South Africa - The Garden Route (1-14 September 2025)
After six weeks in Namibia, we were moving on to our next adventure. Originally, when planning this trip a few years ago, we had planned to make our way eastwards to Botswana, for a conservation and wildlife project in the Okavango Delta. Unfortunately, the project we had booked raised the minimum age to 16 a few months before we set out, which meant we could no longer go as a family. We failed to find a meaningful, high quality project there at short notice, so decided that we would add the time on to our planned stint in South Africa and explore the Garden Route - which I think has many possible forms but generally refers to travelling along the southern coastline of South Africa.
I’m so glad that we did - and that Krish was able to join us for the two weeks. After EHRA and Na’ankuse it would have been a mistake to keep pushing into another project, and we would have missed out on some of the most incredible things we have done/seen so far.
A few of the highlights and key places we stopped below
Table Mountain and Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens. We began our stay in Cape Town, and were near the Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens (hat tip to Oliver Dolby for the great recommendations of where to go/stay that led us here). The apartment we had rented had a door at the back of the garden that led directly into the national park and some of the best routes up Table Mountain. So on our first day in Cape Town we set out for a hike, and planned to climb up Skeleton Gorge and back down - estimating that it will take us a couple of hours and give us a chance to relax in the afternoon.
As we set out, it felt like something out of The Hobbit - where the path begins innocously enough at home but ends up traversing through different lands and diverse terrain. We climbed up Skeleton Gorge pathway which is unlike any other short hike we had done - climbing the ladders and up waterfalls was so much fun. At the top we found the slightly surreal white sandy beach that is perched up at 1000m on Table mountain at the reservoir (and we went for a very cold swim!). After a short break on the unexpected beach, Div said she didn’t want to come down the same way as she was worried about her knees, and we had seen signs for cable cars at the top. Without much phone signal/GPS we had to guess, but wondered how far away could they be if there are signs? Turns out - really far. We ended up hiking across the mountain for another 6 hours, traversing across ravines, over and under canyons, through echoing gorges and dipping above and below the clouds that were rolling in off the ocean. It was magic - and the best one-day hike I have ever done.. Krish, Div and I were so impressed by the girls, they didn’t grumble and showed amazing stamina and positivity to stay happy throughout (even though we had brought minimal snacks as we had planned to back by lunchtime!). We had started out at 9am and reached the cable cars at 5:30pm, after a quick well-earned drink we were on our way down and racing towards our dinner reservation. One of our best days so far, some pictures along our hike below.
Hermanus & Gaansbai. These are beautiful seaside towns, and one of the best places in the world for whale-watching and shark-diving. We could see Southern Right Whales breaching and surfacing from our apartment in Hermanus or whilst we were walking along the beach paths, which was an amazing feeling. We had arrived towards the end of the season where the whales give birth and fatten up their calf before setting off again around the world - so we saw a lot of mother and calf pairs. In Gaansbai we all went shark cage diving with the Great White Shark Cage Diving company - who were brilliant and have a conservation arm and are highly ethical in how they do it. We learned a lot from them about protecting marine life and the ecology, and met some of the interns and students doing research here. It was very cool to see the sharks up close, they are magnificent creatures. Whilst we were in this region, we also went to visit Panthera which I will write about in a separate post as it helped answer some questions and resolve some confusion I had been carrying about wildlife conservation since our Na’ankuse experience.
Wilderness & Nature’s Valley. Moving along eastwards, we stayed in Wilderness and in Nature’s Valley for a couple of days. We did some beautiful hikes, found untouched beaches and coves and took in the majestic landscape. We had the best bunny chow of our trip in the only restaurant in Nature’s Valley - so good we went back twice in two days. It was a very different feeling to being in lush forests and serene beaches when compared to the landscape in Namibia and in Cape Town. We also used this as a base to explore Tsitsikama National Park. Wild swimming in the waterfalls at the end of the Half Collared Kingfisher trail was a particular highlight!
Bloukrans Bunjy. The furthest east we got was just over the Bloukrans river. Krish did a bunjy jump off the bridge, which is recognised as the highest commercial bunjy jump in the world. The rest of us opted to “hang out”, where we were harnessed in and leaning over the edge. It was a great experience, a stunning viewpoint and the team there were a lot of fun.
Oudsthoorn & Cango Caves - on our loop back towards Cape Town we stayed in Oudsthoorn and visited the Cango Caves - which are estimated to be a mind-boggling 20 million years old, and show signs of early human settlement. We’ve seen large cave systems before (the most similar we have seen are the caves of Nerja in Southern Spain), but nothing close to the history and wonder of what is here.
Franschhoek - our last stop was in the town of Franschhoek, which is a popular wine region. Whilst Krish and Div did a wine tour, I took Sia and Anaya on a zipwire experience over a national park - and it was so much fun.
