HOWICK, MIDMAR NATURE RESERVE TO BALLITO BAY, SOUTH AFRICA-- Thursday, March 13, 2014

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Howick, Midmar Nature Reserve to Ballito Bay (146 km or 90 miles), Thursday, March 13^th.

Left the campground and went back up highway 103 to the Nelson Mandela capture site to look at the museum there. The museum consisted entirely of large photos blown up with writings and sayings on them, hung along the walls. The photos detailed his youth, his family, his education, and other aspects of his life. After walking through the museum, we looked at the craft shops where the women were doing pictures out of beads and some other craft work. Valerie took pictures of the very interesting large, imposing, metal sculpture that stands in the front entrance by the road. It is a picture of Mandela’s face behind bars, but you only see his face in the work if you stand in one spot. Otherwise, the sculpture just looks like metal bumpy-sided “spears” stuck in the ground in a circle.

Drove back on R-103, past the dam falls, and into the town of Howick to look at the Howick Falls. The fall of the Umgeni River at this point, is approximately 310 feet in height. Many people have been swept over the falls, especially in the pioneer days as some settlers thought the easiest place to cross the river was just above the falls. There have been a recorded 40 deaths with the first occurring in 1851. Most were suicides, but all add to the several legends surrounding these falls.

There is a nice touristy area around falls with clean looking craft shops and restaurants. We parked our RV with the others in the group in a large parking lot. We then walked the couple blocks to the Falls and then wandered in a craft store on the way back and bought some hand-made beaded Christmas items that were on sale. Bead work (using glass beads of every color and size) is THE typical craft work of South Africa. All the native costumes that we have seen with the dancers and others have had bead worked designs somewhere on them as well as on their belts, necklaces, and headpieces.

As we left the falls, our intent was to drive along the R-103 to the town of Pietermaritzburg and then find R-33/614 and take it to where it came out by the new airport and Ballito Bay that would allow us to completely miss Durban and the congestion of a big city. First we had to find R-103 out of Howick. We circled around, I lost track of the number of times, until we stopped and asked directions. Then, we still circled around until we finally decided to chance a road without signs that looked as if it went into a residential area. It did, but it also was the correct road south and we gave a sigh of relief when we finally found an R-103 sign along the way.

The 30 km drive was really something else, as it went along the crest of the hill with fabulous homes on either side with exquisite landscaping. Trees, vines, flowers, and flowering shrubs abloom in all kinds of color. The road was really narrow and very windy with some traffic behind us, so, there was no way Valerie could stop for pictures. We just had to take them with our “minds eye” to pull out and enjoy later.

Dropped downhill quickly and right onto the main street of the old town of Pietermaritzburg that was founded in 1838. This is the capitol and second largest city in the province (or state) of KwaZulu-Natal. It looked like a very interesting Victorian town to browse through. We took several pictures of old buildings when we stopped for red lights, keeping our eyes out for the road we wanted to take from here. We kept going along this main street, passing a University and modern buildings until we saw the entrance to the toll-way directly ahead of us and realized somehow we had missed our turn. At this point, we decided not to go back the several miles but to hop on the N-3 toll-way and fight the traffic around the city of Durban. When we got at exit 165, we turned north, and dropped back onto the familiar N-2, which follows the coast of South Africa.

Not only did we now find traffic like we hadn’t seen since leaving Cape Town, but also massive road construction that will take years to finish. To top it off, there were still “watch out for cows” signs along the road. The trucks and cars were so tightly packed there wasn’t room for a cow to get through! Clearing the worst of the jam around a widening of a bridge at a junction with a new freeway, we were soon driving through endless sugar cane fields and banana plantations.

About 50 km from the N-3/N-2 junction, past the newly-built-for-the-world-cup- soccer-games airport, we took exit number 210 and crossed over the toll-way. In front of us was a small mall with road construction on-going here also. Navigated a couple traffic circles and numerous speed bumps heading down the hill to the bay.

From there, we turned left and made our way to the Dolphin Holiday Resort, which is set in this tropical environment. Checked in and found a spot to park on the grass, under some trees, and not far from the ablution block that was just across the road in front of us. Valerie walked over to a small shopping mall and got diet cokes, a huge piece of apple strudel and some other items. We were warned again about monkeys in the campground, so vents and windows needed to be closed. A group dinner, hosted by the campground management’s family, was planned at 6:00 in a patio area. It was a nice buffet of chicken and chips (or fries for the non-British speaking).

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