Blog update 9 June 2013 – 18 June 2013

So, we decided to leave Lalanathi a couple of days early, for not other reason than to plan to spend a few extra days in Dundee so that John could get more time in for fly fishing and piccies, as well as a couple more bicycle rides.  Cycling on the South Coast was a ‘no-n0’.  This was where Burry Stander was killed, his bicycle on the side of the road is a constant reminder of how dangerous it is to cycle there.

We left Lalanathi on the morning of the 12 June 2013 after a tearful farewell from Barry, Charlotte, the boys, the animals, Bonnie and Alfred.  If we are ever there again, we will definitely be staying at Lalanathi, our experience there was awesome.

We hit the highway to Mtunzini, Zululand, about 250kms from Anerley.   The N2 is a toll road, so be prepared to fork out your rands.  We noticed lots of smog or cloud banks of smoke, followed by black residue along the way, but weren’t too sure why this was..more of that later.

Having emailed ahead to Xaxaza Caravan Park, our new home for the next month (or so we thought), we arrived at Reception to book in and were met by a lady whom I thought was the owner. She fiddled and faddled around, not sure where to put us, hummed and haaed, so eventually after giving me two keys to two separate bathrooms (heaven knows why), she sort of pointed us in the direction of where Mandy and Zillah were camped.   Wow, what a different experience to the welcome we had, had at Lalanathi :(.  Anyway, after hugs and smiles all round, we set up camp and took the dogs for a well deserved walk around the burbs of Mtunzini   Almost every home has dogs…either not walked very often, or very lonely, cause they make one hellava racket as we walk past

We made our first trip to Richards Bay for some ‘retail therapy’ and of course to stock our cupboards that had run low on provisions.  I mentioned the black residue, well we now knew exactly where that came from.   There are loads of sugar cane fields in Zululand.  From June to December each year the sugarcane is harvested for the sugarmills.   The fields are burnt and the byproduct is the sugarcane, however billows and billows of black smoke engulf Richards Bay, Mtunzini and any other towns that happen to be in the way every time they have a sugarcane burn, which has been often in the two weeks we have been here…once complete this haze hangs over the land, along with it, is the ashes or black residue that gets inside your nose, chest and lungs.  The locals call it ‘the black snow’.  YUK, is an understatement.  In fact, all of us suffered from runny noses, closed chest..some of us a bit more than others aka Mandy and Tina…I felt like S…T.   For this reason and others, we are moving on to our next destination two weeks earlier than we had planned.

Anyway that is the downside of Mtunzini.  The upside is…the town is beautiful.  The beach is in a reserve and the reserve boasts magificent forest walks, complete with boardwalks through old trees, swamps and rafia palms, which are endemic to this area.

From us to you….till next time