This post is for the #wednesdaywalk challenge and the #makemesmile challenge collaboration. This collaboration initially took place once a month, but due to its popularity, @tattoodjay (of the #wednesdaywalk) and @elizacheng (of #makemesmile) decided to make it a weekly thing.
If you want to know more about the rules, visit this week's post by @tattoodjay where you will find all the rules at the bottom of his post after you've enjoyed his beautiful photos from his walk.
This last weekend I wanted to see if we could get access to a hiking trail that we walked back in 2019.
Our oldest daughter showed it to us in August back in 2019. It's on the northern side of Umhlanga Rocks in the Umhlanga Rocks Nature Reserve.
Leaving the parking area, next to a holiday resort, the route went through the nature reserve, through the bush, then crossing over a piece of wetland, until you eventually arrive on the beach, north of Umhlanga Rocks.
From there, you can either return via the same route or have a walk down the beach going down south until you can go onto the walkway just above the beach at the northern parts of Umhlanga Rocks. From this walkway, there are several walkways, passing between the various holiday resorts, and going back up to the main road again. From there you can then follow the main road back to the car park again at the Breakers Resort.
Sadly, in July of 2021, we had huge unrest/looting here in South Africa (warning: if you are a sensitive person, the BBC-news article in this link contains disturbing images of violence and a video of a mother who is forced to throw her baby into the crowd below after their building has been set on fire). You can also read more about the looting on Wikipedia.
During the looting, the UPL Chemical Warehouse was set on fire which caused serious chemical spillage, and contamination of the wetland and rivers in the surrounding area.
After things calmed down and started returning to normal, we wanted to do the same hiking trail I mentioned above, but the Umhlanga Nature reserve was closed due to the contamination caused by the chemical spill during the looting.
Just more than a year later, I wanted to see if we could get access to this area again by now.
But it is still closed.
It was a cool, cloudy day, as can be seen in the next photo.
Not being able to get access to the area, I took this photo through the fence, showing the area where the hiking trail is located.
Not being able to enter the nature reserve, we decided to walk down the road along the various holiday resorts, until we could find a walkway that would take us down to the beach.
We didn't have to walk too far to get to the first walkway.
This is looking down towards the beach.
Walking down this walkway, we came across this neat little garden on the side of one of the holiday resorts at the side entrance.
Just below these resorts, we found this walkway. We decided to first go down and spend some time at the beach before coming back to see where this would lead to...
Why should monkeys go through all the trouble of moving through the bushes when they have beautiful walkways where they can move around effortlessly...?
Standing on the northern side, looking down south down the side of Umhlanga Rocks.
Way back, in the distance (the speck on the horizon in the center), you can see the light tower that I have shared in some of my previous posts. That is where the Umhlanga Rocks main beach is.
Clearly, some vehicle has passed here earlier...
We then decided to find out where that walkway would take us too behind the holiday resorts.
It took us to the back of the Breakers Resort, from where we had a beautiful view over the area, including the wetland, where I actually planned on walking on the hiking trail.
It's not very clear, but if you look closely, you can see the little wooden "bridge" (just below the water that is visible) that would have taken us across the wetland and into the bushes on the righthand side. Entering the "bushy area" to the right in the photo would have been the last stretch before arriving on the beach.
Then, to our right, we found another walkway that also led toward the ocean.
At the end of this walkway, we were in for a pleasant surprise...
The bottom end of the Umhlanga Nature Reserve, with a neat walking trail that is maintained by the Breakers Resort.
A nice view of the trail, going up along the coastline, just above the beach.
They took a great effort to not disturb nature while building this trail.
Our first peak at the ocean while walking the trail.
In the next few photos, you can get an idea of some peaks/views we had, looking out over the ocean with some ships waiting to enter Durban Harbor.
And some typical views of the trail, looking ahead...
Along the way, we came across the original hiking trail that we were planning on walking for the day. It is clear that this walking trail has replaced it and it seems that the hiking trail is something of the past. A huge difference between the original "hiking trail" versus the newly built "walking trail"...lol.
Zooming in a bit on the old hiking trail...
I will share the "end destination" of the walking trail we followed in my post on Friday.
So for today, that's all folks.
Our outing started with somewhat of a disappointment, finding that we still cannot get access to the nature reserve and the hiking trail as planned.
But it ended on a good note with discovering this new walking trail leading through the bottom part of the nature reserve.
It was a nice surprise and a very pleasant walk.
Thank you for reading my post! I do appreciate it!