I ♥ White River Because ...

I ♥ White River

Hi, I’m Amanda from umS­isi House and umS­isi Cottage just out­side White River on the way to the Kruger National Park and just minutes away from the Casterbridge Lifestyle Centre.

White River IS BEST KNOWN FOR its prox­im­ity to the Kruger National Park and the Panorama Route.
GET YOUR PICTURE TAKEN IN the Blyde River Canyon and show your friends what it looks like to be '[on top of the world'.
THE BEST PICTURES CAN BE TAKEN AT the Three Rondavels where the sign says 'Do not go any fur­ther'.
OTHER HAPPY SNAPS AT God's Window and Wonder View. Continued

Sabie Valley Coffee – Spilling the Beans

Sabie Valley Coffee

Let me start by dis­pelling a few cof­fee myths: you shouldn't store ground cof­fee in the fridge but in an air­tight con­tainer, decaf cof­fee is punted by the industry because it retails at a higher price not because it's health­ier for you, instant cof­fee is usu­ally chicory and Robusta cof­fee (cheaper to pro­duce, inferior taste, higher in caf­feine) not Arabica, and there is no money to be made in grow­ing cof­fee crops in South Africa.

Today cof­fee crops cost more than any other agri­cul­tural crop in the coun­try. South Africa used to grow lots of cof­fee dur­ing the '70s and '80s, but today, remark­ably, the Sabie farm runs at a loss, some­thing Tim freely admits. It is the roast­ery, the retail and dis­tri­bu­tion of cof­fee around the coun­try to enthu­si­astic local cof­fee sup­port­ers that keep Sabie afloat.

All this, and more, I learn in a rel­at­ively short space of time from a remark­ably per­son­able Tim Buckland (no rela­tion to fam­ous mime artist, Andrew, I checked), the owner of Sabie Valley Coffee who does weekly cof­fee tours of his roast­ery in the Lowveld. Continued

Casterbridge in White River, almost a Hardy novel setting

Casterbridge

White River is linked to Nelspruit by the R40. The two towns are so close (20 minutes' drive) that it is only time before they merge, incor­por­at­ing the rather innoc­u­ous Rocky Drift that at the moment serves as a buf­fer between them.

The secret to travel, any­where, is to do as the loc­als do – 'when in Rome' and all that. I real­ise more and more that it isn't about read­ing travel bro­chures – they'll send you where they want you to go – but fol­low­ing the trail of loc­als, as they'll lead you to spaces and places where spend­ing your hard-earned dosh will feel that much more reward­ing. Continued

Le Pâtissier — when in Hazyview, visit the Belgian Baker

Le Pâtissier

Croissants, coun­try ham, quiche Lorraine, pastries that include apple turnover, Belgian milk tart, chocol­ate eclair, Danish eight, apple fran­gi­pane, cus­tard slice; Belgian break­fast with an assort­ment of cheeses, crois­sant or pain au chocolat, health bread sand­wiches, artisan breads of every descrip­tion, and cof­fee to die for...

Hazyview, when we get there, is busy. That it rests just out­side the Kruger National Park is doubt­less the reason, par­tic­u­larly as every second vehicle is some rendi­tion of the safari jeep; the type with staggered rows of seat­ing remin­is­cent of a mini-theatre on wheels – 'ta da, we're here to see wild life!' Continued

Kruger – the low down on what to remember, where to stay, what to do and spotting the Big 5

Kruger National Park

The Kruger National Park is undoubtedly THE place to be when it comes to see­ing game in what should be their nat­ural envir­on­ment.  Even if dur­ing school hol­i­days the num­ber of people enter­ing the park is ques­tion­able, traffic fairly con­ges­ted, and the tend­ency of indi­vidu­als to do silly things like feed hyenas and mon­keys (now a con­stant pest in vari­ous rest camps) a sign that even in the Kruger, humans are encroach­ing on the free­dom of the anim­als within. Despite this Kruger Park is a fant­astic experience.

One of the world's largest game parks, Kruger has received a  myriad accol­ades for nature con­ser­va­tion and, more recently, has begun lower­ing fences that sep­ar­ate the park from neigh­bour­ing reserves, allow­ing the wild­life within even greater access to land and water, and increas­ing the chance to spot game. Continued

I ♥ Hazyview Because ...

I ♥ Hazyview

Hi, I’m Tina from Böhm’s Zeederberg Country House in Hazyview, Panorama Route, Mpumalanga.

Hazyview IS BEST KNOWN FOR its warm friendly cli­mate and people, and being so cent­rally loc­ated to major tour­ist attrac­tions such as Kruger National Park and Blyde River Canyon.

GET YOUR PICTURE TAKEN AT God’s Window (surely the closest you will get to heaven on earth)!

THE BEST sun­downer PICTURES CAN BE TAKEN AT the sun­downer deck with a cock­tail in hand at Böhm’s Zeederberg Country House. Continued

Southern Kruger — we review 3 restcamps + hot spots for sighting game

Southern Kruger

The south­ern region of the Kruger National Park lies between the Crocodile River to the south, the Sabie in the north and, in the east, the Lebombo Mountains. Nothing quite pre­pares you for the park's impact, the trees and hills an unex­pec­ted fla­vour to the pic­ture I had of the bushveld as, well, flat (des­pite hav­ing gone to the Kruger as a child).

The south­ern region gets more rain dur­ing the year which trans­lates into more game, shaded by the pres­ence of the Cape chest­nut, coral tree, lav­ender fever berry, and white pear. Continued

A Diversion en Route to Barberton – Boondocks Labyrinth

Boondocks Labyrinth

Stuart and I get off on the wrong foot with one another. It doesn't help that I hear incor­rectly when he intro­duces him­self, and pro­ceed to call him by the wrong name until he gra­ciously cor­rects me when I finally shake his hand at the gate.

He bears this inad­vert­ent dis­cour­tesy without cri­ti­cism, grace­fully in fact. As he does my chal­len­ging tone (I'm a little stressed and Stuart gets the brunt of it. Would it make me look a little bet­ter if I added that I don't like talk­ing on cell phones?).

I later laugh at Stuart's account of what it takes to hold a tele­phone con­ver­sa­tion up on the hill at Boondocks. It is noth­ing short of undig­ni­fied and involves pla­cing one's head vir­tu­ally inside a pot plant with one's der­rière exposed – cell phone recep­tion is vir­tu­ally non-existent, except at the site of the plant and inter­mit­tently on the edge of the escarp­ment. And Telkom refuse to bring in a line all this way. Not hav­ing any tele­com­mu­nic­a­tion or inter­net access forms a large part of the charm of Boondocks. Continued

Nukain Mabusa's Painted Mountain

Mabusa's Painted Mountain

“You can't miss them,” Stuart instructs as we leave Boondocks, “head off that way, go past the what­sit, down a slight dip and they're on your left”. Stuart is busy giv­ing us last minute dir­ec­tions to find Nukain Mabusa's flower garden, advert­ised on most of the local tour­ist inform­a­tion we pick up as worth a look-see.

We zoot off along the R38, Kaapmuiden behind us, Barberton ahead of us. I'm look­ing out for a garden. My bet­ter half, who as usual has done a bit of home­work, is look­ing out for a series of painted rocks. Neither of us is quite pre­pared for the non-event of the stone garden.

Drive too fast and you will pass them by without a back­ward glance. Nowhere is there a road sign to pre­pare you – local tour­ism obvi­ously, des­pite using the designs as a brand­ing tool, hasn't deemed them worthy of any type of formal road­side mar­ket­ing. Continued

I ♥ Malelane Because ...

I ♥ Malelane

Hi, I’m Peter Jaehne from Khandizwe River Lodge in Malelane.

Malelane IS BEST KNOWN FOR its lush, trop­ical sur­round­ings and prox­im­ity to the Kruger National Park.
GET YOUR PICTURE TAKEN AT the Malelane Bridge with hip­pos frol­ick­ing below you in river.
THE BEST Kruger Park PICTURES CAN BE TAKEN AT the Malelane Gate,the entrance gate to the Kruger National Park.

WHEN THE WEATHER'S GOOD, I LIKE TO relax in my swim­ming pool watch­ing the ele­phants below the Lodge.
WHEN THE WEATHER'S BAD, I LIKE TO watch National Geographic movies about Africa and its beau­ti­ful wild­life.
I THINK THE BEST TIME OF YEAR TO VISIT IS all year around BECAUSE the col­ours of the bush and its flora and fauna changes all the time. Continued

Kaapsche Hoop — wild horses, blue swallows, historical buildings and time away

Kaapse Hoop

We round the corner at the top of the plat­eau, hav­ing left Nelspruit behind and below us, and there sud­denly in a clear­ing in amongst a series of rough sand­stone rocks, Kaapsche Hoop makes its pres­ence known.

The gor­geous little ham­let lies high enough above the towns of Nelspruit and Barberton to exper­i­ence a com­pletely dif­fer­ent set of weather pat­terns. Residents will tell you that you can anti­cip­ate a dif­fer­ence of at least five degrees. Continued

Adam's Calendar

Adam's Calendar

“Oh, sorry, no we don't organ­ise tours to Adam's Calendar”, the rather disheveled youth who seems to be man­aging Koek 'n Pan single handedly through an unanti­cip­ated brunch rush, tells me.

I good naturedly fail to men­tion that I've already taken the trouble to fill out the form he thrust in my hands earlier, when I broached a tour to the stones. I'm begin­ning to won­der if Adam's Calendar is delib­er­ately ellus­ive and dif­fi­cult to find for vis­it­ors. Perhaps it's fit­ting that the stones, shrouded in mys­tery, remain that way ... Continued

I ♥ Komatipoort Because ...

I ♥ Komatipoort

Hi, I’m Sue Steele from Trees Too Guest Lodge in Komatipoort, Mpumalanga.

Komatipoort IS BEST KNOWN FOR the Crocodile Bridge Gate into the Kruger, being next to the Mozambique and Swaziland bor­ders and for prawns!
GET YOUR PICTURE TAKEN AT the Kruger Park with an obli­ging ele­phant or lion as your back­drop ... sub­ject to avail­ab­il­ity.
THE BEST wild­life PICTURES CAN BE TAKEN AT the sec­tion of the Kruger between Crocodile Bridge and Lower Sabie.
OTHER HAPPY SNAPS AT the stun­ning Samora Machel monu­ment or from a micro light flight up the Crocodile River.

WHEN THE WEATHER'S GOOD, I LIKE TO visit the Kruger Park.
WHEN THE WEATHER'S BAD, I LIKE TO ... visit the Kruger Park! Remember a bad day in the bush beats a good day in the office!
I THINK THE BEST TIME OF YEAR TO VISIT IS March to October, BECAUSE its not too hot and the game view­ing is stun­ning ... although again there is no bad time to visit Komatipoort and the Kruger Park. Continued

Nelspruit's Lowveld Botanical Garden – a little piece of heaven

Lowveld Botanical Garden

Nelspruit's Lowveld Botanical Garden is where I not only lose, but find my hat. Having dropped it some­where on the path­ways through their incred­ible African rain­forest where my mes­mer­ised self lost track of both time, and my hair cov­er­ing. I was to have it restored to me by one of the entrance attend­ants who care­fully placed it to one side to wait for my return visit, which obvi­ously I was then destined to make.

The Lowveld Botanical Garden lies amidst sprawl­ing strip malls and the Tsogo Sun Casinos in the heart of the 'new' part of town that is given over prin­cip­ally to auto­mobile show rooms. It's rather an obscure place for a slice of nature, and for this reason so neces­sary, and only fif­teen minutes' drive from where we stayed in the sub­urb of West Acres.

For those who know of the garden's exist­ence (because for a school hol­i­day it was sur­pris­ingly empty), it's a little piece of para­dise in amongst the hum of the city. Fortunately, the pres­ence of roar­ing water­falls puts paid to any traffic noise and one eas­ily 'escapes', as it were, into the beauty of the garden. Continued

A visit to Nan Hua Buddhist Temple in Bronkhorstspruit

Nan Hua Buddhist Temple

A visit to Nan Hua Buddhist Temple in Bronkhorstspruit — There is no greater peace than con­tent­ment. The best reward in life is peace, some­thing that can­not be given to us by the Buddha or any God. We need to cre­ate the con­di­tions and envir­on­ment for peace within ourselves.  The key to peace is con­tent­ment.   (Ven. Master Hsing Yun)

I'm stand­ing in the vast recep­tion area of the Nan Hua (flower in the south) Buddhist Temple read­ing vari­ous mean­ing­ful pas­sages by the Master Hsing Yun, the founder of the Fo Guang Shan Buddhist Order ... Continued