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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:
- Cape grassbird
- African black oystercatcher