector Pringle and Sarel Petrus, 2019-01-26
