The Amphitheatre

This past weekend I made another trip with friends to the Drakensberg - that glorious stretch of table-top peaks and dramatic ridges along the northern Lesotho [le-soo-too] border.

Not much to say other than this has been my favorite way to spend a weekend in South Africa. Working 9-5 in a city (and a pretty dull one at that) makes the mountains even more spirit-rejuvinating than I normally find them!

Sentinel Peak and the Amphitheatre are within site of Cathedral Peak, which I visited on my first trip, and are equally scenic. An old oceanic reef (this tidbit from my dad), the Amphitheatre is a great curving cliff, now at 3,000m above sea level, and perhaps 500 feet high, with a small waterfall that pours from a quiet stream running leisurly along the escarpment above. The hike was short (about 3hrs), which left lots of time in the afternoon for a nap and evening stroll. Saturday was windy and cold (so of course I didn't put sunscreen on, and got fried), but Sunday was beautiful, allowing us to scramble up Sentinel (a short ropped section at the bottom, and a nice exposed bit at the top) on our way back down. Accomodation was a nice big cave, which provided comfortable shelter from the afternoon storm, and a perfect vantage point for gawking at the rainbow that followed (the brightest I've ever seen I think).

I'm going to leave it at that. Check out the photos if you get a chance (here). Sorry I have been neglecting the blog of late. Things are going well here. I've become the Web Guy at work, which is not what I have signed up for but has nevertheless been quite fun and a good learning opporunity. The weather is, as usual, perfect - i.e. very un-Christmas-like. A short week next, and then three weeks off for the holdiay. So another drought coming up, but I should have more stories to share in the new year :)