Six friends aim to climb total height of 22 401m
Five ex-Springs Boys High Schools friends, and one other friend, have accepted the challenge initiated by Morehill, Benoni resident Burns Maclear (67), of climbing the nine highest peaks in nine provinces.
The challenge to dare the nine peaks is in aid of the Northfield Methodist Church.
The six of them have been friends for in excess of 45 years.
After their Mount Kilimanjaro adventure in October 2012, they chose to rest a while.
But the resting period was getting a bit too long for Burns.
He came up with the idea after reading an article on Mandy Ramsden, the first African woman to have climbed the highest peaks on each continent.
As they always do things together, Burns approached his friends with the idea and they all agreed.
Meeting at Springs Boys’ High School (SBHS) on Wednesday (October 29), they realised their Kilimanjaro expedition was exactly two years ago.
Five of the friends attended SBHS and were also members of the Springs Old Boys Club.
“In fact,” says Burns, “Koos Bouwer (65), Fred Ashton (72) and I attended Strubenvale Primary School together.”
Their target of R300 000 for the church will hopefully also be reached by then.
“The congregation has been asked to pledge a minimum of one cent for each meter they climb,” says Brian Smith, senior minister of the church.
During their expedition the climbers will travel a mammoth 10 000km in total.
“This is just to get to the town nearest to the mountain we will climb,” says Burns.
The first peak they climbed was Nootgedacht West in the North West.
Burns, Koos, Fred, Trevor Long (72), Dave Inggs (65) and Rob Beardsley (66) completed the climb of 1 806m in just over five hours.
Their second peak is Toringkop in Suikerbosrand 1 913m which they will attempt on Saturday.
Burns is a throat cancer survivor, and says he will take a banner on each climb with the words “Cancer can be Beaten” written on it.
The order of the rest of the peaks they will climb and their summit heights are:
- November 15 – Iron Crown in Limpopo 2.126m.
- December 6 – Die Berg in Mpumalanga 2 331m.
- January 15 to 18 – Murch Point in the Northen Cape 2 156m.
- February 19 to 23 – Seweweekspoort in the Western Cape 2 325m.
- March 19 to 23 – KwaDuma in the Eastern Cape 3 019m.
- April 17 to 20 – Namahadi in the Free State 3 275m.
- May 14 to 18 – Mafadi in KwaZulu-Natal.
The group will have climbed a total height of 22 401m at the end of their journey next year.
Burns says it is twice the height of Mount Everest and 3.8 times the height of Kilimanjaro.
“Come rain, snow or sunshine, we will complete reach out target, depending on our health,” says Burns.
