Giant protea trees grow up on the ridge in the canyons on the way up to Sani Pass, shrouded in fog.
I added a bonus country to my world travel list today, one I was not expecting to add: The Kingdom of Lesotho! Lesotho is a small landlocked sovereign nation that is entirely surrounded by South Africa, and can only be accessed by traveling through South Africa first. There are several points of entry, but the only one from the west is over the precipitous and hair-raising Sani Pass that crosses the Drakensberg Mountains and enters the country at the summit at 2874 meters (9427 feet). This is the highest road-accessible place in southern Africa and a popular tourist destination known for its scenic sweeping views.
The Sani Pass road has no fewer than 15 switchbacks in less than a mile while gaining at least a thousand feet of elevation. You can’t see how steep and narrow this road is in the fog, although hopefully the hairpin turn and the faint vehicle in front of us give you some idea of that!
We left the Drakensberg Gardens Resort in a drizzling rain, having hired a tour company to do the 4WD driving for us, since our small 2WD rental cars were prohibited on the rough unpaved track. The colors of the fresh green grass resprouting after controlled burns and the tawny and russet colors of the unburnt sections were intensified by the wetness and the even lighting filtered through the fog, although views were greatly diminished as a result. Most surprisingly, at the top of the pass where the border lies, the sun suddenly broke through, revealing an ocean of clouds lapping against the sheer cliffs nearby. We stopped for lunch at the Sani Mountain Lodge, billed as the highest pub on the entire African continent. (I had the penne carbonara. Mmmm.)
Fog and drier air battle it out for local dominance at the edge of the earth. The border between the two countries is along the rim of this escarpment, with Lesotho being to the right in the sun and South Africa to the left under the clouds.
Look closely and you can see a fogbow in the middle of the picture.
After our dining experience, I spent some time taking photos of what looked like the edge of the world dropping away into a chasm of clouds. That was beautiful, but what was truly fascinating was the ongoing struggle between two different-temperature airmasses. The chilly foggy one rising up from below would be pushed back by the warmer drier one blowing to the west off of the high plateau that covers much of Lesotho. The temperature differential between these two air types was easily 15 degrees F or so, not to mention significant variances in humidity. Standing on the sandstone rim of the cliffs was rather like standing in a warm room with the refrigerator open in front of you – a mix of warm and cool air sloshing around, each battling for temporary dominance. I’ve never felt anything quite like it, at least not on a scale that large. The herds of grazing sheep only added to the oddness and beauty of the scene. 
Sheep cross the road in between Sani Pass and the Basotho village we went to in the next post. They’re not any smarter in South Africa than they are in the USA.
More sheep. There isn’t much other way to make a living up here other than to raise these and goats, which can convert the sparse high altitude grassland into products usable by humans.