Gray Mares Falls
Leader and report by Deon Small
We all met at Shawswood from 8:00 and soon as everyone had arrived and the necessary paperwork done, we were ready to set off.
The group was 16 in total and after a quick briefing of what to expect on the trail, we started to make our way to the start of the path leading through the pines.
The condition of the paths and the level of the river was a bit of an unknown at the present moment as there had been quite a lot of rain the past few days.
Luckily there was no rain and the sun was blazing down on us and the cloudswere giving up the fight with the sun.Â
On entering the forest, we got out of the heat and into the cool of the shade and we could hear the river rushing over the rocks way deep in the forest. The forest is home to a number of birds, like the Knysna Turaco and the Narina Trogon.
A number of small mammals also call this home, with some Samango’s calling the trees home, but we could only find some spoor of the smaller Duiker or Bush Buck.
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We reached our first river crossing and some quickly took off their boots with most opting to just live on the wild side and get their boots wet. We made our way, snaking up the path with a few more river crossings and by now most did not worry about wet shoes anymore.
The path up was tricky in some sections due to the moss and wet conditions under foot, making it quite risky if your foot placement was not correct. The rocks around the river crossings were slippery and luckily there were a few hands around to help everyone safely across. The forest was cool and quiet with just the river rushing over the rocks breaking the silence.
We arrived at the small waterfall and had a welcome tea break, something I have come to realise (from the Giants up Trail), is not to mess with the tea breaks as this could cause the group to revolt and you would not get them to move until you allowed them their well-earned break.
This was also to be the point where the more adventurous could carry on to see how close we could get to the bottom of the falls. Grey Mares Falls is a spectacular waterfall with a vertical drop off about 104m and in full flow looks like the tail of a grey mare running through the fields. Due to all the rain, we’ve had, the falls was quite spectacular and gave all a great view from the bottom.
After I quickly set up a safety rope to make the ascent to the ladder a bit easier, we made our way up a further 300m, but the conditions underfoot started to deteriorate. As leader I had to make a call that we would have to stop at an appropriate view point as the rocks were extremly slippery and we did not need any accidents on the rocks as it is a mission to get some one back down. We had a photo session and then started to pick our way down the rocks to where the rest of the group was waiting for us. After a well-earned lunch break and some even had a swim, we slowly started to make our way back down, crossing the rivers and taking care to not slip and slide on the slippery sections.
Unfortunately, Stubs twisted her ankle and after a quick first aid session we all got going and before long we were on the final stretch back to Shawswood. On our way back we could see that Stubs was not doing too well with her ankle so I went to fetch my car to drive up and fetch her and take her back down safely to camp. The rest of the group made their way back to camp without any incident and as the sun was now out in full force, everyone was glad to be back at the cars. After a quick farewell to new friendships and old friendships renewed, we were all on the road again this time homebound, and already planning for the next adventure.
