Karkloof Country Club

Karkloof Mountain Bike Trail – rated number one in SA.

Best suited for:

Beginner, Intermediate and Experienced riders.

What we love about it:

The flow. We have encountered passionate mountain bikers throughout South Africa (mainly in the Western Cape, to be honest) who think their local trails are the ultimate flow. While this is great in terms of local support, it’s not true. Only those who have ridden these trails will understand trail flow’s real meaning – and feeling. And unless you have travelled to Karkloof and ridden those trails properly, you cannot make any claims like this without expecting to be corrected by anyone whose biking life the Karkloof trails have enhanced. Truly, Karkloof is SA’s best mountain biking trail.

What you can expect:

Karkloof is confirmation that you don’t need mountains for excellent mountain biking; you just need hills. And a trail-builder that knows how to stitch the ascents and descents together in a way that makes you feel like you’re eating your favourite ice cream and can’t wait to go back for more.

Hylton Turvey, a mountain biker that grew up in Karkloof, is the reason for the legendary flow on these trails. He understands the area better than anyone. While expanding his trail-building services to build courses in other parts of the country, his finest work remains at Karkloof, where he still lives.

Until recently, the Karkloof and Howick trails were run separately but next to each other. It’s all under one management now, which is good because Howick’s tracks also have character. There’s flow, but not Karkloof flow. There are more challenging sections, where rocks and roots force you to make quick decisions and offer more skilled riders stimulation.

The Karkloof trails comprise of two sections; the southern section, the most extensive section on Sappi-owned land, and a smaller northern area on Mondi-owned ground. Overall though, the Karkloof trails fall under Sappi as the responsible landowner. And this is great because Sappi is a big supporter of mountain biking in general and mountain biking on its land in particular.

There are no apparent fences between the Sappi and Mondi land at Karkloof. The trails on the Sappi land begin in glorious earnest almost from the trailhead itself at Karkloof Country Club. In contrast, the best of the courses on Mondi land requires a good bit of time and energy. Climbing to the highest ground towards the west before basically surfing your way back down some of the most fantastic singletracks you will ever experience – known as the Outback Trails because they head out and come back. Much of the land is for forestry, so many routes weave through forest singletrack or on forest roads. There are some open sections of grassland and some farmland too.

A new section of trails called the Milk Trails is on a local dairy farm in Denleigh. These trails are only open when the forest fire hazard is high, and the regular trails are closed.

The Karkloof Trails:

Although you can ride all day and not cover all the trails, there are seven marked routes at Karkloof Country Club catering for the majority of mountain bikers as follows:

3km – Beginner with 19m of ascent

15km – Intermediate with a high percentage of singletrack and 332m of ascent

20km – Beginner/Intermediate with a high percentage of forest roads and jeep track and 336m of ascent

23km – Intermediate with a high percentage of singletrack and 449m of ascent

37km – Intermediate/Experience with a high percentage of singletrack and 690m of ascent

55km – Experienced with a high percentage of singletrack and over 1000m of ascent.

The only events/races held at Karkloof each year are some KZN MTB Enduro Series rounds and the Sappi Karkloof Festival, which incorporates a variety of mountain biking disciplines over three days. It acts as a fundraiser for the Karkloof trails network.

Have you experienced Karkloof?

Please tell us what you think by leaving a review of your ride.