Today was our last day, five of us, John, me, Carolyn,Chris and Tony, still had the energy to get up early and be ready to start a walk from the lodge to Mahai falls with Sampson. We left at 6am - it was a lovely clear and cloudless morning with great views of the Amphitheatre which looked magnificent. As we walked the sun rose and due to mist in the east was a perfect red ball. It was a great and refreshing way to start the day - we again saw grey reedbuck gra...

Today Admire picked up our bags at 6.15am , we packed our lunches and had breakfast at the other cottage before setting off from Berghouse to our next stop - Witsieshoek mountain lodge, the highest lodge in Africa at 2200 metres, to collect our mountain guide and head off to do the iconic chain ladders walk and onto the plateau of the "Amphitheatre" of the northern Drakensberg. As we travelled we passed a massive reservoir retained by the Sterkfontein dam, saw sp...

Today was our first walk in the Drakensberg mountains and as it was along a gorge it was led by Admire. We entered the Royal Natal National Park and after parking in the the closest parking area and signing the register at the start of the walk we set off on the 14km walk along the the Thukela gorge ( 7km to the top and 7km back). The views were stunning but the cloud stayed set fast over the highest parts of the amphitheatre, a massive elliptical rock face wit...

This was a long travelling day - we all helped pack up so we were on the road by 7.15am. Most of the day was spent snoozing on the bus - but this was broken by comfort stops and snack buying stops. Lunch was just outside Dundee in the grounds of a museum at Talana - the site of a battle in 1899 during the 2nd Boer War. Prior to arriving I had consulted Wikipedia to learn a little more about significant historical events in the area eg during the Anglo Zulu war - ...

Early start today, so it was up for coffee and lemon cream biscuits, before getting on the bus at 6.20am and heading to the estuary for an early morning boat cruise and walk along the St Lucia Estuary. This was a new adventure for us; the light was lovely, the temperature was cool but it slowly warmed up allowing us to shed one layer of clothing. By coincidence one of the guides on the boat was Brian who had taken us to Umfolozi when we were here a couple of week...