Kowyns Pass Traditional Cache
surreptitious007: This location is now available for someone else who would like to use it.
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Difficulty:
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Terrain:
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Size: 
(small)
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Kowyns Pass is on the R533, between Graskop and Bushbuckridge. The current pass (the third attempt to follow the same route) has a gradient of one in fourteen and was completed in October 1959. It is named after a local Sotho chief, Koveni who controlled the land along this track.
By the 1890's, the need for a more effective route from Delagoa Bay (present day Maputo) to Pilgrims Rest was becoming an urgent matter.
Nearly every mountain pass in South Africa follows the line of an earlier game trail, and Kowyns Pass was no exception. Almost single handedly, Max Carl Gustav Leibnitz, improved the existing animal track along the escarpment into the first 'Kowyns Pass'. The pass starts outside Graskop at an altitude of 1450m and winds down into Bushbuckridge which is 500m lower. It had a gradient of one in three in some places. The ascent was a 2 to 3 day grind of sweat, hard work and foul language. The heavier wagons required three spans of oxen to get up the steeper sections of the pass. Going down the pass was no game either because huge branches had to be attached to the wagon to assist with braking.
At the top of the pass, Leibnitz built a tollgate and inn. He did not have a liquor license, but his business flourished and many humorous tales of this illicit drinking have become legend in the Lowveld.
Proceed from the parking area, up the dirt road to the communication towers. If you are in a 4x4, this is an 800m drive, if not; it is an 800m scenic walk.
Do not attempt to drive up this road in a non-4x4 vehicle!
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
Sbyybj gur cngu hagvy lbh trg gb n ynetr syng ebpx; ybbx haqre vg.