WHEN Rain O’Brien set out on a 28km hike through the Cobham wilderness area in the Drakensberg world heritage site over the long weekend, she may just have become the youngest person to complete the arduous task.
The plucky six-year-old Tecoma Pre-Primary School pupil carried her 3kg backpack and set out along with brother Reef (10) from St Raphaels School, their father Shane and four other experienced hikers.
Rain is possibly the youngest girl ever to traverse up into the mountains, walking for eight hours on Friday and overnighting in a spectacular cave. That night a spotted genet and a porcupine visited the cave while black-backed jackals sneered and called throughout the night close by along the ridges. The walk down was at times treacherous with steep paths back down the mountains on Saturday for another eight hours. “On the way back, Rain stood on a yellow belly grass snake and saw wild eland galloping along the plateau and we had a troop of chacma baboons barking at us on a couple of occasions as we passed through their rocky home,” said proud dad, Shane.
