Turtles, Tracks, Beaches

In the upper north-eastern corner of South Africa lies an unspoilt and protected coastline known as the Elephant Coast. EVAN NAUDÉ explored it, and even had time for a quick visit to Mozambique.
 

It is just after 05:00 on a Monday morning when Roy, my taxi driver, picks me up in the dark outside my house in Cape Town. His shift is over after he drops me at the airport, he says, but my whole day is still ahead of me.

It’s going to be one of those long days that happen now and again in the life of a travel journalist, and goes more or less like this: At the airport it’s one long queue onto the plane because the flight is chock-a-block with business people migrating to Johannesburg for the week. I sleep like a log the whole flight and only wake up as we touch down at O.R. Tambo.

Here I’m greeted by Derryck Mitchell from Front Runner and we head through to their factory in Kyalami. Jaco Nel, Front Runner’s sales manager, hands me the keys to a Jeep Rubicon with enough 4x4 gear to make a cash-strapped guy like me drool. For the rest of the day I drive through Gauteng, Mpumalanga and KwaZulu-Natal to reach the coast.

On the way I pick up my co-pilot, Miena Steyl, and by the time we reach St. Lucia it’s already dark.

A taxi, an aeroplane and three provinces in a 4x4 later, I am finally ready to explore the Elephant Coast, which lies between here and the Mozambican border. But that’ll have to wait, because right now I need some sleep.

Don’t feed the crocodiles

The next morning I see the town in the daylight. I’ve never been to St. Lucia before and I immediately like the place. At the town’s entrance there is a sign warning me that hippos roam the streets at night, at the lake there’s another notice asking me not to feed the crocodiles and in front of the supermarket I see a gang of vervet monkeys and later a family of mongoose scurrying across the street.