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Wilderness Trail Tales

Part 1- Introduction


It was early in 1985 that I first had the opportunity to do a walking trail . A friends father had told me about his experiences on the Wolhuter Trail a few months prior . He told us how Douw Swanepoel , the trails ranger (later section ranger and a renowned crocodile expert , now deceased ) and ex SA Defence Force reconnaissance commando operator had shown them the skeleton of a buffalo he had had to shoot on trail a short while before hand , so having a keen interest in things connected with the SADF and in particular the "recces" , I wanted a "piece of the action" , the stories of lions roaring through the night at the adjacent waterhole through the night adding to my enthusiasm .
I had fairly recently become addicted to the Kruger after rediscovering the latent interest when visiting the Kruger on my first annual leave of my working life in "civvy street" some 18 months prior , and had read as many books I could regarding its history , one of which was Memories Of A Game Ranger by Harry Wolhuter . My enthusiasm thus sufficiently whetted , it was fitting that I booked 2 places on the Wolhuter trail , and myself and a friend departed for the Kruger close to midnight in a Honda Ballade 130 , registration number KFG 676 T , taking in the Long Tom Pass at dawn en route .

Going to enjoy this!

Going to be some thread
Looking forward to some great stories

Sounds interesting...

Ndloti.. I have my hiking boots on, small backpack with provitas and a flask of rooibos and am ready to join you on your hikes ... all of them.This is going to be great

Wishing and waiting for this for a long time!!

I've always enjoyed reading your commentary, Ndloti - filled with wisdom, humour, imagination, and great situations!!
Looking forward to reading these ...

Part 1 - Wolhuter Trail Feb / March 1985

I am writing each installment spontaneously and from memory - thus some detail has been forgotten .

I have after a mammoth effort of scanning the slides and posting and editing this , moved Part 1 further down to page 2 .

Thanks - 55 to go .

COOL, Ndloti

Thanks for sharing ndloti!



I can see how you were hooked

Drat , so few ooh's , aah's & squeals of delight - obviously I need to post photos ?

There is more to come , though it could take some time . I think photos are necessary - finding and looking at them may just jog my memory and enrich my limited writing skills .
Memories tend to fade after so many years - and there were so many experiences that it is difficult to distinguish each enjoyable occurence and link to a particular trail .
I am writing these entirely from memory - I kept no diary and made no notes besides a piece of paper in an old wallet with the trail name and approximate date I walked .

Most of my pictures are on slides which I must view individually and have scanned , so there is a lot of work to do before I post Part 2 ...

This is too good to miss, so we will wait patiently

Ndloti,
The longer it takes to prepare
the better the reading will be

Ndloti, limited writing skills, I dont think so

The pictures will make it even more enjoyable, but hearing about the experience is already exciting