Category: South Africa

After leaving De Hoop Nature Reserve, I headed south as far south as you can go on the continent of Africa to the southern tip at Cape Agulhas:

Cape Agulhas, also known as the “Cape of Needles”, is a rocky headland in thte Western Cape Province and it is the geographic southern tip of Africa and the beginning of the traditional dividing line between the Atlantic and Indian Oceans. It is approximately half a degree of latitude, or 34 miles, further south than the Cape of Good Hope near Cape Town. Here, the warm Agulhas Current flows south along the east coast of Africa and retroflects back into the Indian Ocean. While retroflecting, it pinches off large ocean eddies (called Agulhas rings) that drift into the South Atlantic Ocean and take enormous amounts of heat and salt into the neighboring ocean. This mechanism constitutes one of the key elements in the global conveyor belt circulation of heat and salt.

Here’s the monument at the southern tip depicting the traditional dividing line between the Indian and Atlantic Oceans. Of course, the waters of the two oceans don’t literally meet at this dividing line, but rather they mix along a broad zone extending outward from this point. Nonetheless, it is a pretty significant landmark from a global perspective.

As I am sure you realize, I generally don’t take selfies, but I couldn’t help myself standing at such a geographical phenomenon:

Historically, the cape has been known to sailors as a major hazard. The sea off Cape Agulhas is notorious for winter storms and mammoth rogue waves, which can range up to 100 feet high and can sink even large ships. Over the past few hundred years it is believed that around 150 ships have sunk around Agulhas. Here’s one old wreck to support this claim:

The weather was rather raunchy at the Cape, so I opted to move on farther down the coast towards Cape Town while waiting for the weather to change, and I found a campsite right on the coast with the Green Dragon literally 20 feet from the rocky shoreline, but utterly exposed. However, the rain ceased, the wind stopped blowing, and a pair of black oystercatchers were calling from the rocks nearby – a I fitting last campsite for this epic journey.

From here, it is on to Cape Town, where I will service the Green Dragon and get it prepared for storage. I will undoubtedly have time to explore the penninsula of Table Moutain National Park and the Cape of Good Hope, and visit with the African penguins, but these are all things I reported on last year at the beginning of my journey, so I will not repeat it in this year’s blog, except I have show you at least a couple of penguin shots:

If you are new to my travel blog this year and want to hear about Cape Town and surroundings, you can find these posts on the blog way back at the bottom of the list.

So, until my return next year, it’s goodbye to all you dedicated followers that have accompanied me on this year’s journey and are still reading this blog. We saw lots of wildlife, explored some exotic places (e.g., Zanzibar), drove some off-the-beaten path roads, visited some really stunning landscapes, went on some amazing hikes, and met lots of different people. I hope you learned a few things along the way and enjoyed the wildlife, landscapes and people as much as I did. As hopefully this travel journey demonstrated, life is truly an adventure worth taking, again and again! The journey continues next year if all goes as planned….

Just in case you were wondering, the bird species in the video slideshow of Robberg Nature Reserve and Wilderness National Park were the African black oystercatcher, knysna turaco, and cape grassbird.

After leaving Wilderness National Park, I continued along the coast to a somewhat remote and wild section of the Cape coast to De Hoop Nature Reserve:

To get there, I took the “road less traveled” route, which required a pontoon ferry crossing – always fun – and miles and miles of rolling colorful farmland interspersed with ostrich farms (yes, ostrich are farmed for their meat):

De Hoop Nature Reserve is a nature reserve covering 130 square miles in the Western Cape Province, located about three hours east of Cape Town near Cape Agulhas, the southern tip of Africa. In the mid twentieth-century, the South African government bought the farms De Hoop and Windhoek with the intention to establish a wildlife farm for endangered species. In the mid 1970s, the area became dedicated to the conservation of the Cape Floral ecosystem, and became the southernmost nature reserve in Africa. It was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2004.

The vegetation in De Hoop Nature Reserve is part of the world’s smallest and most threatened plant kingdom, known as the Cape Floral Kingdom. The reserve also contains one of the largest areas of the rare lowland fynbos (shrublands and heathlands). Indeed, the entire upland portion of the Reserve is covered by lowland fynbos, with scarcely a tree to be found anywhere except in the Rest Camp. Here’s what the landscape looks like:

Interestingly, the Reserve supports rather large numbers of eland, Cape mountain zebra, bontebok and ostrich, and many can be found in and next to the Rest Camp. You may recall from last year’s trip that we saw mountain zebra – not to be confused with the common Burchell’s or plains zebra – in Mountain Zebra National Park, where we also saw blesbok antelope. Blesbok and bontebok are subspecies and look very similar; both are striking in the contrasting rich brown and white colorings. The bontebok subspecies has an extremely restricted range in the Western Cape centered in this Reserve. Here’s a few photos:

De Hoop also includes a Marine Protected Area (MPA) covering 40 or 50 km of coastline and near-shore waters which represent the most important nursery and mating grounds in all of Africa for the southern right whale. There are supposedly 500 or more whales that come to this section of coast to give birth, nurse young and mate. During my brief visit to the beach dunes on my day hike, I saw several dozen individuals lollygaging around in the waters just off shore. I managed to capture one tail shot that was just in focus enough to prove it was a whale – sorry, but photographing a whale breaching is really hard from a distance when you don’t know where and when they will breach:

I camped at the De Hoop Nature Reserve campsite. My site was perched above the river with a nice overlooking view of the water where the river empties into a vlei – now completely flooded and essentially a lake – and the hills beyond. Unfortunately, I had a close neighboring camper separated from my site by a wooden fence. Here’s what it looked like:

Here’s a video slideshow of my day hike from my campsite along the vlei (i.e., currently a lake), through fynbos vegetation to the beach, and back to my campsite in a big loop at De Hoop. Note, it is springtime here in South Africa and the fynbos vegetation was in full flower. It was really beautful, in a desert bloom sort of way, which I tried to capture a little in my slideshow, but didn’t do it justice:

De Hoop Nature Reserve video slide show (6 minutes)

Ok, I’m off to the southern tip of Africa. See you there.

New Species:

1. Cape spurfowl
2. Great crested grebe

Sorry, my email notification of new posts is still not working.

After leaving Tsitsikamma National Park, I headed farther down the coast on the Garden Route, first to the Robberg Nature Reserve and then to Wilderness National Park:

After leaving Tsitsikamma, I stopped off for a short hike to an overlook at the Nature’s Valley section of the Garden Route National Park and then spent the night at a random campsite at a place called Buffels Bay, which turned out to be quite nice:

I spent the following very rainy day hiking at a regional nature reserve called Robberg Nature Reserve and Marine Protected Area, and it was a spectacular 10 km hike despite the rain. Located in the town of Plattenberg, the Reserve encompasses a narrow penninsular that sticks out several kilometers into the ocean, forming Plattenberg bay. The penninsular rises sharply from the sea forming dramatic cliffs and steep slopes, and is surrounded on all sides by rugged rocky shoreline. The vegetation above the rocks is almost entirely fynbos, which is simply low shrubs and heath that can survive in the harsh wind and salt spray environment. One of the features of the Reserve is the massive Cape fur seal colony. I saw many hundreds to several thousand seals both in the water swimming and on the rocky benches above the surf. It was a rainy, soaking wet day of hiking, with only 2 other hikers on the trail, but it was one of the best all time hikes nonetheless! The photos and video don’t do it justice. Rather than include photos here, I made a video slide show of this hike combined with one of my hikes at the next Park (see below).

After my rainy but glorious hike at Robberg, I headed to Wilderness National Park, which like Tsitsikamma is now incorporated in the Garden Route National Park. This Park is not wilderness, as we understand it, by a long shot, but rather named for the adjacent town called Wilderness. This Park, like Tsitsikamma and Nature’s Valley, protects indigenous coastal forest along with wetlands, lakes and riverine habitats. I camped at the Ebb and Flow campground right on the river, which was quite nice, and, to my delight, there were only a handful of other campers in the campground, and they were all some distance from me as they were closer to the ablutions.

I took a couple of hikes from the campground, one up the river to a waterfall and the other down the river to the ocean. Neither were terribly exciting, as they couldn’t compete with my previous hikes, but they allowed me to exercise my body so that was good enough for me. I included photos and videos of my hike up to the waterfall in the video slideshow and composite video below.

Here’s the link to the video slideshow of my Robberg penninsula hike and Wilderness National Park waterfall hike. Note, for you BIRDERS, there are a few species mix in: one easy ID, one not too difficult but easily confused with other similar species, and one challenge that will likely require use of a field guide (have fun, and let me know what you come up with):

Robberg and Wilderness hikes video slideshow (3 minutes)

And for those that like or only watch the videos (you know who you are), here’s a composite video of footage of those same two hikes:

Robberg and Wilderness composite (15 minutes)

Ok, on to my next Park on the Garden Route. See you there.

New Species:

1. Cape grassbird
2. African black oystercatcher

Notice, you may not have received an email notification of my last post for Addo Elephant National Park because my mail service was suspended for having too many spam comments. It is actually posted in case you want to go back and see it.

After leaving Addo Elephant National Park, I headed to the coast and south along it to Tsitsikamma National Park:

Tsitsikamma is a coastal reserve known for its indigenous forests, dramatic coastline, and the Otter Trail – a 45 km 5-day rugged shoreline hike. The park covers a 50 mile long stretch of coastline. The word “Tsitsikamma” originates from the native Khoekhoe language and means “clear water”, probably referring to the clear water of the Tsitsikamma River. The Park was established in 1964, but later was combined with a couple of other parks to create the Garden Route National Park. The Park represents the eastern anchor of what is referred to as “The Garden Route”, which is a glorious 190-mile stretch of coastline in South Africa, running from the small town of Mossel Bay (Mussel Bay) in the west to the mouth of the Storms River in Tsitsikamma National Park in the east. It’s called the Garden Route because of the lush coastal forests that line the wide sandy beaches and rocky shoreline.

Tsitsikamma Park conserves a considerable portion of the natural biota of the Garden Route. The primary vegetation consists of mountain and coastal fynbos (what we might call shrublands and heathlands), montane forest, sandy and rocky shoreline, and the inter-tidal and sub-tidal zones. I spent 3 nights in the Park, which afforded me the time to do a couple of long day hikes.

My first day hike combined an indigenous forest hike in the steep hillside leading down to the rocky shoreline with a hike to the famous suspension bridges over the mouth of Stormsriver and to a lookout point high up on the bluff overlooking the Park’s coastline. Here are some photos from these hikes:

On my second full day, I hiked the first section of the Otter trail, which led me to a beautiful waterfall and beyond to the first overnight hut on the trail. It was a stunningly beautiful hike along rugged rocky shoreline and bluffs – I would love to come back and do the full 5-day hike. Here is a photo journey:

I camped at the The Stormsriver Mouth Rest Camp. Yes, it as a typical South African National Park rest camp, hundreds of packed together campsites, chalets and the works, but you have heard my rant before. Fortunately, I found the one and only campsite nestled in the coastal scrub and relatively secluded and private (because it was the farthest you could get from the ablutions). And there was perhaps only 1 or 2 other campers in the entire campground, so it was actually pretty nice! Here’s my campsite and 1 of the 3 campground sections in the Park:

Here’s my composite video of my campground and hikes at Tsitsikamma National Park:

Tsitsikamma National Park composite (16 minutes)

Ok, next stop a little farther down the coast for some more hiking. See you there.

New Species:

1. Kelp gull
2. Knysna turaco

After leaving Dwesa Nature Reserve, I drove south along the coast to my final wildlife safari destination, Addo Elephant National Park near Port Elizabeth in the Eastern Cape Province:

Addo was founded in 1931 in order to provide a sanctuary for the eleven remaining elephants in the area. The Park currently covers 633 square miles, third largest park in South Africa, and has proved to be very successful, currently supporting more than 600 elephants and a large number of other mammals, including lion, leopard (no cheetah), buffalo, and several antelope species.

As far as the landscape goes, honestly, it’s not the most spectacular compared to the other Parks I have visited. The Park is divided into several sections, including a coastal section that I did not visit, but I suspect is much like the other coastal Parks I have visited, and several inland sections that range from rolling hills to more rugged mountains covered by a mixture of shrubland (or thicket or bushveld as they call it, as it is mostly low stature shrubs and trees of varying densities and many of them covered with thorns – think Pinyon-Juniper woodlands of the southwest) and grasslands either in the uplands or in the valley bottom depressions that they call a “vlei” if it stays wet during the rainy season. Here are a few photos of the landscape:

Ok, the landscape may not be jaw-dropping beautiful, but boy-oh-boy did this Park live up to its namesake – elephants, elephants, and more elephants. As I said above, this Park is purported to have roughly 600 elephants, but on a single drive to 3 or 4 waterholes, I probably saw 200-300 individuals, and this was in just one section of the Park. There’s not a lot of other wildlife – a few small herds of buffalo and lots of zebras, warthogs, and greater kudus, but the incredible concentration of elephants was truly phenomenal. And did I ever tell you how much I enjoy watching elephants? They are always doing something interesting, especially interacting with each other. It reminded me a lot of when Nancy and I visited Hwange National Park in Zimbabwe last year and camped at waterholes and witnessed the amazing elephant jamboree there. Because this was my last wildlife safari park on this trip and because I love watching elephants, I put a lot of elephant footage in the composite video below, but I threw in a little footage of some other species and the landscape to make it more interesting and diverse. I also took lots of photos as well since it was my last viewing for most, if not all, of these species. See the photo gallery below for a sample.

For my first two nights, I camped at Addo Main Camp in the main section of the Park. Have I already told you how much I dislike South African Park campgrounds? They are paranoid about wild animals in the campgrounds, so the entire campgrounds are fenced into keep animals out and people in. They pack campsites together like sardines in a can, and the South Africa campers appear to like it this way – go figure? The campgrounds are always part of a larger compound that includes chalets of various luxuries, restaurants, shops, gas stations, etc. Basically, their “rest camps” are like little cities and there are people running around everywhere. In the campsites, you hear conversations on all sides. You get the picture! Not my kind of camping, but sometimes there is simply no better option and you have to accept it – as was the case here in the main camp of Addo (but see below). I so don’t like the campgrounds that I forgot to take a picture – sorry, my description above will have to suffice. Ok, enough of a rant.

For my third and last night, I abandoned the “big city” campground and splurged for a platform tent at a small camp called Spekboom located in the middle of the Park. With just 5 tents, each well spaced out and private, and situated adjacent to a water hole with elephants visiting all day and night and grumbling and trumpeting their presence, it was glorious. And I was the only one in the camp! Why didn’t I stay there all three nights? It cost twice as mch ($100 versus $50 per day), but it was well worth it. Here’s a photo of my tent nestled in the spekboom bushveld (note, spekboom is one of the dominant shrubs in this vegetation type):

Sadly, I’m leaving Addo and my last safari on this year’s trip – argh! Next stop, several coastal parks and reserves that are part of the Garden Route National Park on the Eastern Cape and then to Cape Town and my final destination. See you there.

WARNING! Here’s my very long composite video from Addo. You probably only want to watch this if you really love elephants like me and have some time on your hands to kill, perhaps as a substitute for a Netflix show. Sorry for the length but this was my last wildlife safari park on this year’s journey, so I went kind of crazy. Also, this Park was all about elephants, which I really love to watch, so there is a lot of elephant footage – I simply couldn’t help myself:

Addo Elephant National Park composite (55 minutes)

Photo Gallery:

New Species:

1. Cape crane
2. Blue-mantled crested flycatcher
3. Cape weaver
4. Spottedbacked weaver

After leaving Lesotho, I headed southeast back towards the coast to begin my journey along the eastern Cape back to Cape Town. I had a random one-night stopover en route to my next destination, Dwesa Nature Reserve on the coast:

Dwesa Nature Reserve is administratively combined with the adjacent Cwebe Nature Reserve in the Eastern Cape Province. Parts of the Reserve were established in 1927 and later expanded in 1975, covering an area of 21 square miles, and it is combined with the Dwesa-Cwebe Marine Protected Area, established in 1989 and covering an area of 74 square miles. On one side, the reserve is surrounded by the Indian Ocean, and on the other by rugged coastal , scarp forest, coastal scrub (i.e., dense tangle of short trees, shrubs and vines that is almost impenetrable) and coastal grasslands. The Reserve is split into two parts (Dwesa and Cwebe) by the Mbashe River. I only visited the Dwesa part of the Reserve as it is the only part with public camping. I spent two wonderful nights in the Reserve and on my full day I took a six-hour hike through the Reserve to one of the rocky headlands, as shown in these photos:

I camped at the Dwesa public campsite. Interestingly, when I arrived at the gate after driving two hours on gravel road from the main highway, they told me that there were no accommodations because everything was undergoing renovation, including the campground. Consequently, the place was empty except for a few staff at the gate and reception. After a few lost heart beats, thinking I would have to retrace my path and find another place to stay, I talked them into letting me camp because I am totally self-contained; i.e., I have my own water and don’t really need a flush toilet. So, I had the entire Reserve, including the campground to myself. And what a delightful campsite it was, situated in an opening within the coastal scrub along a small stream a short distance from the beach. However, if all the designated sites had been occupied it would have been a zoo, as the sites are packed together with barely enough room for a vehicle and tent. I parked the Green Dragon under a large flowering tree that was buzzing all day with sunbirds and weavers -glorious. Here’s my campsite:

Although this Reserve protects important indigenous coastal ecosystems (i.e., scarp forest and coastal scrub and grassland), I was surpised and disappointed at how run down the infrastructure was: roads mostly overgrown and impassable, signs non-existant or grow over, structures old and falling apart, foot bridges falling apart, etc.. I was quite surprised, because South African Parks are generally extremely well maintained. They claimed they were renovating the facilities, which were supposed to be done in June, but I saw almost no evidence of renovation except one new building that I think is going to be an ablution for the campground. What a shame. This Park at one time must have had top-notch infrastructure and accommodations, but clearly they abandoned all maintenance years ago and everything is deteriorating. The supposed renovation hasn’t even scratched the surface. The hired workers are mowing the grass while the buildings and bridges and roads are falling apart – go figure. Sorry, I digress, but it’s just because this is so atypical of South African Parks.

Ok, sadly, I am off to my last wildlife park and safari, Addo Elephant National Park. See you there.

New Species:

1. Green twinspot
2. Greater double-collared sunbird
3. Southern boubou
4. Kysna woodpecker
5. Olive woodpecker
6. Cape ganet
7. Blue-collared crested flycatcher

After leaving the Blood River Heritage Park, I headed to the Drakensberg Mountains, first to Royal Natal National Park in the northern portion and then to the Cobham section of Maloti-Drakensberg Park in the southern portion.

My first three days were spent in the northern portion of the Drakensberg in Royal Natal National Park. This Park is 31 square miles located in KwaZulu-Natal Province at the northern end of the Drakensberg and forms part of the uKhahlamba Drakensberg Park World Heritage Site as well as the Maloti-Drakensberg Transfrontier Conservation Area Peace Park along with protected lands in the abutting country of Lesotho.

Like most of South Africa, the Drakensberg Mountains were once the hunting ground of the San people (bushmen) – remember them from the movie “The Gods Must be Crazy”. The San were largely nomadic, hunter-gatherers and though the San no longer live in the area, they recorded their exploits in the form of remarkable rock paintings, and the Park is notable for its concentration of recorded sites. On my first hike, I came upon a small bit of San rock art in the form of a couple of pictographs dated to be about 8,000 years old. The San inhabited the region for at least 40,000 years and perhaps even longer. Can you imagine a culture lasting that length of time, given that our Euro-American culture is only 400 years old?

The flagship natural feature of the park is the Drakensberg Amphitheater, a rock wall 3.1 miles long by up to 3,900 feet high. Tugela Falls cascades down from the head of the Amphitheater and is purported to be the world’s highest waterfall at 983 meters or 3,900 feet. Unfortunately, there has been no rain in this region since May and thus everything is dry and most of the streams aren’t even running, except for a trickle. The stream source for Tugela is a watershed in Lesotho up on top of the plateau and escarpment, and there is no water in it, as I confirmed on both of my hikes. So, unfortunately, I wasn’t able to see the actual waterfall in action. Approaching the Park by car and seeing the Amphitheater from a distance is quite striking, as shown here:

Note the tall block-shaped peak anchoring the right side of the Amphitheater; that’s Sentinel Peak which figures prominantly in my second full day hike in the composite video below.

Also, this Park, like most in Africa, burns the vegetation frequently, and I have talked a lot about this in my blog to date. On my hikes, there were some great examples of before and after showing what burning does to the dry grasslands, does, so I thought I would show that here:

Note, in the photo above, clearly it has been some weeks since the area was burned, hence the abundant green shoots of grass coming up – despite the lack of precipitation. The contrast between before and weeks after burning is quite striking.

I did a short hike to a small waterfall and a viewpoint on the day I arrived, and then a long hike each of the next two full days. The first hike was from the bottom, hiking up Tugela canyon to a slot canyon close to the base of Tugela Falls, and looking up at the Amphitheater.

The next day I drove up high and hiked up to and around the base of Sentinel Peak to the top of Tugela Falls – albeit without water – and looking down from the top of the Amphitheater.

I took a lot of video footage of all three of my hikes, to create virtual hikes for those of you that like that, and I talked a lot about the geology of the area on one of the hikes, so I am not going to repeat it here. Sorry, you’ll just have to watch the video if you want a very simplified version of the geological processes that created this amazing landscape.

Here’s the link to my composite video from Royal Natal National Park. Note, this video is entirely a set of three virtual hikes, with regular footage and commentary along the trail. So, it’s very long, in part because of my geology overview on one of the hikes, but also because I compressed 15 hours of hiking into 45 minutes; also, it’s a great way to go on the hikes without actually doing the work – I know, I can hear some of you right now saying, but what’s the fun in that? However, most of you will never get here and do these hikes, so this is your only chance to hike here, even if it is only virtual. Lastly, I am dedicating this video to Yaroon, who commented that my Mount Mulanje trek video was his favorite of all time, so that has inspired me to do this virtual hike video:

Hiking Royal Natal National Park composite (45 minutes)

At Royal Natal National Park,I camped in the public campsite called Mahai. It was essentially a big field with scattered trees – nothing to rave about – but the view up at the escarpment was stunning and the ablutions were first rate. Here’s a photo of my site the first night, but I switch to one with a shade tree for the next two nights, but both had the same stunning backdrop:

After three days in Royal Natal NP, I headed to the southern section of the Drakensberg to the Cobham section of Maloti-Drakensberg Park. This area has the same basic geology as Royal Natal and the same cultural history, as it too is renowned for its preserved sites with San rock paintings. Apparently, there are over 500 recorded rock cave shelters used by the San 8,000 plus years ago with over 30,000 recorded individual pictographs or paintings. I took two full day hikes in this section, the first up to a high point called the Pinnacles and the second up a major canyon to a series of San rock cave shelters that are now used as destination wilderness campsites. The country was stunning and reminded my alot of places Nancy and I have hiked in the western U.S. Predominantly canyons, big and small, cut through the sedimentary formations with the slopes, ridges and valley bottoms covered with grasslands, except for the occasional patch of forest in a protected drainage or cove. Here’s a few photos from my hikes:

As with my visit to Royal Natal, this Park was about stretching my legs in some beautiful country, and thus my composite video below is another set of virtual hikes. So, again, if you enjoy going on virtual hikes, watch this video:

Hiking Maloti-Drakensberg Park composite (25 minutes)

My campsite at Cobham was quite nice, situated under some big cedar trees with a view of the surrounding canyon and nice ablutions. The picture shows lots of tents, but these were for a student group that was in the back country, so I had the campground to myself until the third night when another family showed up.

Ok, I’m off to Lesotho entering via the famed Sani Pass. See you there! But, may not have internet service for the next several days while in Lesotho, so don’t hold your breath for my next post.

New Species:

1. Olive thrush
2. Yellow-throated bush sparrow
3. Cape wagtail

After leaving iSimangaliso Wetland Park, I headed for the purportedly oldest proclaimed nature reserve in all of Africa, the Hluhluwe–Imfolozi Park, located north of Durban in the heart of Zululand:

This Provincial Park consists of 370 square miles of hilly topography north of Durban and is considered the flagship park of the KwaZulu-Natal province of South Africa. It is proclaimed to be one of the oldest parks in Africa, originally created in the 1890s as a sanctuary for one last tiny population of southern white rhino. This is where the species was presumably saved from extinction. Thanks to conservation efforts, the Park now has one of the largest populations of white rhinos in the world, although this population remains severely threatened by the poaching of hundreds of rhinos every year in the park. Indeed, I confirmed this with the Rangers I spoke to. Moreover, I even witnessed a recently killed rhino to vividly confirm the reality of this conservation nightmare. Let’s remember who’s really to blame for this despicable business – the Chinese and Omani that create the demand for ivory.

I camped at Nyalazi campground – with only 7 sites – just outside main eastern gate for $10 USD per night, as opposed to staying at one of the lodges in the Park (no camping options) for a minimum of $110 USD per night and upwards (by an order of magnitude for the luxury lodges). I opted for the cheaper option. Note, this was still more expensive than a comparable campground in Mozambique and Malawi. Here’s my site and a sunset view of the Game Reserve from my site:

The Park was much like all the other South African Parks in that it has a paved road right down the middle the length of the Park and several good gravel loop roads off this main road, all manageable by any vehicle. There was only one 4×4 only drive in the Park – which I drove! The Park has several lodges as well. The entire Park is very hilly, with perhaps a thousand feet a relief and consists of extensive dry grasslands on the hills interspersed with brushfields and woodlands, in addition to riparian vegetation along the few major rivers and larger drainages. The hilly terrain made for some very scenic driving. Here are a few shots of the landscape:

I drove most of the accessible roads in the Park and spent a lot of time driving without seeing more than impala, warthogs, and nyala, but I did manage to see a few elephants and the occasional giraffe, zebra, buffalo, wildebeest, kudu, duiker, baboon, and vervet monkey – see the photo gallery below for a few of these. The prize, though, was seeing southern white rhino, which this Park is famous for, as I noted above. I found rhino on several occasions on my drives, including a group of 10 resting in the open next to a pan in the late afternoon – see the video for that footage. Most of my observations, however, were of amimals in the bush, where they like to be for foraging and cover, such as in this photo:

Here’s my composite video of some of my observations at Hluhluwe-iMfolozi Park, mostly watching animals at a mud hole from a hide and watching white rhinos, with a couple of elephant encounters thrown in for good measure:

Hluhluwe-iMfolozi Game Reserve composite (20 minutes)

I left Hluhluwe-iMfolozi Park and headed west towards the Drakensburg Escarpment and ended up at an iOverlander random campground in an historical park called Blood River Heritage Park. This Park is a memorial to the roughly 500 white Voortreckers who battled some 15,000 Zulu warriers in 1838 on this site and killed some 3,000 Zulus before the demoralized Zulu army retreated. The Voortreckers were the Boers (i.e., original Dutch settlers in South Africa) that migrated north from their Cape Town settlement starting in 1836 to avoid living under the Brittish colonial rule. The migration was known as “The Great Trek”. The Voortreckers met with considerable resistance from some of the native tribes, especially the fierce Zulu Nation, who faught them on many occasions. The Zulu nation had the largest army in all of Africa at this time, built up by the famou king Shaka Zulu before the time of this battle. This Park is about what became known as the Battle of Blood River as told from the Boer’s perspective. Being here reminded me of the classic movie Zulu Dawn with a young Peter Otoole. I have vivid memories of the Zulu warriers rushing the barricades with spears and getting mowed down by riffle fire and ultimately admitting defeat and retreating after many thousands were slaughtered. The only difference is here they had a circle of 64 wagons – a “laager” – instead of a missionary fort with adobe walls. What is really interesting, and unique as far as I know, is that right next door to this historical Park is a Zulu run historical Park about the same battle, but told from the Zulu perspective. How interesting to see the history told from two contrasting perspectives. I wish I had time to visit both Parks and hear the contrasting stories, but the Drakensberg compels me. Here are a couple of photos of the wagon laager:

Photo gallery:

From the Wildside:

New Species:

1. Jackal buzzard
2. Golden-breasted bunting
3. Mocking cliff chat

I crossed into South Africa immediately after leaving Ponta do Ouro. If you want to recall some interesting factoids about this country, take a look at the “Welcome to South Africa” post from last year, as I won’t repeat them here. However, it is worth noting here that as soon as I crossed the border I entered the comparatively developed world with a noticeably higher standard (and cost) of living. Roads (including all primary, secondary and even many tertiary) are all paved, and if they are not, then they are solid gravel. There are even some roads with paved sidewalks and I even saw a couple of road crews picking up trash along the highway. And the housing, in general, is way, way better for most people. Most of the towns of any size have genuine supermarkets (sometimes several), banks with ATMs, and even shopping malls in some places. In Mozambique and Malawi, and even Kenya and Tanzania, these things only existed in the big cities. Everything cost 3-4 times more than in the previous countries, including, especially food and lodging. Now, don’t allow these observations to make you think I entered the fully developed western world. Nope, there’s still trash everywhere, recall from last year that not ALL roads are in great condition (some pothole hell here as well), and there are still slums in other parts of the country (e.g., Joburg), and not everyone has a decent house, but what a difference.

Driving through this corner of the country also took me past thousands of acres of pineapple farms (of course I stopped at a roadside stand and purchased a couple) and perhaps hundreds of thousands of acres of industrial tree farms, almost exclusively Eucalyptus trees with perhaps 1% some kind of sand pine. I felt like I could have been driving through Weyerhauser Company lands in Washington state, if I substituted Douglas fir for Eucalyptus.

My first destination in South Africa was Isimangaliso Wetland Park, previously known as the Greater St. Lucia Wetland Park. This Park is situated on the northeast coast in the KwaZulu-Natal province of South Africa about 146 miles north of Durban by road.

Isimangaliso is South Africa’s third-largest protected area, spanning 170 miles of coastline, from the Mozambican border in the north to Mapelane south of the Lake St. Lucia estuary, and encompasses 810,000 acres of natural ecosystems managed by the iSimangaliso Authority.

What is this so-called Authority? I learned from talking to Park staff that this Authority is a joint venture between the government and a private corporation, and it really shows. The Park is clearly being run as a for-profit business based on the prices charged for entry and overnight camping. For example, I paid $45 USD per day just for entry, plus $75 USD per night for camping. Note, that is roughly 10 times what I had been paying for campsites in Mozambique and Malawi, and, as it turns out, the campsites in the former two countries were much more to my liking. Not only that, but they have divided the Park into something like 10 sections, and each section is administered separately, so you have to pay separately to enter each section. I wanted to stop en route to my second night destination campsite at a couple different places to look for wildlife, but at each gate they wanted me to pay another $45 to enter just for a hour or so. Highway robbery! Extortion! I got the sense that the government sold a half share of the Park to this corporation to make some big bucks. Oh ya, did I say that they are also capturing animals here, including zebra and waterbuck for sure, and selling them to buyers such as private I game farms and Parks in places like Malawi and Mozambique that are trying to rebuild their native fauna. I ran into a team and their game transport trucks heading out to capture zebra and waterbuck. I don’t like the philosophy behind this Park! Selling off animals might be reasonable if the habitats were at carrying capacity, but from what I saw, they are far from it. Indeed, I saw very few animals for the size of the Park and the quality of the habitat. I’m guessing that this is at least partly due to them selling off animals to make a buck.

The park was proclaimed a world heritage site in 1999 because of the rich biodiversity, unique ecosystems and natural beauty occurring in a relatively small area. The reason for the huge diversity in fauna and flora is the great variety of different ecosystems in the park, ranging from coral reefs, sandy beaches and rocky shoreline, subtropical dune forests (or thickets), grassland savannahs, and a variety of estuarine and freshwater wetlands and lakes. In fact, it is recognized as one of the outstanding natural wetland and coastal sites of Africa. Here’s some photos of the different ecosystems I observed:

For my first night, I camped in the northern third of the Park at a campsite called Sodwana Bay. I had high hopes for this site, but in turned out that this is a major destination for tourists wanting to recreate on the beaches and for scuba diving on some of the offshore reefs. Get this, the campground had over 1,000 sites; yes, that’s right, 1,000! It was a maze of roads with sites in every direction and packed together. AND, during the high season it gets fully booked! Can you imagine? It would be a total zoo. Fortunately for me, there was no one else in the entire campground that I saw except for the game capture folks. There were also 2 or 3 private lodges within the Park next to the campground that were full with people, mostly scuba divers I believe. I was partly excited about camping here because they had a 5 km hiking trail in the interior to the grasslands and wetlands that was suppose to be great birding, since they have no roads to drive. Well, the trail was closed because of lack of maintenance and because they claim there had been some “muggings”. With all the money this corporation is raking in – remember, 1,000 fully booked during the high season at crazy high prices – it’s reasonable to expect them to maintain the only trail in the Park and do a little law enforcement for tourist safety. I was very bummed, since the only thing left to do is hang out on the beach! Here’s a shot of my campsite and I couple of the visitors I had:

I left Sodwana and headed south to Cape Vidal in the southern third (and different section) of the Park and one that I had read about and heard from some fellow overlanders was a really, really nice spot and campground. Cape Vidal is about 30 km out on a penninsula and the furthest point you can drive on the pennisula. I expected to drive out on a sand track to a remote, little used, beautiful setting with perhaps a few other people. Wrong! The road was paved, there were lots of tourists, and the campground was abysmal. If you have ever camped at most state park campgrounds in the U.S. you might be able to picture this campground. At least 50 sites, each small and right next to each other. No privacy, packed with campers, many retired but some with loud kids, most with the classic South African set up; i.e., a huge compound with multiple trailers, chairs, tables, security lights on stands, kitchen tents, and all sorts of stuff to keep them supplied and entertained for days. So, no surprise, I decided not to stay a second night. Here’s a shot of my campsite – the farthest from the ablutions as possible and with a couple vacant sites either side of me as a result – before even more people arrived, for what its worth, and I am not going to show the beach because it looked almost exactly like the last few beaches I visited:

Perhaps the only positive thing about this site, other than the hot showers, is that I did have a couple of welcome campsite visitors:

This section of the Park only has one drive open to the public, which sucks given the size of the area, and I saw very little wildlife on this drive other than a few zebra and a dozen or so buffalo, except for this beautiful girl:

Note, given Rick’s comment on my last past, I felt obliged to show my mistress – as apparently I have one!

But I did encounter several greater Kudo driving in and out of the Park, which are always a delight to see, especially the bulls with their huge spiral horns (see video for that):

Here’s a quiz bird for Phil (and anyone else that fancies themself a birder; e.g. Stephen, Steve, Brenda, …):

Here’s a composite video of my visit to iSimangaliso Wetland Park, but keep your expectations low:

iSimangaliso Wetland Park composite (17 minutes)

I’m off to Hluhluwe-Imfolozi Park, supposedly the oldest proclaimed nature reserve in all of Africa, where they supposedly have lots of white rhinos. We’ll see about that.