Tag Archives: jonkershoek

Caperoutes – a project from another decade

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The Caperoutes concept was born as my second attempt in rock climbing route guides. It almost came to fruition 9 years ago. Life intervened and this project got shelved into the dusty archives of my external hard drive. I wanted to produce something new, unique and beautiful to look at. Caperoute’s aim was to provide accurate route information to facilitate your adventure. The mountains have not moved in the interim.

What inspired Caperoutes?

I love Dave Cheesemond’s Classic 50 Routes. This was and in many ways still can be a “to do” list of routes. My initial thoughts was to modernise this and make Caperoutes into the ultimate bucket list.

Why am I publishing this now?

I have put a ton of work into producing these mini guides. The Caperoutes guide as a whole is not complete but in its parts as mini guides to individual areas they make sense. Each mini guide hopefully gives the best routes in that area across various grades. This info has been sitting in a folder on my computer for too long. There is much fun adventure out there to be had. Hopefully these topos can help you find some of that for yourself.

Are they accurate?

As accurate as any guide out there. Yes there are mistakes as I discovered with The Ledge. There always will be and that makes for good stories around the gas stove.

Will they be published in a book?

Not by me (unless I get paid a whole bunch of money to make this worthwhile 😉 )

Why am I doing this now since I have not climbed in close to a decade?

I am not wanting to tread on anybody’s toes. There are fantastic route guides out there in print. Please support them. However there is also a huge gap. This project hopefully can complement what is out there.

So I trust the info is still relevant. Use it, share it, don’t use it. Whatever.

A picture is worth a thousand words:

Topos are the way forward! They are much easier to understand for locals and international visitors. The combination of photographs and sketched topos offer you the perfect amount of info without taking away from the experience.

I had big visions for this project but became overwhelmed by the enormity of it all. Several people inspired me along the way. Stefan, Tristan, Justin, Riki, the forgotten German. Thanks for supporting me when you did.

All material is original and I would really appreciate if you respect my copyright on it.

Here is the list of mini guides for you to download. Enjoy and leave a comment if you want.

Caperoute Symbols

Caperoute Tafelberg

Caperoutes Castle Rocks

Caperoutes Jonkershoek

Caperoutes Apostles

Caperoutes Krakadouw

Caperoutes Maltese Cross

Caperoutes Wolfberg

Caperoutes Yellowood Amphitheater

 

Caveman skills clinic

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Conrad-Stoltz-Caveman-Skills-Clinic-Jonkershoek-Stellenbosch-March-1415-I spotted a tweet, almost by chance, for a skills clinic being offered by none other than Conrad himself. My mountain bike signed us up as he feels he is as good as Conrad’s bike ( both are red, black and white – mostly). Who was I to object?

We checked tyre pressure and set up before heading out. It became immediately apparent the passion that Conrad has for riding. Liezel was a superb wing woman who bandaged bloody knees, fetched pumps, arranged drinks and snacks and took the odd action pic. All I between shouting encouragement to us (not the Caveman)

After practicing on some level ground we attempted a short single track section, hand built Caveman style. A few laps later we all felt pretty good about our selves. Only to see the master descend and realise that we had at least 10 000 more hours to go!

We headed to some more single track and I tried to implement the lessons. “Attack Position” is all I thought while my body still followed old bad habits.

Yesterday, a week later I headed to Tokai to practice or as Conrad calls it “play”. I am reading Brian Lopez’s book and feel like I have only touched the surface.

I look forward to practicing more and seeing improvements. I am so psyched to improve my riding and my time at Grabouw next year. However I feel I have the tools to improve. Now it is just down to LOADS of hard work getting these skills dialled into the body.

I truly hope that Team Stoltz continue and expand on these courses and clinics going forward. I think they should be mandatory for any mountain biker. 

I wish Conrad and Liezel all the best in polishing this product as I think there is a real future for their offering and in so part with the knowledge to help improve so many of us. We as a mountain bike community need the older guys (sorry more experienced) to share their knowledge. This will build the new generation!

Slab Route B Rifberg Jonkershoek

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Head onto the Contour Path from the gate side (I climbed up from the White Bridge but this looses too much altitude). You will see the obvious orange overhanging wall to the right of the grassy slabs. head onto the ridge leading up to this. A vague path can be found on the crest. ascend up to the base of the rock. There is a larger tree and bivy spot just above a waterfall which is dry in late summer. traverse left on a grassy ledge onto easy scramble terrain. scramble for about 100m picking the easiest line. You will reach a narrow ridge which looks down into the gully to the left.
A huge grass slope stretches up from here. Follow this all the way to past where is bends to the right and to the summit ridge.

I traversed to the summit and towards Bergrivier Nek from here.

looking down grass gully
view across to the Pieke
looking across to Table Mountain
looking across at the rest of the Peninsula