On Thursday we left Ansteys backpackers for The Secret Stop in Ballito. It's a really chilled last stop in South Africa and has awesome accommodation that gives you the feeling you’re in the jungle. It has a pool that is right by a fireplace. That afternoon we chilled by the pool and had a few beers and swam before dinner. Ballito has great waves on offer. The waves have a lot of raw power and long rides.
Friday we went to town, the waves were a little out of control in Ballito. So we headed to Ushaka beach which had good 3 Ft clean waves. It was sunny and was going to be the groups’ first surf on their new boards. Everyone was very happy with the boards. We surfed all day till around 5:00 pm. It was an awesome day and it’s going to be a great week in Ballito.
On Saturday we had good weather and fun waves all day. The waves were good at low and high tide, giving the group good time to catch lots of waves. We left for Ballito after two long surfs. On our way home we showed the group the coastline up the north coast of Durban, which is riddled with loads of breaks to surf. The weekend we are in Ballito is the Easter weekend, which means public holidays of course. The nightlife is great, so it being Saturday night we went out to two different clubs. It was a great night and lots of dancing went down.
The coast up the north coast of Durban gets a lot of swell and has a lot of power behind it. Sunday we woke up to a solid 5-6 ft swell. It was breaking really fast and was barrelling, and was just too gnarly for the guys to surf so we spent the day around the pool at the Secret Spot. It was a beautiful day to chill out and relax and had a few beers then pizza for dinner. We had an early night cause Monday we were waking up at 4:00am and heading to the Imfolozi Game Reserve.
The Imfolozi Game Park is North of Ballito on the same road that we will be taking to Mozambiqe. After our 2-hour drive we arrived at 6:15am Monday morning. The game park is 24000 hectares and has the Big Five animals plus many other animals. It consists of two parks, Imfolzi and Hluhluwe. You do the drive through the park in your own vehicle. We saw a wild dog at the start of the drive, which was really lucky and already worth the drive for! We also saw zebras, buffalo, baboons, impala and other antelopes. At the half way stop, where we got cold drinks and snacks, we saw two warthogs chasing each other. We covered the whole Imfolozi side of the park. We stopped on the drive at a small waterfall but the river wasn't flowing hard enough, we did spot a couple tortoises on a rock, which was different. We left the park at around 2:00pm, which got us home in time for a refreshing swim in the pool and bolognaise for dinner.
We went to the Mozambique embassy early Tuesday morning to get the groups visas. It saves us a lot of time at the border. After doing the visa's we went to Durban piers for a surf and lunch. The waves were very fun and the group had a great time. We then headed to collect the visas and came back for a surf.
Today we said our sad goodbyes to Lauren who unfortunately isn’t coming to Mozambique with us. We are also gaining two new recruits, one who is doing the Mozambique Adventure (for the second time as he loved it so much in nov/dec last year) and one who is doing the Mozambique Surf Camp after having done the Costa Rica trip with Chris Bond almost three years ago now. So we will have an exciting new dynamic to the group.
Everyone is looking forward to paradise and tropical water, although we have loved Durban and its waves and culture. Next blog will be from a new country!
Adios