Travel Diary: South Africa North Coast

After our 2 weeks at Trafalgar we decided to head North up the coast with the first stop being just outside Tania old hometown as we hoped to catchup with some friends.  On our first morning there we received a wake up as to how easy it can be to catch Covid-19 when we received a phone call from Tania Aunt to say her and Neville, who we visited for lunch the day before, had just learnt they had been exposed to a positive case and so by association we may have inadvertently been too.  Fortunately, the caravan park we were staying in was very empty and we had a whole ablution block to ourselves so self-isolation was not too difficult while we waited for their test results to come back.

Once we had received the good news that they had tested negative and thus we had no risk of exposure, we hit the road again with a brief stop at the farm before heading up the KZN north coast.  For the first time in many months we truly felt like we were on the road and exploring, as for Stuart this was brand new territory and Tania had not visited the area for a couple of decades.

A fairly frequent question we often receive is “how do you travel with no bookings or clear destination for the day in mind?”  In general we do have an area in mind as the end destination but we certainly don’t like booking as it then ties you to an accommodation option which could be a great place or one that just does not tickle your fancy, in the case of the latter we like to be able to just skip past and in the case of the former we like having the option of staying longer  than would be possible if we had other bookings already made.  

The above was all proven to be valid (for us) when we pulled into Tugela river mouth expecting to stay a few days but none of the accommodation options appealed or could fit Mr. Jones and so with no bookings in hand we were able to easily move on and as luck would have it the next spot we tried, turned out to be a winner.   As with so many Ezemvelo parks, Umlalazi is in a stunning location and dirt cheap to stay at.  Apart from a couple of crazy Zebras, a group of Duiker and a troop of Monkeys we had the campsite to ourselves.   

We have been suffering an intermittent fuel starvation problem for quite a while, it probably first occurred in Malawi (Malawi Travel Diary), then again when leaving Montagu and most embarrassingly when we first arrived at Zimbali after the marathon trek from Montagu.  We thought we had solved the issue when we found a kinked fuel hose but clearly, we had not as on the way up to Hluhluwe we suddenly lost power on the freeway.  The issue is quite simple, Mr Jones develops a vacuum in the fuel system, which is easily fixed by opening the fuel sedimenter, listening to the hiss of air as it escapes and once diesel flows we are back in business.  It’s often less than a minute breakdown, just very inconvenient depending on where it occurs.

After spending a wonderful day in Hluhluwe-Imfolozi game reserve with some good sightings including spending a couple of hours observing lions, we experienced our second fuel starvation breakdown in the same amount of days as we drove towards the exit.  Now if we could only figure out the cause of the problem.

As there is no camping options within Hluhluwe game reserve, we spent the days preceding and after in and around Hluhluwe town,  the first stop was Bushbaby Lodge & campsite which looked lovely on paper but in reality was a bit tired and neglected.  After the day in the game reserve we tried a different spot, Hluhluwe Bushcamp, which is relatively new having opened just before lockdown occurred. It had a funky vibe with the use of lots of vibrant colours and fabrics in and around the bathrooms, pool, etc. 

Many moons ago, Tania had spent a number of wonderful holidays at Kosi Bay and always raved about it when talking about the KZN north coast so after Hluhluwe this was to be our next stop, we had even made bookings for this due to its popularity.   The risk with having high expectations of a destination is that you can be easily disappointed, fortunately Kosi Bay did not disappoint!   We had two glorious days snorkelling at the mouth where the lake system empties into the Indian Ocean and another glorious day lounging around camp and in the lake.   

The campsite at Kosi Bay is tucked between a very large dune and the lake and as a result gets no cellphone signal but if you wade out into the lake or walk to the end of a long pier you can get pretty decent reception.  In the search for signal over the course of our travels we have climbed hills, stood on tree stumps, extended the hotspot phone into the sky on a phone attached to a pole on the roof  of Mr. Jones but at Kosi Bay we experienced a first by having to wade out into the lake and sit in warm water while catching up on social media.  Naturally we couldn’t resist posting a picture of this which elicited many envious comments.  We would most definitely have been one of those envious commentators a couple of years ago, but what is often not seen is the other side when the weather is not good.  The very next day mother nature dutifully provided us with one of those not so good days.

Kosi Bay is only 5 kilometres from Mozambique’s southern border which most readers will know has been our favorite destination over the years, at least the central section. Surprisingly though we have never visited the southern most section around Ponta do Ouro, fortunately or unfortunately the Kosi Bay border remained closed from Covid lockdown and so any temptation to venture back into Mozambique for a month was removed and instead we turned and headed back south down the coast.

After a resupply shopping run in St Lucia and lovely lunch we headed off for Cape Vidal.  We have so far been very impressed with all the staff at the various Ezemvelo parks we have visited over the last months, sadly the reception staff at the entrance to the Isimangaliso Wetland park (which has the smartest entrance of all the parks) could do to learn a thing or two from their less well to do colleagues.  It is more than a bit off putting when you arrive and enquire if the Cape Vidal campsite has vacancy, which is inside their park, and they provide you with a telephone number to phone and find out for yourself and all of this done with attitude.

Outside of the reception staff, the park itself is wonderful with the large St Lucia wetland system, rolling grasslands, coastal dune forests and beautiful beaches.  We had hoped to stay for at least a week but unfortunately the electricity transformer at camp had blown up and a couple of grey days combined with the campsite being within the dune forest meant our solar system never stood a chance so we were forced to move on after only 3 days to Sugarloaf campsite on the outskirts of St Lucia town.

The December festive period in South Africa is not a great time to try and travel like we do with no bookings and very little planning, as it is the time when 90% of the country takes holidays meaning many places are fully booked up to 6 months prior and the majority of campsites hike their fees massively.  With this in mind we had thought we would travel to just prior to the start of this period (10th), then stay at Tania sister farm for a few weeks while doing maintenance and making some upgrades to Mr Jones.  Knowing that we had quite a bit of work ahead of us we decided to head straight to the farm after only a couple of days at Sugarloaf and get cracking on the To-Do list. Ultimately this turned out to be a good decision as some of the maintenance jobs turned out to be a rather long saga.

Our trip back to the farm was not without the inevitable fuel starvation breakdown, which meant that swopping out the mechanical fuel pump was one of the priority jobs to be attended too.  Sadly that did not do the trick as on our only rest day the issue reared its head again as we headed down to the beach. We have now also replaced the entire fuel line that had the kink in and which we removed with an elbow sleeve way back in August and optimistically hold thumbs that will be last of this saga

Over the course of 3 weeks we pretty much ticked off the entire to-do list, outside of one job which we can anyhow do on the road.  It definitely helped having a well-equipped workshop and very handy brother in-law to get it all done as with an old vehicle you inevitably run into issues, many thanks Johan!  The less sexy maintenance jobs done can be found in our maintenance log and aside from those we also installed a gas geyser on the side of Mr Jones and built a box to cover it while travelling  which combined with the nifty shower cubicle we installed (product: “Quickpitch En-suite”) must surely qualify us as “glampers” now! A short video of the shower setup can be found on our HippySquared facebook page.

Maintenance Log: Our running record of repairs and maintenance both to Mr Jones and the equipment we carry along with him.

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