The title refers to the road coming through Witsieshoek, now Phuthaditjhaba, in the Free State, going up to the Sentinel car park. It is a strange road. Was it constructed just to give us hikers better access to the top of the Tugela Falls and Mount-Aux-Sources? Very unlikely.
Mount-Aux-Sources map (Barrier of Spears)
The road this article is about is shown on the map, roughly in the middle going past Basuto Gate and finishing at the Witches.
The first piece of road, the road to Witsieshoek towards the Drakensberg, was constructed in 1928. This was partially to pick up on the traffic over the Namahadi Pass to and from Basutoland, as it was called then. The path only allows for foot and animal traffic. The importance of this pass can be seen by the fact that a police post was built near the top, on the South African side, the picture from my archives shows the ruin how it looked in 1994.
Namahadi Police Post (Horst Müller)
And the remnants of the building still serve a purpose, giving shelter from the cold winds that blow over the plateau in winter.
[[{"fid":"8930","view_mode":"media_adaptive","fields":{"format":"media_adaptive","field_file_image_alt_text[und][0][value]":false,"field_file_image_title_text[und][0][value]":"Namahadi police post tent -...
