Tag Archives: outdoors

Up and into the Echo Ravine

What better way could there be to ring in the first day of a new year than exploring new places? Especially after ending 2014 on a literal high atop the Brandwag Buttress? That’s why Marilize and I decided to undertake the Echo Ravine trail at Golden Gate Highlands National Park that day (Joubert was out exploring other pastures in Golden Gate with his grandpa), a walk we’ve not done before. We were not disappointed that we did, the scenery on the way to, and inside, the ravine is simply awe-inspiring and in our view this is one of the best short (taking an hour or two to complete) walks in the Park. It’s not an easy walk, requiring you to clamber over boulders at several stages, especially as you near the head of the ravine, but the rewards are entirely worth the effort.

Into a copse of Ouhout Trees at the start of the trail

Which way to go?

Scenery on the way

Upwards and onwards

Romance in the ravine – Heady Maiden moths

The vegetation gets denser as the ravine’s walls come closer

Small mountain stream flowing through the ravine

The walls are closing in

Clinging to life

The walls are closing in

Small mountain stream flowing through the ravine

At the head of the ravine

Looking back out of the gorge

Don’t lose the way

Small mountain stream flowing through the ravine

Clinging to life

Water falling from the overhanging rocks above

Getting to the top of the Brandwag

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We wanted to do something special to end 2014. We couldn’t think of any better way to spend the last morning of the year than getting to the top of the Brandwag Buttress, the icon of the Golden Gate Highlands National Park, even if the weather did not play along as nicely as we had hoped.

The walk to the top of the immense Brandwag (Afrikaans for “sentinel”) formation is the most popular of Golden Gate’s trails. You can walk the Brandwag route in less than an hour, but to us that would be missing the point; you have to take time to appreciate the scenery along the way and the grand views from the top. There are two routes to choose from; one starting at Glen Reenen Rest Camp and the other at the Golden Gate Hotel and Chalets, and combining the two; going up one way and down the other, really is the way to go.

Which way to go?

The trail

Crossing a mountain stream

Enjoying the view

A trail with a view

Hiding from the wet weather under an overhang

Low clouds and scenery

Looking down at Glen Reenen from the top

Looking down at the Golden Gate Hotel and Chalets from the top of the Brandwag

The road westwards towards Clarens

The route down on the Hotel side of the Brandwag

Halfway down

A grey rhebuck coming to investigate the interlopers in his territory

Cape Rock-Thrush (male)

Crossing the Little Caledon

Walking back to Glen Reenen

From the foot of the Brandwag Buttress

Fresh

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The crystal clear and unquestionably fresh mountain streams at Giant’s Castle Game Reserve, in the uKhahlamba Drakensberg Park

Giant’s Castle’s fresh mountain streams

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

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

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

Wall

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The spectacular Amphitheatre formation in the Drakensberg range is the focal point of the Royal Natal National Park.

Royal Natal Amphitheatre

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

Summer at Hluhluwe-Imfolozi

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Over the last couple of weeks we’ve shared with you several exciting sightings we enjoyed at Hluhluwe-Imfolozi Park, during our December holidays in the bush. Time to wrap up that part of our trip now.

We left the cheese farm near Mtubatuba very early in the morning of the 24th of December, and made it to the Memorial Gate just in time for it opening at 05:00AM (it’s a drive of about 75km only). We used Memorial Gate so that we could explore the Hluhluwe-section of the reserve on our way south to Mpila Camp, where we could check in 14:00 in the afternoon.

Buffaloes on the way to Maphumulo Picnic Site

Yellow-throated Longclaw

Red Duiker in Hilltop Camp

Nyala at the Hluhluwe River bridge

Single-striped Grass Mouse at Centenary Centre

Elephant browsing at Imfolozi

Mpila is a favourite camp of ours. It is unfenced, except for a single strand of electric wire strung high enough to only keep out elephants and giraffes. Other wildlife, including large predators, regularly roam among the accommodation units. Visitors should keep a special eye open for raids by vervet monkeys during the day, and for hyenas at night while preparing their evening meals on the barbeque fires.

These impalas considered Mpila a good place to raise their lambs

Hyenas come into camp every night. This one we saw at Masinda Lodge, a short distance from Mpila, one morning

Mpila, Hluhluwe-Imfolozi, December 2014

That afternoon, we went for a quick drive and had some fun with a cute white rhino calf. Hluhluwe-Imfolozi is renowned as a rhinoceros haven, and we pray that the hard work and dedication of the rangers protecting them against a terrible onslaught from armed poachers will not be in vain.

Black rhinos

I’m coming for you!

When we made our December 2014 plans a year before, we specifically wanted to spend Christmas at Mpila. A special day at a special place. We set out for a quick drive on a glorious morning, then went back to camp to prepare and enjoy Christmas lunch. In the afternoon the Park was inundated by a quick cloud burst, luckily the gravel roads are in good condition and we could continue to explore the Park soon after.

Chistmas sunrise over Hluhluwe-Imfolozi

Beautiful Sontuli Picnic Spot on the banks of the Black Umfolozi

Heavy clouds threatening to dampen Christmas

Heavy rain falling over HIP on Christmas Day

Three-Banded Plover at uBhejane Hide

Yellow-billed kite

Elephant and dung beetle

Spotted hyena

Boxing Day brought us our memorable encounter with lions in trees, but Hluhluwe-Imfolozi has much more to offer and our sightings this day was particularly varied. Our day ended with our best ever sighting of a wild African Rock Python, almost as long as the road was wide!

Elephants crossing the White Mfolozi

Not scared of heights!

Wild lilies in bloom

Warthog piglet

Master of all he surveys

Our best ever sighting of a wild python!

Every day at Hluhluwe-Imfolozi brings something special and exciting, and the 27th of December was no different. Our day started with a thrilling wild dog pack on the hunt, but that wasn’t where it ended!

Wild Dog alpha pair

Browsing elephant

Another sighting of this self-confident bull

Warthog family spa treatment

Warthogs

Mocking Cliff-chat (female)

Young buffalo bull

Muddy buffalo cow

Bad tempered buffalo bull

White Stork

Warthog piglets

Steppe Buzzard

Our last full day at Hluhluwe-Imfolozi Park seemed to belong to the elephants, with a number of really close-up encounters, but we also had a good laugh at a hyena that bit off more than she could chew.

Hluhluwe-Imfolozi 28122014

The day of the elephants

The story of the (over) ambitious hyena

Buffalo mud-wallow

The day of the elephants

White-fronted bee-eater

All too soon our five night stay at Mpila came to an end. We had collected so many memories, and can’t wait to return. Driving to Nyalazi Gate we tried to postpone our departure as long as we could, even spending half-an-hour looking for a distant pride of lions reported by fellow spotters in the kznsightings group (a group set up so that visitors to the game reserves in Kwazulu-Natal can share what they find while exploring with other visitors).

Zebra in Imfolozi’s misty hills

Spotted hyena sniffing the breeze

Can you spot the lions? 😀

We found the lions and then departed for Midmar in the KZN Midlands.

Summer at uMkhuze

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uMkhuze Game Reserve, in the iSimangaliso Wetland Park and World Heritage Site, was the third destination of our epic summer 2014 bush holidays. We arrived at uMkhuze’s western gate, Emshopi, on the 18th of December, after an easy 164km drive from Ithala Game Reserve. Our reservation was for three nights in an extremely spacious cottage at Mantuma Rest Camp. When we say “extremely spacious”, we are not lying; you could have held a dance in the lounge!

Mantuma, uMkhuze, December 2014

We’ve already shared with you our experiences at two of uMkhuze’s biggest attractions, the Nsumo Pan and Kumasinga Hide, and in this post we’ll focus on some of the things we saw in the rest of this unique reserve.

Nsumo magic

Zebra reflections at Kumasinga

Of the bat, it has to be said that uMkhuze is one of South Africa’s best known birding destinations. The variety of birds is absolutely staggering, thanks to the diversity of habitats the reserve protects, and we were lucky to add a couple of new “lifers” to our birding tick list.

European Honey Buzzard

Broad-billed rollers

Cattle egret

Purple-crested Turaco

uMkhuze protects a sizable piece of sand forest, a very rare plant community in South Africa. An equally rare little antelope, the suni, lives only within this habitat. We had several sightings of them, but getting even a half-decent photograph of these shy creatures proved very difficult!

A pair of suni in the sand forest

We also had our first sightings of large predators (on this trip) at uMkhuze. Lions were reintroduced to the reserve a year ago, and we were thrilled to find two females during a guided night drive. On our last afternoon at uMkhuze, we found a very shy spotted hyena lurking in the bush.

Lions at uMkhuze (18122014)

Spot the spotted hyena!

uMkhuze protects large populations of other well-known African mammals and they certainly were not shy to show themselves!

There seemed to be impala lambs around every corner at uMkhuze

Plains zebras

White rhinoceros

Don’t mess with a black rhino

Blue wildebeest

Grey duiker

Radio-controlled warthogs

uMkhuze has its fair share of creepy-crawlies too!

Colourful spider

Red Toad at home outside our cottage

Common Tropical House Gecko outside the bathroom window

I’ve already mentioned what a diverse reserve uMkhuze is, and there’s no better place to see this than from the top of the observation tower just a few kilometers south of Mantuma Rest Camp.

Atop the observation tower

A view towards the Lebombos

Acacia flowers

There’s beautiful specimens of the fever tree at uMkhuze

uMkhuze really is a gem in the crown of South Africa’s wild places, and we always enjoy visiting here. Leaving through the Ophansi Gate on uMkhuze’s eastern boundary we felt like we should have stayed a bit longer still, thankfully we could console ourselves by thinking about the great destinations that were still waiting for us on our summer trip to the bush!

Driving through the riverine forest at Ophansi Gate

Driving into the riverine forest at Ophansi Gate

In the pound seats at Kumasinga

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The fantastic Kumasinga Hide is one of the uMkhuze Game Reserve‘s major attractions. The hide is built in the middle of a natural-looking waterhole and offers uninterrupted views and excellent photographic opportunities right around. During our visit to uMkhuze in December 2014 we spent several hours every day at the hide, enthralled by the spectacle of literally hundreds of animals and birds making their way to the water to slake their thirst in the oppressive summer heat.

Best to look over your shoulder every now and then while walking to the hide!

uMkhuze’s Kumasinga Hide

Spectator

Even beneath the hide there’s action!

Rush hour at Kumasinga

Nervous impala

Nyalas are very common patrons at Kumasinga

Nyala bulls coming for a drink

Nyalas are very common patrons at Kumasinga

Nyalas drinking

Red-billed quelea

Fork-tailed drongo dropping in for a drink

Emerald-spotted wood dove

Warthog spa treatment

Blue wildebeests slaking their thirst

Zebr and wildebeest sharing the waterhole

Thirsty zebra

New to the waterhole

Zebra reflections

Marsh Terrapins basking in the sun

We have lots more to share from our uMkhuze visit, so please join us again next week!

Depth

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The Bourke’s Luck Potholes, at the confluence of the Treur and Blyde Rivers, form the head of the Blyde River Canyon, the third biggest canyon on earth.

Bourke’s Luck Potholes

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

The magic of Nsumo Pan

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uMkhuze Game Reserve, in the iSimangaliso Wetland Park, has a lot to offer any nature lover, no matter where their interests lie. One of the reserve’s biggest drawcards is the Nsumo Pan, a large body of water fed by the Mkuzi River. Nsumo is home to breeding pink-backed and great white pelicans, hippos and crocodiles, among the huge variety of birds and animals that live along its reed and fever-tree lined shores. The reserve authorities have made it really easy to enjoy Nsumo’s magic: a tar road skirts a part of its northern banks, there are two bird-viewing platforms at the water’s edge and a beautiful picnic site with clean ablutions and braai (barbeque) facilities.