Road to Hell. The Swartberg Mountains, Garden Route

The road to Hell may be rocky, but its twists and turns, looping creamy white like a fancy ribbon, led me to something more akin to my idea of Heaven. I had waited a long time to descend into Die Hel and my procrastination only served to augment my ghostly expectations of this once inaccessible valley.

Now many visitors satiate their curiosity and take the plunge into the beckoning abyss between the towering Swartberg Mountains of South Africa's Western Cape. Flame-coloured rocks guide you into the narrow valley, while distant quartzite crags glint icily over the scene.

This kloof (valley), holds so many secrets that visitors now come in search of its lost existence. Bushmen paintings suggest that these hills and valleys once teamed with game animals, yet few were left when the white man ventured into this remote place in 1830.

Escape from Beautocratic Brits

The British forcibly occupied the Cape in 1806 and within twenty years the Afrikaner community loaded up their wagons and left British rules and regulations behind. They often searched for the most inaccessible locations and a most unlikely legend explains how some Afrikaner Boers (farmers) found Gamkaskloof valley, later known as Die Hel (The Hell).

A young white boy Danie Hartman, was supposedly kidnapped by the Khoikhoi bushmen and hidden away in a remote valley. Upon his escape he told stories about this remarkable secret place, so inaccessible that even a horse could not reach it. The sound of such peace and isolation was so appealing that families moved into this remote area and cultivated the land.

A more likely explanation is that Boer cattle strayed off and were tracked into a narrow river valley just 20 km long and 600 m wide. They realised that by moving here they could easily shut out the world and the English, and this they did for more than one hundred years.

Full of Refined Folk

Petrus Swanepoel was the first to settle in 1830 and six more families followed, until at its height there were 120 residents. A teacher who came to the valley for a couple of years described the people as 'refined folk' with a good standard of living.

Never shy of hard work, this little community became self sufficient with wheat and rye, nuts, peas, beans and vegetables. Their cattle and goats provided meat, milk and butter. Oranges, figs, apricots and grapes grew readily and wild honey was collected and made into beer and honeybush leaves made a fragrant tea. Life was sweet.