Drakensberg Escarpment

The magnificent Drakensberg escarpment forms the edge, at around 3,000m, of the high Lesotho plateau. Volcanic basalt was forced up some 180 million years ago, and spread to form a layer more than a kilometre thick over earlier sandstone. The eastern end has eroded into a line of tremendous cliffs over 200km long, which form the effective border between South Africa and Lesotho. Here you will gaze on famous and fantastical formations and long, grassy ridges and gorges descending into the plains some 1,800m (6,000ft) below.

The sandstone foothills the Little Berg are very special in their own right, a maze of canyons and grassy ridges. Their lush, flowery greenness for much of the year will surprise many travellers expecting sparse grass and dry rock.

The scale here is deceptive: you have to concentrate to appreciate the vastness of the cliffs drops of 1,000 metres are not unusual. You can sometimes feel you are looking down at the gorges of the Little Berg through the wrong end of a telescope.

Behind the escarpment is a broken, treeless plateau of rough grass and low alpine shrubs which is reminiscent of Scotland or parts of Mongolia almost anywhere, in fact, other than Africa. Meeting the sudden jagged edge of the escarpment as you tramp across this beautiful but seemingly regular landscape never ceases to amaze.

Lesotho is a small, dirt poor kingdom trapped within South Africa. Here on the high plateau, you may meet Sotho herdsmen living in rough little kraals in summer.

Drakensberg means Dragon's Mountains in Afrikaans; they are the Barrier of Spears to the Zulus, whose kraals are scattered up the valleys of the Lower Berg, their herds grazing on the lower slopes.

Much of the walking above the escarpment crosses rough ground, sometimes on tenuous animal trails. That said, much of it is easier going than you might fear.The walking opportunities are endless and hugely varied. As well as the great high walks along the top of the escarpment: