The charm of roads less travelled

The best road trips usually begin with an idle thought. That’s how my epic end-of-year adventure — which involved circumnavigating Lesotho over two weeks — got its inauspicious start.

My wife was going to be away over December and the thought of being homebound did not appeal to me. I had a lot of thinking and planning to do for 2025, and I figured staying in Joburg was not conducive to that. No, I needed inspiration. And what better way to get it than on a solo road trip to somewhere remote.

I grabbed my trusty road atlas — that’s old school, I know, especially for a tech journalist who lives online, but there’s nothing like poring over a paper map book to let the imagination run wild. And run wild it quickly did!

Before I knew it, I’d plotted a solo adventure, this time with the help of Google Maps, to take me from Gauteng along dusty Free State farm roads to South Africa’s border with northern Lesotho and then on a counterclockwise route around the Mountain Kingdom, hugging the roads closest to the border through the Free State, the Eastern Cape highlands and the KwaZulu-Natal Drakensberg.

The plan? To avoid tarred roads as far as possible, especially the national routes. Accommodation was booked at strategic places and I spent months preparing every little detail — important, given that I would be embarking on this adventure alone and I needed to ensure I was prepared for any eventuality, especially in the remote Eastern Cape mountains.

And so, on December 22 — a quiet, grey Sunday morning in Joburg — I climbed into my packed bakkie, which is a beefy 4x4 more than capable of what I had planned, and set off for the tiny Free State dorp of Rosendal.

Part 1: Joburg to Rosendal and Rosendal to Lady Grey

To avoid the N1 or N3 out of Joburg, I followed the R59 through Alberton to Vereeniging and on to Deneysville before taking a route directly south along Free State regional and farm roads.

I forget how many sandstone churches I photographed. All were well maintained (but all unfortunately locked up tight, even on a Sunday). I wish I could say the towns I travelled through were as well looked after as the churches.

For the most part, the roads — some tar and some gravel — were in good nick, which surprised me. Perhaps I was lucky to miss the worst of the province’s notorious roads along the route I’d planned.

Rosendal is a lovely town, a haven for artists, who have turned it into a tourist hotspot (without the crass commercialism of nearby Clarens). Unfortunately, it being a Sunday afternoon, most places were closed when I arrived. But I wasn’t fazed: a long drive lay ahead, so I got an early night.

After eggs and coffee the next morning at Krummel — the restaurant is an institution in the area — it was time to hit the road to Lady Grey, via a mix of farm roads and (mostly good) tarred regional ones through crumbling Free State towns.

I ignored Google Maps, which had wanted me to take a longer route to the town via Aliwal North (Maletswai), and opted for a more mountainous but shorter route through Sterkspruit. This was a mistake. Traffic was gridlocked. Minibus taxis, smoke-belching skedonks, livestock (cows and goats) and thousands of people choked the narrow road through town.

I got into Lady Grey hours later than I’d hoped, but still, thankfully, with daylight to spare. I checked into the fading but still lovely Lady Grey Hotel (officially, the Mountain View Country Inn), had a look around town (including at another striking sandstone church), photographed an incredible sunset, ate a quick burger at a local diner-cum-curio shop and crashed into bed. The real adventure would begin the next morning.

Part 2: Lady Grey to Barkly East and Rhodes

Every South African should drive though Joubert’s Pass at least once. The gravel pass, which begins in Lady Grey, takes in two small dams, before ascending steeply along a narrow, rutted route to the summit. It’s worth stopping here and taking in the views, both west (back to Lady Grey) and east into the Eastern Cape highlands.

The rest of the pass is a long, slow drive eastward through majestic scenery. I drank it all in, stopping around every corner to take photographs.

After a detour along a Jeep track through a sheep farm to see a local Cape vulture breeding colony, situated in a deep and remote gorge somewhere south of Lady Grey, I pushed on to Barkly East for diesel and lunch: delicious and well-priced bobotie at the Dorpstal Coffee Shop, located at the old Royal Manor Hotel.

Like the Free State towns and Lady Grey, Barkly East is in serious need of investment, but it still seems to be functioning.

Conscious of time, I hit the gravel road to Rhodes, which would be my base for three days as I explored the high mountain passes in the area.

The road goes through countryside so staggeringly beautiful that it’s difficult to describe it without sounding hyperbolic. After deciding to take a brief (5km) detour to a remote farm to see and photograph a huge sandstone cave, I arrived in Rhodes just in time to see Santa Claus make his way along the quaint village’s tree-lined roads, every excited young child in town in tow as he handed out Christmas gifts — a magical scene.

It turned out there was something festive happening every day for weeks over the holidays, with the famous Rhodes Hotel at the centre of much of it. The hotel was built in 1899, just two years after the village’s founding, as a rest stop for travellers exploring what was then a wild frontier.

I’d have loved to have had more time in Rhodes, to amble along the Bell River, perhaps to try my hand at fly-fishing, which is popular in the area, or to simply lounge around at the hotel. But there were also mountain passes to explore, and that was my priority.

So, at 4.30am on Boxing Day, car packed with extra diesel as well as ample food and water (in case of trouble), I set off on a circular route from Rhodes that would take in Lundin’s Nek Pass, the challenging but spectacular Volunteershoek Pass and the Tiffindell-Tenahead Traverse, before descending the western side of Naude’s Nek Pass, back into Rhodes.

It was, in a word, epic, though I had to cut the adventure short by skipping the traverse. Instead, I headed down the incredibly steep but partly concreted Carlisle’s Hoek Pass from the Tiffindell ski resort (now permanently closed) just as the weather was closing in — with a forecast for severe thunderstorms. I made it back to Rhodes minutes before the skies opened.

Part 3: Rhodes to Bergview Estate via Sani Pass

With great reluctance, I pushed on from Rhodes, vowing to return for a longer visit.

Naude’s Nek Pass, which connects Rhodes with Matatiele via a rough gravel road that cuts east before Maclear (Nqanqarhu), is another mountain pass not to be missed.

Also not to be missed is the five-star Tenahead Lodge, about 5km north into the mountains from the top of Naude’s Nek Pass (and for 4x4s only).

The lodge — the highest in South Africa — is regularly buried in a metre or more of snow several times a year, with guests often being stuck there for days. Not that I think they’d mind — the place is fabulous and oh-so comfortable.

From Matatiele, I pressed on along bumpy gravel lanes before joining the tar road into Underberg and Himeville, my base for my first venture up Sani Pass, which proved to be a tougher drive than I’d expected, but also fun.

There are plans to tar the pass (it will be an engineering marvel if they do it), so if you haven’t driven it yet, do it soon.

Studiously avoiding Google’s efforts to route me east to the N3 at Mooi River to get to Bergview Estate in the northern Berg (my next three-day stopover), I discovered some of the most picturesque country roads — including Jeep tracks — I’ve ever driven on, with the imposing main wall of the Drakensberg keeping me company on the journey north. I was drinking it all in again and stopping frequently to take (and share) photos.

Bergview Estate was my place to unwind, and the lovely hosts of my Airbnb, with whom I quickly became friends, made this leg of the journey a highlight. I read, braaied, listened to music, did dozens of crossword puzzles and pondered the meaning of life, the universe and everything.

Part 4: Bergview Estate to Clarens and home

The final leg of my adventure took me along more gravel roads into Bergville before I headed up Oliviershoek Pass, skirting the Sterkfontein Dam (going past a violent thunderstorm) and on to my next stop, Clarens, through the Golden Gate Highlands National Park, which I explored the next day.

The final leg would take me along a picturesque road to Fouriesburg and back to Rosendal to complete the blue circle I was drawing in Google Maps. From there, I hand-picked a route north along farm roads all the way back to Deneysville, over the Vaal River and into Gauteng.

On my journey I had met incredible people, eaten amazing food, conquered mountain passes and seen scenery too beautiful to describe. As with all great road trips, I also learnt a considerable amount about myself and what truly matters in life.

And it all started by opening a map book. I wonder where that map book will take me next.

McLeod is editor of TechCentral