The first five Apostles
Jubilee Buttress
Location: On the Atlantic side starting from Theresa Avenue
OSM map. (Shows Porcupine and Diagonal but not the Jubilee path itself. Needs adding!)
Overview: Follows the Diagonal Route up to Porcupine Ravine and then traverses onto and up Jubilee Buttress. This traverse onto Jubilee Buttress is called the 'Travers-Jackson traverse'.
Alternative start: After the first step in Diagonal, cut sharp left into Blind Gulley. About two thirds of the way up Blind Gulley when one reaches a clump of large trees, look for a cairn and go up a steep diagonal ascent (faint path) to the rockband. Follow the rockband around until Porcupine Buttress is reached at a point slightly below the traverse. Avoids the eroded Diagonal path and is more interesting.
Route Description:
From Theresa Avenue up to the pipe track and go north towards Kloof Nek for 500m. Take the Diagonal path (signposted). Follow the path up through the first rockband, then traverse at 480m level around Porcupine Buttress into Porcupine Ravine. Ascend Porcupine Ravine, passing where Diagonal turns off at 740m elevation and continue up to 840m. Slightly lower and out to the left is a pleasant platform with good views that makes a good tea spot. The photograph of the traverse is taken from that platform. (One can continue up Porcupine Ravine to the top as well.) Traverse to the right around Jubilee Buttress at 840m level for about 200m ascending slightly as one rounds the buttress - see picture on the right. The path is faint but discernible and there are cairns. When one can traverse no further, ascend a 3m Grade 3 step up a chimney or open book (variety of routes possible) and then continue up the ridge on easy ground.
There is no path on this section but going is easy on broken ground. The flat ridge has a knife edge offering good views and an interesting perspective of the Back Table dams. Continue along the ridge bearing slightly left to meet up with the path that comes up Porcupine Ravine. Continue on that for 300m to meet the main Apostles path.
(Nolan Moss commented as follows: After you have completed the traverse from Porcupine Ravine around Jubilee Buttress and ended up on the ridge on top, the 'path' eventually splits. The left fork ends up in Ark Valley and the end of the Porcupine Ravine route, as detailed in the description. But the right fork is a direct path that ends up at the sign post at the top of the Diagonal Route. This is a short cut to avoid the Valley of Isolation + Valley of the Red Gods. It's sandy and eroded and invisible from the bottom. Right at the bottom the path is out of sight behind some large boulders.)
Descent:
Variety of routes possible. Quickest is down through the Valley of Isolation to the Valley of the Red Gods and down Diagonal Route, or continue 350m further to Kasteels Poort.
