Guest Post: ‘Eastern Shores’ by Nick van de Wiel

Hi there everybody,

Thank you Gerry for inviting me to do this week’s blog post about the iSimangaliso Wetland Park, and the amazing photographic opportunities one can find therein.  But I’ll first start with a little about myself. Some of you might have seen some of my images that I recently started uploading to the Photo-Africa Image Library, many of which are taken in the iSimangaliso Wetland Park.  I am from Holland originally but made South Africa my home and now live here with my fiancée. Both of us hold a Masters in Biology and are FGASA qualified guides and together we run a small safari company specializing in private (and) photographic tours.

Being passionate about both photography and about the bush is a blessing, especially if you can spend a lot of time on/in both. We find ourselves lucky to live in St. Lucia, the only town INSIDE a World Heritage Site, from where we can explore the various parks in the area with our guests. But enough about me, lets talk about the iSimangaliso Wetland Park, or better, ‘show’ it, in an attempt to share it with you all. I would like to extent the invitation to all off you to come and see this magical place for yourself. There is so much to see and do, and in terms of photography, the possibilities are endless. Feel free to contact me for tips and advise. The area can easily be explored by yourself on a self drive, or you are very welcome to book a safari with us of course.

The iSimangaliso Wetland Park is the ‘new’ name for the Greater St. Lucia Wetland Park, and is considered the oldest game reserve in South Africa, being established in 1895. In December 1999 it became South Africa’s first Natural World Heritage Site. It got this title for a reason: The 332.000 hectare park, stretching from just South of the town of St. Lucia all the way up to Mozambique, contains three major lake systems, 8 interlinking ecosystems, 700 year old fishing traditions, most of South Africa’s remaining swamp forests, Africa’s largest estuarine system, 526 bird species and 25.000 year old coastal dunes – amongst the highest in the world. It is a park where one can see elephants and whales or turtles in one day, where one can dive in the morning, go on game drive in the morning, and go on a turtle walk on the beach in the evening.

That might sound all nice and well, but in reality it is still very much a park in development. But in this fact lies the beauty in my opinion. We can see this development, we can be a part of it. Only 18 years ago they started to remove all 14.000 hectare of alien pine trees, the stumps of which can still be seen in some places. We can see them rotting away, and we can see new vegetation over successive generations. Elephants, cheetah, wild dog etc have been reintroduced again to different sections of the park, and new tourist roads are continuously being built to make it more accessible for tourists.  And although it is officially a 332.000 hectare big single protected area, it is currently still ‘divided’ by wilderness areas, inaccessible areas, and stretches of disputed community land, resulting in the fact that it has multiple sections with different entrance gates. What it comes down to: If you enter the iSimangaliso Wetland Park in Mkhuze, don’t think you’re gonna be able to drive to the beach and see whales, but you have a good chance of seeing cheetah and elephant. If you enter the park at Kosi Bay, you might not see any mammals but in the right season you might see loggerhead and leatherback turtles. So if you plan a visit, think about what you would like to do and see, and then see which section of the park can meet your needs and deliver your wishes.  Because of this we have decide to make this blog post a bit of a sequel. In various weeks I would like to show you the different sections in a photo essay, which will allow you to make an informed decision as to which section of the park you would like to visit, if not all

For today, I would like to show you the ‘Eastern Shores’ of the Park. This section lies to the East of the Lake St. Lucia, with the Indian Ocean on its West side. The Eastern Shores is the most popular section for bush & beach lovers, as a typical day here includes a game drive in the morning, lunch and a few hours on the beach at Cape Vidal, and then a afternoon game drive back to St. Lucia town. Highlights include:

Superb landscapes & sweeping vistas of the wetland savanna, which looks like no other savanna in South Africa. In fact, the openness of vast grasslands with only here and there a tree looks more like the classic East African Savanna, than like the usual ‘more bushy’ South African savanna.

Catalina Bay is a section of the St. Lucia lake, and is always worth a visit for bird lovers. Plenty of crocodile and hippo can be seen there too.

Chances of seeing elephant, cheetah, wild dog and lions here are remote to zero, as the latter three don’t occur here yet, and the elephants only cross the lake a couple of times a year to explore the Eastern Shores. The other days of the year one can find them on the Western Shores. However, the Eastern Shores has a large population of disease free buffalo which are often encountered, as are the rhino’s. For me one of the greatest assets are the magnificent kudu often found here out in the open. They have huge horns, and also the waterbuck are very impressive. The smaller relative of the Waterbuck, the Southern Reedbuck is very common here and easily observed.  With a bit of luck one might encounter one of the many leopards in the area.

The narrow strip of coastal forest running along the coastal dunes are home to the Sykes’ (or Samango) Monkey, which are quite habituated to humans (and photographers!).

Once one drives over the dunes to visit Mission Rocks or Cape Vidal, a complete new world opens up.  Beautiful beaches, both sandy and rocky, are great for fishing, snorkeling, surfing, swimming, sunbathing and of course photography. It is amazing how much colourful life lives on those rocks, and for the photographer patient enough hermit crabs come out of their shell, and ghost crabs out of their burrows. It can be really rewarding to sit dead still for a while.

Talking about little critters, the herpetofauna is great here to, thanks to the high diversity of ecosystems, of which most are relatively wet. For the photographer with a keen eye and the right equipment in terms of flashes, softboxes, tripods and remote releases, little frogs and chameleons are happy to pose and can yield really nice photos.

Enough for today, next month more about the Western Shores of the iSimangaliso Wetland Park.

Kind Regards,

Nick van de Wiel

Nick’s Links:

• Website – Nu Photography
• Safaris - Tailor Made Safaris (soon in English)