Mpumalanga, the province, means “East” and literally “The Place Where the Sun Rises” in the Sesotho language. In October, two South Africans walked the longest highline ever rigged on the continent. Cary Small and Leighton Calder walked across the 1200m highline without falling, setting a new South African record.
Read on to discover how they got the line across.
Featured and below photo by Alaister Russell
Waterval Boven, A Place for Adventure
Renown for its world-class sport climbing routes on bulletproof red sandstone rockfaces, Emgwenya (formally Waterval Boven) is also home to the Mayhem Mountain Festival which takes place at the Mayhem Mountain Adventures campsite 10km up the road from town.
During the past 7 years, a highlining community has grown from strength to strength in this northern pocket of South Africa, fed by the Gauteng slackline community and the Friends and Allies climbing gym. The campground hosts easily accessible and bolted highline anchors which proved to be the perfect setting for a big project.
Access by Foot and Four Wheels
Through relationship building and efforts of the community and property owners our project was granted access to the neighbouring farm. Getting to the far-side anchors with a 4×4 proved invaluable in transporting the gear and highliners. Forgoing the 45-minute drive (18km) would mean navigating two steep kloofs without paths.
Located near ‘the library’ climbing crag, the tension-side anchor was accessed by vehicles too. Conveniently, it is only a 10-minute walk on foot from the campsite. Considering the two cars full of webbing, it would have taken more than 10 hungry highliners to carry the webbing to the anchor.
Weather Window
Arriving on Friday the 17th with a weekend of rain predicted our weather window for the project looked like four to five days over the following week. As gear arrived on site, we set about preparing 1400 meters of webbing by taping and flaking it into bags while sounds of thunder rang out around us.
With intermittent rain falling, we waited in position for a clearing in the sky to tag the gap across the valley. Thankfully, the weather remained pleasant until the following Monday when the empty campsite received a torrential downpour.
Tagging the Gap
Leighton managed to fly his DJI Mavic drone with a DIY releasing mechanism from a hill in the valley up to the tension side anchor. Due to vision obscured by fog, warning signals on the screen, and the drone performing 360 degree turns, he decided to prematurely release the tag line. Fortunately, they retrieved the HMPE fishing line to make a successful second attempt.
Reaching the far side with a third flight proved challenging, with low battery levels resulting in a crash landing into a tree. Cary managed to reach and retrieve the drone and tagline to connect the line, bridging the gap with 3 and 4mm polyester tagline.
Who’s Line Is It Anyway?
Cary invited his friends from the USA: Alexandra, Danny, David, Natalie and his partner from Canada, Audrey to visit South Africa for a whirl-wind adventure across three provinces. The group brought with them expertise alongside high-tech gear. This contributed greatly to the South African’s 350 meters of high-tech webbing in the mainline.
Gustav Van Rensburg, a mountain guide who runs Roc’ n Rope Adventures in Boven, lent 900 meters of 6mm HMPE rope for our curtain system, and 400 meters of 11mm static rope to be on hand for our rescue system. Leighton couriered gear and travelled up from Cape Town with webbing and HMPE to help make the line possible too.
Training for the Big Line
The 180-meter long highline, New Age Jurassic Park, remained rigged from August and provided a challenging walk on which we could train. We rigged Leightons paradigm freestyle rig with the near side anchor of Noodle in the mist (50m) and the far side anchor of James’ Line (65m) using bungees on each anchor.
This brought excitement from members of the Johannesburg crew who experienced this amplified bounce for the first time. Swart built his bounces, sofa, sofa roll, and chest roll. Carmen grew her confidence bouncing in a seated position.
Tensions Reached
Six people helped to pull the curtain line to 3KN of tension using a 3:1 mechanical advantage system (expecting some advantage lost through the Clutch). The slippery nature of the HMPE rope required two sets of equalised Blakes’ hitches for tensioning in front of a munter hitch on a steel carabiner as a manual progress capture.
Curtain Detached and Line Walked
While letting out the webbing through a Rock Exotica Kootenay, we connected it to the curtain in 10 points spaced out around 120 meters. These connections consisted of ‘HangOver’ ‘Rollex’ and ‘BC Rollers‘ rolling along the HMPE line, connected with a 3-4-meter-long accessory chord to a carabiner attached to the backup webbing.
With the webbing spanned across the gap, we were able to remove a 50m section of Great White and attach the sewn loop of the Y2K to the soft release on the static side. Helping to remove the stretchiest webbing from the rig (6% at 10kN).
We moved the dynamometer across to the highline anchor and tensioned the line to 4kN before confirming that both side’s anchors looked good. Wes then set off on a marathon roll across the line to detach the curtain and collect the rollers.
We tensioned to 6kN before Leighton tied in and set off on a beautifully stable walk across the line, unfortunately falling in the last segment of webbing. Swart then made his way across the line with the challenge of staring into the setting sun. He got off with the tension at 3.5kN (likely due to new webbing stretching).
With the light fading and the stars appearing, I was able to walk out 100 meters to take a few steps past the Y2K and experience the feeling of the narrow spider silk beneath my feet.
Crossing the Big Line
The visiting highliners graciously scheduled the South African’s keen on crossing the line to go first. I was fortunate to bag the ‘sunrise’ session, rising at 4:30am beneath the stars to start walking the line at first light. The LineScale read 3kN and increased by 0.3 with me on.
It felt surreal to step into the huge valley with what felt like an endless line before me. The sections of webbing disappeared with little to no effect on the proximity of the horizon. Each fall brought with it a relief to my shoulders, but a sense of urgency remained. This was not the place to ‘hang out.’
Reaching the last 120 meters of the line, I felt elated and communicated with Tim to get ready and roll out onto the line. A special moment occurred as his weight on the webbing lifted me slowly into the air, making the last steps to the anchor less inclined.
Tim made great progress with some long walks and a handful of catches and falls, crossing the line in an hour and a half. We looked back on the valley and waited in anticipation for Luca to arrive. He walked with progressively more wind, deciding to roll across the remainder of the line. During this time, Anj was able to experience the mammoth line with a walk and some whips.
The wind continued to pick up during Sean’s crossing, making it slow going. He showed determination, walking to the end in two hours despite taking many whips.
Into the Record Books
We were collected on the far side by Cary, who started his walk across the gap. He fought beautifully in the last segments, standing on one leg for breath-taking moments of disbelief to walk across with no falls on his first attempt.
The following day, Leighton set off at a brisk pace, crossing the line in under an hour with a fall. He rested on the far side before walking back towards us with a noticeably different attitude. Taking time to stand in exposure, shake his arms out, and walk at a slower pace. In the last segment, he moved with intention, bringing it all the way home!
It was a beautiful moment to share on the tension side anchor in the dying light.
New Perspectives
The visiting highliners added a welcomed energy to the project. Gracefully waiting for the local highliners to experience this unique line before attempting to cross it themselves. It is this admirable gesture and their beautiful energy on and off the line that secured their position in our hearts.
Over the 5 days the line was rigged, 20 people of varying abilities were able to experience rolling out or taking steps on it. Helping to elevate the South African highline community by making us believe in our ability to rig and walk a 1-kilometer highline which was previously unthinkable.
This achievement is a testament to Audrey and Danny’s commitment to planning and orchestrating the schedule for people to cross the line each day to ensure efficient sessions. While still remaining flexible and fitting in last minute requests to roll out on both anchors even while the curtain was being clipped.
Pulling and Flaking
The derig commenced late on Saturday morning and was complete within 7 hours. We had 9 people pulling webbing, rope, and lastly tagline on the tension side. Many hands made light work of the countless meters of material that needed to be flaked into bags.
Unwinding in the Evenings
Each evening, we experienced a beautiful cacophony of stories and laughter around the central fire. LED juggling balls flew in patterns through the air while paraffin-soaked poi spinning lit the campsite with excitement.
The farm’s endless supply of invasive wattle meant hot showers fueled by a donkey geyser, and hot coals to cook on. This primal element connected us in a way that we seldom experience in the city. It evoked a warmth within us.
Thank You to All Those Involved
A heartfelt thank you goes out to Camilla, Ruben, and Brady for hosting us. Thank you to the slackline community who lent a hand, added energy, and shared stoke for this project. In addition, thank you to Alaister, Cas, Chris, Danie, Dylan, Ernst, Gustav, James, Maia, Michelle, Mienke, Mike, Ruhan, Rikus and Sunnyboy for adding your energy and contribution to the project.
Thank you to David Blaszka for capturing many of the moments on camera.
Notable Achievements on the Line
Cary (onsight) and Leighton sent the line.
Alexandra crossed with one fall (She also endured a windswept session with 53 falls!).
Danny crossed the line blind-folded with one fall in the last segment.
Laurence crossed with 2 falls in the last 200-meters of his second crossing.
Sean crossed with 3 falls on his second crossing
Audrey, David, Tim, and Swart walked across the line.
Celine and Luca walked and rolled across the line.
Natalie had long walks on the line.
Sebastian, Zac, Rikus, Sabrina and Anj walked, took steps and whips on the line.
Chris, Michelle, Maia, Joe, and Carmen rolled out to experience the line.
Wes rolled across to detach the curtain and Swart rolled across to attach the curtain.
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