Orange Trail
4 km · Easy
The shortest loop on the reserve. A good warm-up, or a family outing without a real climb.
See the Orange Trail →The lay of the land
Hartbeespoort sits under the Magaliesberg, and most of the hiking worth doing here, ours included, climbs its slopes or follows the valleys beneath it. The trails are spread across private farms and reserves rather than one public park, so each has its own access, its own booking and its own gate.
Almost all of them need to be booked ahead rather than turned up to on the day, and gates tend to open early to beat the heat. At Vergenoeg that's 06:00 on weekends and public holidays, 07:30 on weekdays.
How the area compares
This follows AllTrails' own ranking of the best trails in Hartbeespoort. We know our own trail well. For the others we've stuck to what we can verify, and left the rest blank rather than guess.
| Trail | Distance | Difficulty | Known for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Vergenoeg Hiking Trail · Black Route That's us |
~10 km | Hard | Magaliesberg cliffline and Cape Vultures. Top-ranked trail in Hartbeespoort on AllTrails, 4.7 from 458 reviews. |
| B'sorah Trail | ~14.5 km | Moderate | The longest route with a confirmed distance on this list. |
| Harties River Hiking Trail | ~6, 8 or 10 km options | Not confirmed | Follows the Crocodile River. Needs to be booked ahead. |
| Van Gaalen Greek Church | Not confirmed | Not confirmed | Vergenoeg's neighbour, the Skeerpoort cheese farm. Shares the same valley trail network. |
AllTrails lists several other routes in the area that we have not walked ourselves, so we are not going to describe them: Iron Throne Purple Trail, De Wildt Adventure Trails, De Wildt Euphorbia, Aasvoelbad Hiking Trail, Nadia's Peak and Remhoogte. Their Hartbeespoort list is the place to compare them properly.
Distances and difficulty ratings are as published by AllTrails.
Our three routes
All three start and finish at the same trailhead in Skeerpoort. The reserve holds a 4.7 rating from 414 Google reviews.
4 km · Easy
The shortest loop on the reserve. A good warm-up, or a family outing without a real climb.
See the Orange Trail →5 km · Moderate · 360 m climb
A real climb without committing to the whole mountain. Moderate grading, genuine elevation gain.
See the Red Trail →10 km · Advanced · 680 m climb
The trail AllTrails ranks first in Hartbeespoort, where it's graded hard. A real climb up onto the cliffline, rated 4.7 from 458 reviews there.
See Vulture's View →Before you go
Questions before you set out
For most trails in the area, yes, including all three of Vergenoeg's routes. Vergenoeg's gates open at 06:00 on weekends and public holidays and 07:30 on weekdays, both closing at 17:00.
Vergenoeg's 10 km route, Vulture's View, is rated hard on AllTrails, advanced on our own trail markers: about 10 km with 680 m of elevation gain up onto the Magaliesberg cliffline. It's the top-ranked trail in Hartbeespoort on AllTrails, rated 4.7 from 458 reviews.
Vergenoeg's Orange Trail is its own easiest route at 4 km with 80 m of climbing, graded easy. B'sorah Trail, one of the other well-known routes nearby, is graded moderate at about 14.5 km.
Yes. Dogs are welcome on Vergenoeg's trails for R20 per pet. Policies vary elsewhere in the area, so check with each venue before you arrive with one.
At the reserve's trailhead in Skeerpoort, North West province, on the Magaliesberg above the Skeerpoort valley and a short drive from Hartbeespoort.
Hiking near Hartbeespoort