The Karoo to the Clouds Expedition
This is a demanding 17-day journey engineered to conquer the highest public unpaved roads and alpine passes in Southern Africa.
Starting and ending in Cape Town, this route cuts a vast, continuous loop across the arid expanses of the Great Karoo, climbs into the remote volcanic heights of the Eastern Cape Highlands, and scales the iconic Drakensberg escarpment into the landlocked Mountain Kingdom of Lesotho. This expedition is custom-built for adventure riders seeking technical topography, thin mountain air, and raw backcountry navigation.
Tour Highlights
Sani Pass Ascent: Complete the iconic gravel climb up the sheer cliffs of the Drakensberg escarpment into Lesotho.
Swartberg Pass: Cross Thomas Bain’s unpaved engineering masterpiece, framed by towering red sandstone formations and tight switchbacks.
Naude’s Nek Pass: Ride the loose-rock switchbacks of South Africa’s highest unpaved pass, peaking over 2,500 metres.
Ouberg Pass: Scale a steep, rugged gravel escarpment wall, climbing onto the high Roggeveld plateau.
The Maluti Mountains & Katse Dam: Navigate breathtaking high-altitude ridge tracks and winding alpine tarmac loops surrounding Africa's second-largest reservoir.
The R355 Corridor: Tackle the longest continuous stretch of unpaved road in South Africa through the heart of the Tankwa Karoo.
Seweweekspoort: Ride a smooth, water-crossed gravel floor slicing directly through a vertical shale mountain gorge.
The Eastern Cape Highlands: Navigate the remote dirt tracks linking the preserved Victorian alpine outpost of Rhodes Village.
Route
The loop kicks off from Cape Town, clearing the coastal mountain folds to access the unpaved expanse of the R355 across the arid Tankwa Karoo. We tackle the steep, low-speed-throttle challenges of Ouberg Pass to reach the high Roggeveld plateau. From here, we split the deep interior transit into manageable unpaved stages, tracking east across the vast Karoo plains via Fraserburg, Loxton, and Beaufort West before dropping onto quiet backcountry tracks flanking the Sneeuberg Mountains.
Heading into the Southern Drakensberg, we chart a course through the rugged, unpaved tracks of Cradock and Barkly East to reach Rhodes Village. We scale Naude’s Nek Pass, negotiating loose-rock hairpins and steep alpine gradients before dropping down through Maclear and Matatiele. The route then tracks parallel to the southern Drakensberg range to reach the absolute base of the escarpment.
We confront the iconic Sani Pass, maintaining constant momentum through the final steep, rocky switchbacks to the summit at 2,874 metres. Once inside Lesotho, we navigate the spectacular, high-altitude loops connecting Mokhotlong, Thaba-Tseka, and Katse Dam. This sector delivers a world-class mix of rugged double-track and winding alpine asphalt tracking parallel to remote mountain rivers before we exit the central highlands back into the South African interior.
Our southern transit points the fleet back toward the Cape Peninsula via the sweeping unpaved highways of Zastron and the Gariep Dam corridor. We cross into the Great Karoo, refuelling at Colesberg before dropping into Prince Albert to tackle our final mountain assaults. We cross the spectacular unpaved switchbacks of Swartberg Pass, carve through the towering vertical shale walls of Seweweekspoort, and link the scenic tar sweeps of Montagu and Franschhoek Pass to roll cleanly back into Cape Town.