Hi all
And Welcome to the Kingdom of the Zulu – KwaZulu-Natal.
On Sunday we packed the last of our luggage into the back of the van and headed out for another mammoth journey east towards our final destination – Ballito.
Ballito is situated just north of the port city of Durban on the east coast of South Africa.
The border between the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal is marked by the Drakensberg Mountains where the golden, grass hills of the Transkei are replaced by miles and miles of sugar cane plantations and coastal forest. The road bends northward at the town of Port Shepstone on the South Coast and hugs the coast all the way to Ballito on the North Coast.
The wind was howling onshore as we arrived in town. The sea was wild with white waves and foam – definitely not an attractive scene. We got ourselves settled into our new hostel and met our hosts Mike and Roz Smith who gave us a nice warm welcome around the fire.
It continued to blast into Monday and the ocean was just way too out-of-control to even consider paddling out. Instead we decided to explore our new surroundings a little more. We started out by checking out some of the local surf spots in Ballito, but with the wind being as it was, it was very difficult to imagine that anybody surfed at these breaks. Given the right conditions, though and Ballito really comes alive. This little town recently played host to the very popular Mr. Price Pro surf contest (formally the Gunston 500), which is the longest running surfing event in the history of the sport. The swell was absolutely massive during the event this year and allowed for some really outstanding surfing.
After our short tour of Ballito we headed south towards South Africa’s “Surf City” to go and see what all the fuss was about. As a Durban boy myself, this was literally like coming home again. We visited some of the main beaches in the city such as North Beach and New Pier and took a look at the setup. One of the really nice things about surfing in Durban is that there are a number of piers for you to jump off of or swim out next to, which makes your paddle out to the waves a whole lot easier. The harbour walls as well as the bluff on the south side of town act as a barrier, protecting the bay from the prevailing south-west winds and causing it to blow offshore quite often in Durban. Unfortunately that wasn’t the case on this day, so we didn’t stay long.
We made our way back into town to visit one of Durban’s local shapers, Hugh Thompson. Hugh has been shaping boards for as long as he can remember. He’s a 5 x SA champ, 15 x KZN champ and current Longboard champ in his division. He’s a familiar face in the Durban line-up and with his wealth of knowledge and experience; it was really good to have him show us around his factory. He showed us the process of making a board, right from selecting a blank (the foam core) to glassing over the board to placing the fins. It was a very interesting excursion, especially considering a few of the guys were looking at getting more performance-orientated boards themselves.
After a quick lunch in the Durban Botanical Gardens we headed out to visit another one of Durban’s most famous shapers, Clayton Nienaaber. Clayton is well known for his performance shape surfboards which are hugely popular with many of Durban’s pros. Ollie got himself kitted out with a new Spitfire from the rack while Tash found herself a nice looking Evo model. Emma decided to get a custom shape that will be more suited for more advanced manoeuvres. The boards are all in the shop at the moment getting their sprays done, so we should be picking them up this afternoon!!
Yesterday the wind continued to howl onshore from early in the morning. It was going to be another day out of the water, but fortunately, in a place like KZN, there’s just so much to do that one more day out of the water gave us an opportunity to visit one of the game parks in the area. Umfolozi forms part of the Hluhluwe – iMfolozi National Park which is home to Africa’s Big 5, the Lion, Leopard, Rhino, Buffalo and Elephant. We got on the road nice and early and arrived at the gates around 9:30. We spent the whole morning meandering through the park in search of the elusive wildlife and managed to get lucky on a few occasions. We ran into a number of Impala, Wildebeest, Zebra, Warthog, Giraffe and even a few Buffalo on our way out. It was a fantastic morning in the reserve and seeing that we still had some time on our hands, I decided to take our crew down to St Lucia, which forms part of the iSimangalelo Wetland Park, a World Heritage Site on the Elephant Coast. We took a walk along the estuary and managed to get a real close view of a bloat of hippo’s relaxing on the shores. There were also a number of crocs out sunning themselves on the banks of the river. In all, it was an awesome little detour and the perfect way to end off our adventures in the wilds of the KZN game parks
We got back to Ballito in time to enjoy a delicious pub dinner at Shea’s restaurant before turning in for the night.
Today the wind has dropped off substantially and is due to turn westerly by the afternoon so hopefully we’ve got some waves on our hands later.
So till next time…
Take care,
Bevan