Early in 2021, my wife Jeanie and I were invited to join a group of friends on the Pondo Trail, a slackpacking adventure from Port Edward on the KwaZulu-Natal south coast, across the Mtamvuma River and into the northern part of the Eastern Cape, finishing at a small camp just north of Port St Johns. As unlikely as it seemed in the middle of a Covid wave that we’d be able to travel a year ahead, we still agreed to join the group, hoping that by February 2022 we would all be vaccinated, or immune, or both.
I did ask Jeanie for a moment of pause before we committed, while I quickly assessed the birding potential of five days away, as I always do. Leave taken from work and time away from home must always deliver some good birds. It’s one of the rules of the universe. Fortunately, that coastline represents a largely underbirded area of South Africa and while it’s mostly unknown, I surmised that the subtropical bush of southern KwaZuluNatal and the scarp forests and hilly grassland of the Eastern Cape would be excellent for birding.
This story is from the January/February 2023 edition of African Birdlife.
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This story is from the January/February 2023 edition of African Birdlife.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
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