Day 2 Otter Trail 16 June

Quartz Outcrops

Link to detailed route page and map click on route title [route-snippet id=”552″ featured=”image”]Ngubu Hut to Scott Hut The formal trail description has this as 8 km, however I included the couple of detours we did to the Quartz Outcrops and Blue Bay.

The Otter Trail booklet describes this day as being ‘probably the most diverse and beautiful of the entire trail’. We certainly enjoyed it. It also turned out to be the day with the greatest vertical ascent, glad we had got used to carrying our packs on the T Trail. Quite a lot of nervous energy in the group (excluding father and son) about handling the challenges of the day but everyone got on well. We left last on every day as it meant we could pace ourselves to hike on our own which was our preference, rather than get tangled between the 3 groups. Nice that this was accepted easily by the others and that we were not excluded during  afternoon /evening social time.

After a couple of km we reached the Skilderkrans quartz outcrops – cliffs down to the ocean. Fantastic aspect, could look back along the coast we had hiked along and what we would be hiking over. Could really feel the force of the ocean from here watching at waves crashing up onto the cliff ledges and then sucking back into the sea.

Got to our first river crossing on the trail Kleinbos – fairly upstream but could still see the impact of the tide on the river flow. Pretty crossing with pools and rocks. Too cold for a swim / paddle at this time of year. Noticed that except for the major rivers which we had been advised not to drink from due to possible pollution, the other rivers were largely dry / small pools with no flowing water. Shows the impact of the drought on this area. So we decided to carry the water we needed for the day and just fill up at the huts.

A reasonable amount of today’s hiking was through woods, however these on the coast had a very different feel to those inland. One area  was like an open English beech wood very open with little undergrowth.

Lunch destination was Blue Bay, now the path down is marked which was helpful. Decided to take our packs with us and not risk baboons finding them. The rest of the group though we were mad as they left theirs at the trail junction. It was not that far down to the beach and we were happy to enjoy our tuna sachets (1 each) and Provita watching the waves.

Steep climb up from the beach to a viewing platform on the cliffs above. Johan said he had seen a whale but it had moved away. We did not spot it but enjoyed sitting there enjoying the sun before the hike down to the hut on the far side of the headland.

This hut was in a gorgeous setting on the Geelhoutbos River mouth, Arum lilies were flowering. Looked for a sunny spot up the river for our bird bath but decided nowhere was really that private. Instead heated up our 2 small camping pots with hot water and had a very crowded wash (2 of us together) in the Cold Shower room. Everyone else had cold showers (every day!). I preferred our solution. The next night we decided we had enough fuel to heat up water for 2 separate washes!

Lovely sunset this evening, still managed a fire but there was less wood and it was also colder so we were all in our bags before 9. Had a lovely view of the Genet, very tame, which Mike got a couple of good photos of. I was sceptical as I did not think the camera would take such a good shot at night with flash. Glad to be proved wrong.

 

 

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