Look up! Is it a bird? A plane? No, it’s new ziplines at Golden Gate Highlands National Park

Why go to a national park merely to spot wildlife and soak up nature’s hush when you can strap in, step off a platform and slice through the Maluti Mountains like a soaring eagle with a safety harness?

That’s exactly what the South African National Parks (SANParks) is offering with the launch of Free State’s Golden Gate Highlands National Park’s seven ziplines, which take about an hour to complete.

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The Maluti Mountains rose in cold, commanding layers beneath a pale winter sky, their towering hills still capped with the frosty aftermath of last week’s cold front that swept across South Africa.

The air felt sharper, the sandstone cliffs more dramatic and the landscape almost too vast to take in from the ground.

The Maluti Mountains at the Golden Gate Highlands National Park.  Picture: Supplied/SANParks

That changed at the zipline’s take-off platform.

With the sun warm against my skin, the guide instructed me to sit, and for a split second it felt as though there was nothing between me and the valley floor but cold air and an unhelpful imagination. Perched at the edge, suspended somewhere between sky and earth, the thought of falling arrived before reason had time to catch up.

Then the harness caught.

The cable, Golden Gate Zipline owner Mika Lutchman said, was designed to blend into the surroundings without intruding on the park’s natural scenery. It did exactly that: almost invisible against the mountains until it became the thin, firm line carrying me into the landscape.

My heart beat faster. My stomach dropped. Then came the push.

Wind slapped against my face hard enough to pull tears from my eyes, but the adrenaline forced a laugh out of me as I flew 650 metres, the longest cable out of the seven, over the mountains, past emerald-green pools and the dam below.

With my hands thrown into the air, I forgot the small but important matter of braking – prompting the emergency block to be activated as I came racing towards the end of the line like a Formula 1 driver taking the chequered flag.

SANParks launched the seven ziplines at the Golden Gate Highlands National Park. Picture: Supplied/SANParks

I stopped about a metre short of the platform. The guide calmly clipped himself onto the line, slid out to fetch me and brought me in asking warmly why I didn’t use the pre-zipline training of braking at their signal – a reminder that while a rider may feel like the main character, the guides are quietly managing every detail behind the scenes.

I understand that for most visitors, the biggest obstacle is not the mountain. It is the conversation happening in their own heads: “Will I cope? What if I fall? What if I do not brake? What if I get stuck?”

Adrenaline junkies may arrive bouncing with confidence, but others wear their fear more carefully.

Golden Gate’s guides appear to read that hesitation almost immediately, adding their reassurance without making a spectacle of anyone’s nerves. Their steady presence allows visitors to stop thinking about safety and start paying attention to what is around them.

A Golden Gate Zipline guide straps in Bongumsa Gwiji, a communications practitioner at SANParks. Picture: Supplied/SANParks

They also allow the scenery to remain the star of the show.

Suspended high above the hills, details that would disappear on a hiking trail suddenly come into focus: the enormous scale of the mountains, the feeling of being swallowed by their folds, and the calls of birds cutting through the wind.

SANParks launched the seven ziplines at the Golden Gate Highlands National Park.  Picture: Supplied/SANParks SANParks launched the seven ziplines at the Golden Gate Highlands National Park.  Picture: Supplied/SANParks SANParks launched the seven ziplines at the Golden Gate Highlands National Park.  Picture: Supplied/SANParks

It is a different way of seeing a park that remains less known than some of SANParks’ headline destinations.

The new zipline adds another layer to the park, where visitors can already hike, ride horses, go quad-biking and explore the Kgodumodumo Dinosaur Interpretation Centre.

SANParks managing executive for tourism development and marketing Kaula Nyilenda-Mphaphuli said the attraction forms part of a wider push to position Golden Gate as an adventure tourism destination, alongside its cultural and natural heritage offerings.

Golden Gate is not a one-trick pony. It is a place for travellers who want their heritage with a side of height, their hiking with a dose of speed and their mountain views delivered at full throttle.

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