Authors note: This is definitely soft core erotica. More story than sex.
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We stop at the rusted loop of wire which was all that remained of a billy can, which by urban legend had been hung there by one of the hikers who opened up the route we are on. Returning from his last hike before going to war he hung his new billy can on a large King Protea that marked the halfway point to Eel Cave where they normally made camp before going exploring. He said he would collect it when he returned. Save the weight he said. But he was lost, missing in action, his body never found. After much discussion his friends agreed that the billy can was left hanging there as memorial to him. He was reputed have brought good weather on hikes and the legend evolved that if you spat into the billy can you were assured of good weather.
When I first saw it was still vaguely recognisable as a billy can, but time and rust had eaten away at the metal of the billy and now there are just some rusting wires that represent the handle and the top rim. It still marks the half way point across the flat ridge known as "The Plateau" and is a good place to stop and stare at the Strydomsberg towering over the surrounding kloofs and ridges.
I spit at the billy, more out of habit than out of belief that I would get anywhere near and, as usual I miss by a wide margin. George, one of my hiking buddies laughs at me and then spits neatly and accurately through both loops.
"It's easy. You must just relax."
I mutter darkly and glance up at the peak ahead. "Lets get going, I want a swim before the sun sets."
"You are obsessed by that pool, Brian. It is just a hole in the ground with some water in it."
"Peasant. It is the only pool in the entire world, the entire universe that has emerald coloured water in it and that I cannot reach the deepest part of."
"Can't take the cold. Weakling."
We grin at each other and turned to Gene the third of our hiking triumvirate.
"Well? You gonna spit or you gonna condemn us to awful weather for the rest of the weekend?" George asks, "He cannot do it, so you need to make a contribution."
"Doesn't work." Gene mutters. "Peasant superstition."
Gene is the monosyllabic member. George and I provide the noise, Gene? Well he is just sort of, uhm. Gene. Monosyllabic, completely indestructible. A tractor and a total hiking natural.
Laughing we turn and walk toward the beckoning mountain another hours walk away. As we walk across the plateau, I recount the story of my hangover I got from trying to keep up glass for glass of malt whiskey with Tim a friend of my father. He is a tiny Irishman who, my father swears is more leprechaun than human. Bushy beard, red face and sparkling blue eyes. He appeared out of the blue one evening when my parents were out, quizzed me about hiking and listened intently to my description of Chasers Kloof and how I intended going up there soon. It was his suggestion that two weeks hence would be full moon and it would be a perfect time to visit. By the end of the evening I was horribly drunk so before I staggered off to bed he fed me some vile stuff he said would cure my hangover and make me "see right". It didn't work. If anything it made me feel worse and gave me terrible nightmares that faded before I could tie them down when I woke.
Tim's last words to me were: "You be careful up there boyo, bad things happen if you are foolish."
George and Gene hoot with irreverent laughter and we move on to other topics until the rhythm of our walking lulls us into silence.
Soon I find myself looking 300 m down into Chasers Kloof, the river visible in patches and faintly audible in the almost absolute silence. Without a word, Gene steps forward, lowers himself onto one foot, kicks the other out in front of him as a guide and pushes off down into the dry water course comprised of sand, stone and dust. This is one of the highlights of the hike. The water course is about 15 degrees off vertical so you have to lean back to prevent yourself from tumbling head over heels down the side of the kloof. The slide goes about three quarters down the slope and ends at the top of an old avalanche. Just before the avalanche, trees stand on either side of the river course providing the only braking method along the whole distance. The idea is to grab onto both trees and let your feet shoot out in front of you, then let yourself slide down slowly onto the top of the avalanche and walk down to the river and the camp site. It is incredibly exhilarating and, if truth be told dangerous, but we ignore the danger because we consider ourselves immortal.
Dusty and laughing we dump our hiking bags, establish the camp site with speed born of repetition and then we split up as always. Gene disappears down stream to commune with nature or whatever he does when we first reach the river, George lies down, feet resting on an old tree trunk, covers his eyes with his hat and is almost immediately asleep. I turn and go upstream to the pool.
George is of course right. I am obsessed with the pool but for very good reason. I am a strong swimmer, competitive swimming from the age of 9 and now racing for a lifesaving club and I am more at home in water than on land. On land I stumble, I trip and quite often fall, but put me in water and I change into a fast moving, lithe confident creature. Deep diving is fun, body surfing, snorkelling, anything to do with swimming is my joy. And of course water is the essence of my joy. Wild water, unchained, untreated, free to flow is wonderful stuff. The stuff that lurks sulkily in swimming pools carrying ear and nose infections is ugly stuff. I love free water and Emerald pool is my idea of heaven and to make it even more alluring, I cannot reach the bottom at the deepest part of the pool. I can see it but I cannot reach it. 15 m is not deep, but the cold, the unearthly colour of the water, its taste, its softness combine to defeat every attempt I make to get to the bottom.
The pool lies in a round hole in the mountain. It looks as if someone gouged a circular chunk out of the mountain and let water into it. High cliffs surround three sides with a sloping waterfall in the middle of the arc and the cliffs are covered in tree ferns, sword ferns and moss. A small water fall drains water from the pool on the shallow side which is where I am now standing. The reason that the pool is called Emerald pool is that viewed from any side, the water is an emerald green caused by the local East Cape flora. The deeper the water is, the more intense the green becomes. The water rippling around my toes is almost yellow. The pool is best viewed by standing on top of the waterfall which is above the deepest part of the pool. It is here that the utter beauty of the pool can best be appreciated. We don't approach that way because of the difficulty of getting past the pool and to our camp site below the pool.
The camp site gives us easy access to the narrow kloof that runs 10 km down and ending up in Groendal Dam. In that 10 km meander there are jumps and slides. At times the sky disappears as the cliff faces of the kloof close up over our heads. It is an awesome kloofing spot and not fully explored yet. We are doing that, not for any other reason than it is a challenge, it is fun, dangerous and we, of course are immortal.
I sit with my toes in the water, drowsing in the sun, psyching myself up for another attempt on the deep dive. I wont do it without back up, but I am content to sit and stare at the pool, my soul at rest.
I am far away so when a voice says: "Its really beautiful isn't it?"
I jump up, spin around and, being the complete bumbling idiot that I am on solid ground fall flat on my face.
A peel of female laughter echoes off the cliffs.
"You, young man will go very far. Falling at my feet like that."
I find myself staring up at a woman in her early twenties, hair that is raven black, deep violet blue eyes that sparkle with intelligence and a figure that I have dreamt of in my wildest dreams, but never met.
I manage to haul myself to my feet, smile as brightly as I can, keep my eyes on her face rather than her breasts that are obviously not covered by more than a light tee shirt and then turn to look at the pool.
"It is more than beautiful. It is..." Words fail me, I shake my head, hold my hands out, and find myself blushing slightly.
"The most beautiful pool in the world?" she finishes for me.
She stares at me for a long while then looks back at the pool.
"Pity we cannot get on top of the waterfall, it must be very beautiful from up there."
"You can climb up there. You use the crack along the left hand side of the pool. Look you can see where the tree ferns stick out of the crack." I lean over her shoulder, place my hand on her back, point out the path and breath in her musky perfume.
She looks dubiously at the row of ferns while I bask in erotic dreams.
