Today’s hike along the south coast of Africa, in this region called the Garden Route, is just awesome with the blazing sunshine, despite it being mid winter. When you have so much warmth and sun during the short winter days, it really makes up for any chill felt overnight. This is what makes the south coast of Africa such a sought after and epic travel destination.
The fleeting healthy rain showers have moistened the ground and now the trees branch out still further with the blast of sunshine to spur them on. Similarly, people who live here are constantly blessed with a glorious backdrop upon which to live their lives, right through the entire year. I have been hiking along these shores for some years now and never have to stop or take shelter for longer than a day or two while a rainstorm passes over. Other than that, it’s possible to roam about in the beautiful forests along these shores all year long.
Such is the abundantly fresh and healthy environment that exudes life and supports it like a mother would a child. “Mama Afrika” as she is known, is truly magnanimous and merciful to her dependents, all of us living entities who reside on her southernmost shores. Just a few miles inland and we have a mountain range behind which is semi-desert and a different situation. I guess it might be much like Australia, where the coast is more habitable and thus populated compared to the relatively arid hinterland.
Trekking through the indigenous forest that hugs this coastline makes for an uplifting adventure for any lover of the outdoors. I recommend these shores as a definite winner of a destination to anyone from the northern hemisphere, and that applies any time of the year. Why spend your days in the snowy winters of the north when you can come here to Africa’s southern shores to bask in the sun and swim in the warm Indian Ocean?
This region really facilitates optimum health since it allows for regular outdoor adventures like hiking, cliff climbing, numerous water sports as well as other more exotic extreme sports for the wild at heart. Just be warned that there are sharks in the ocean, just offshore. Yesterday a marathon swimmer was attacked by a Great White shark said to be 4.5 meters long. The swimmer was dressed like a seal, in his black wetsuit and big flippers, and swam behind the big breaking waves, precisely where the sharks roam about hunting for seals. As a result he was bitten and died almost instantly.
It was, of course, a tragedy for the little holiday town of Plettenberg Bay, where my hiking trail hugs the cliffs at the coast. This is the second shark fatality in about ten years, so it was a vary rare event. Yet everyone knows that the nearby seal colony of Robberg Peninsula (rob means seal in the local language) is also the home of the Great White sharks. Surfers have been paddling out regardless for years and seldom have any trouble from the sharks. I, however, prefer to keep to the less travelled and more remote rocky hiking trail just west of the peninsula.
Here I get to see whales in the distance from the cliffs, around this time of year now. I also regularly see dolphins in long lines swimming past, which is an awesome sight. The hiking trail takes me up and down steep paths to and from the rocky shoreline way below the cliff tops. This kind of lifestyle really is conducive to keeping fit and healthy. Not even during the global pandemic did I experience any debilitating influence that hampered any hiking sojourns.
So depending on your risk tolerance or aversion, you will be able to enjoy all sorts of outdoor sports and pastimes in this region called the Garden Route and especially here in the top holiday tourist town of Plettenberg Bay. I would equate it to the beautiful islands of Thailand, the only other equally attractive place I have seen on the planet in my rare occasional journeys to find a better beach than this one. If you love the beach and mountain hiking, then this is the place for you, so check it out on the map and do some research into taking an easy flight to one of the nearby airports.
The closest main airport is in the town of George, about 90 minutes away by car on the highway. The journey takes you all along the coast which is itself a beautiful scenic route. Or if you have a bigger budget, you can even take a flight from the bigger cities of Cape Town or Johannesburg, with their international airports, and fly right into the town of Plettenberg Bay itself, via a smaller plane that arrives twice a week at the local landing strip.
In fact this town is the playground of jet setters from all over the world. Even the fortunate locals from the major cities here like to hop on a flight every weekend to come spend it here after a busy working week at the office in the big city. They either have their own private plane or they use the small 15 seater type plane which flies Fridays and Mondays to and from the two main cities of Cape Town and Johannesburg.
I personally left Cape Town, my home for the first 30 years of my life, to come live here permanently, since I saw the rise in pollution and population which is inevitable in any main city in the world, over time. Now I live the permanent holiday lifestyle in the top holiday destination along the entire southern African coastline for thousands of miles, in my opinion. And I’m not alone in that opinion. Even international travellers have agreed that this little hidden tourist hotspot is one of the best they have seen globally.
So take my advice and put the Garden Route on your travel itinerary and make your way here when you next get itchy feet or any opportunity to spend some time in paradise by the sea, on these African shores. You won’t be disappointed.
(photos my own)
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