We’re heading east to Durban, and then eventually back to Jo’burg. We drove through Western Cape yesterday, and now we’re almost in Eastern Cape, spent last night camping at the Glentana Beach campground, which is set just back from the beach. There are 2-storey beach houses along the beachfront, then the campground is set just behind the houses in a secluded area, and then there are more houses behind the campground on higher ground so they have a view. So having the campground in the ‘hollow’ seems like good use of the space.
Eastern Cape is in the ‘Garden Route’ part of South Africa. Not sure if it’s just clever advertising, but the climate here is apparently one of the most temperate in the world. Mild winters, comfortable summers and plenty of rain, if the grassy campsites are anything to go by. There is a team of guys here lawmmowing and whipper-snipping the thick grass, and where they have already been looks like a bowling green.
We drove past the turn-off to Cape Agulhas, the southern-most tip of South Africa yesterday morning. It is also the official dividing point of the Atlantic and Indian Oceans. We didn’t go there – maybe next time!
Not a lot of wildlife-spotting recently, although I did see a dwarf mongoose at Table Mountain, and we saw some rock hyraxes at the Cape of Good Hope. These mammals look like giant brown guinea pigs, ranging from 2 to 4 times the size. What’s really interesting and quite amazing about them is that their closest living relatives are the elephant and sirenians ( which includes the dugong and manatees)!
We’ve booked a couple of nights at the Addo Elephant National Park, which is a couple of hundred kms further east. We couldn’t get in tonight, so we’ll try the Garden Route National Park which has incorporated several national parks and forests, with a few accommodation options.
Your camp site could be anywhere in Australia looks good sand it does not appear that they have trouble with high seas by looking at the homes on the hill face I see the power cable did it cost I guess this is some way out of Cape Town do those hills would be covered in beach houses now as for the baboons I could make some comment but ,the thing is are we not lead to be leave these are a dying breed it appears know shortage of wild life in all your traversals are we getting a message from the do gooders ?
Ron, power is standard at most campsites and included in the cost of the site. Most sites have cost us between $18 – 35 per night. The expensive ones were in Botswana and we were paying a ‘conservation fee’ as well. For the South African ones, we bought a ‘Wild Card’, like a National Park pass, for $300 for the 2 of us and that covers all our conservation fees for a year.
Glentana is just over 400kms from Cape Town.
Yes, we have seen lots of wildlife, but in South Africa apart from baboons, it’s all been in parks and sanctuaries. If it wasn’t protected, I’m pretty sure there would be none left.