Tag Archives: Golden Gate Highlands National Park

The floral splendour of Golden Gate

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There is only one way to truly appreciate the amazing diversity and breathtaking beauty of the flowers that occur in the Golden Gate Highlands National Park, and that is on any or all of the Park’s walking trails. This is a gallery of just some of the fragile blooms we enjoyed while exploring the Park during our December bush holidays.

Floral splendour at Golden Gate Highlands National Park
Floral splendour at Golden Gate Highlands National Park
Floral splendour at Golden Gate Highlands National Park
Floral splendour at Golden Gate Highlands National Park
Floral splendour at Golden Gate Highlands National Park
Floral splendour at Golden Gate Highlands National Park
Floral splendour at Golden Gate Highlands National Park
Floral splendour at Golden Gate Highlands National Park
Floral splendour at Golden Gate Highlands National Park
Floral splendour at Golden Gate Highlands National Park
Floral splendour at Golden Gate Highlands National Park
Floral splendour at Golden Gate Highlands National Park
Floral splendour at Golden Gate Highlands National Park
Floral splendour at Golden Gate Highlands National Park
Floral splendour at Golden Gate Highlands National Park
Floral splendour at Golden Gate Highlands National Park
Floral splendour at Golden Gate Highlands National Park
Floral splendour at Golden Gate Highlands National Park
Floral splendour at Golden Gate Highlands National Park
Floral splendour at Golden Gate Highlands National Park

We’ll be dedicating upcoming installments of de Wets Wild to three of Golden Gate’s easiest walking trails.

Shadowed

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Contrasting light and shadows in the Echo Ravine, in the Golden Gate Highlands National Park. An easy but exquisitely beautiful walk from Glen Reenen Rest Camp delivers you to the ravine, a wonderland of enormous rock walls, dripping water, crystal clear streams and a diverse plant life. We’ll share more from Echo Ravine, and other trails at Golden Gate, in a forthcoming post.

Shadowed

“Shadowed” is the theme for this week’s WordPress Photo Challenge

Yellow

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The grasslands of the Golden Gate Highlands National Park are a tapestry of wild flowers and seeding grasses in summer. Among these are some brilliant yellow varieties.

 

Golden Gate floral splendour
Golden Gate floral splendour
Golden Gate floral splendour
Golden Gate floral splendour
Golden Gate floral splendour

We’re catching up on the WordPress Photo Challenges we missed while on our extended summer holidays in the bush. “Yellow” was the theme for the challenge of 19/12/2014

Twinkle

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The sun reflecting from a rapid in the Golden Gate Highlands National Park’s Little Caledon River

Twinkle

We’re catching up on the WordPress Photo Challenges we missed while on our extended summer holidays in the bush. “Twinkle” was the theme for the challenge of 12/12/2014

It’s the end of our summer in the bush…

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We arrived back home in Pretoria after our epic 21-night summer holiday in the bush. We’ll soon start wrapping up with a weekly trip report of the beautiful wild places we visited. Today we’re simply compiling a gallery of the photos we posted on a daily basis while we were away.

Chelmsford 13122014
Chelmsford sunset 14122014
Ithala 15122014
Ithala 16122014
Ithala 17122014
Lions at uMkhuze (18122014)
uMkhuze’s Kumasinga Hide
uMkhuze 20122014
iSimangaliso 21122014
Vervet monkeys hiding from the wet weather (iSimangaliso 22122014)
Western Osprey taking flight (iSimangaliso 23122014)
Hluhluwe-Imfolozi Christmas Eve
Chistmas sunrise over Hluhluwe-Imfolozi
Cubs in the tree (Hluhluwe-Imfolozi 26122014)
Wild dogs on the hunt (Hluhluwe-Imfolozi 27122014)
Hluhluwe-Imfolozi 28122014
Midmar 29122014
Golden Gate 30122014
Golden Gate 31122014
Golden Gate 31122014
Golden Gate 01012015
Golden Gate Highlands National Park

Surrounded by splendour at Golden Gate

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Few places can compete with the Golden Gate Highlands National Park when it comes to sheer scenic splendour. Visiting the Park is always a pleasure, and our November 2014 visit was no exception. The Park is looking beautiful following the first good spring rains, and walking or driving around, there’s just so much to take in!

This way for great scenery!
Peace and tranquility at Golden Gate
Crystal clear mountain streams
Mushroom Rocks
The view from Glen Reenen
Double rainbow over Golden Gate
Rainbow over Glen Reenen
Misty sunrise
Valleys cloaked in mist
Glen Reenen
The road to Clarens
Fresh water in abundance
Thunder and lightning over Glen Reenen
Lighting up the skies over Glen Reenen
Craggy heights silhouetted at sunrise

Summer is the best time for bird-watching, when the migrants from cooler climes arrive and many male birds are adorned in their breeding plumage. In addition, Golden Gate is home to several rare and endangered species, and we were lucky to encounter some of them.

 

We had daily sightings of the rare bald ibis on the Oribi Loop at Golden Gate
We had daily sightings of the rare bald ibis on the Oribi Loop at Golden Gate
We had daily sightings of the rare bald ibis on the Oribi Loop at Golden Gate
Endangered bearded vulture in flight
Bearded vulture at the feeding station
Red-winged starling looking after our car
Cape Longclaw

Of course, a National Park wouldn’t be complete without large mammals, and Golden Gate has its fair share of animals adapted to the climatic extremes of a mountain environment.

Black wildebeest seem to like running around…
Black wildebeest seem to like running around…
Black wildebeest, at rest for a change, on a plateau
Black-backed jackal setting out to forage at dusk
Grey rhebuck
Grey rhebuck
Baboons
Baboon jockey
Zebra in the mist
At speed
Dwarfed by the spectacular scenery

It is always rewarding to bend the knees and appreciate the smaller, less obvious, of Golden Gate’s inhabitants.

Natural beauty
Natural beauty
Natural beauty
Seems not only human females require flowers for the romance to blossom – these beetles are mating on a Hypoxis stem
Stink bugs
As disgusting as they may be, flies are an important component of the ecosystem
Industrious ant
Fungus cropping up all over after the rains
Fungus cropping up all over after the rains
Aardvark hole
Termite mound damaged by an aardvark
Termite mound damaged by an aardvark

After seeing Golden Gate looking so lovely, we can hardly wait for our next visit at the end of December!

 

 

 

 

Lightning over Glen Reenen

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Time to pack up and head back to Pretoria this morning, but not before sharing one last photograph from the Golden Gate Highlands National Park; last night we were treated to a display of thunder and lighting over the mountains around Glen Reenen as a storm cell passed quickly through the area.

Golden Gate 8 Nov 2014(b)

 

 

Golden sunrise at Golden Gate

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We woke up this morning to find the valleys of the Golden Gate Highlands National Park cloaked in a thick fog, drove to one of the mountain tops, found a spot above the low lying clouds, and were rewarded with the most beautiful sunrise.

Golden Gate 8 Nov 2014

Some de Wets have all the luck…

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While I was working today, Marilize and Joubert spent some time at the Golden Gate Highlands National Park’s Vulture Hide. And they were rewarded with a fantastic sighting of another rare South African bird, the Bearded Vulture! Am I jealous? Yes. Yes I am.

Golden Gate 7 Nov 2014

A birding highlight at Golden Gate

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This afternoon we were very fortunate to enjoy a quality sighting of one of South Africa’s rarest bird species here at the Golden Gate Highlands National Park: the Southern Bald Ibis.

Golden Gate 6 Nov 2014