The iconic Knysna Heads – Featured Blog

What are the icons of the Garden Route? There are a few.  The adventure activities in the Tsitsikamma, Storms River Mouth, the view over the Beacon Isle Hotel with Robberg in the distance, the Knysna forest, the lakes around Sedgefield and Wilderness, Kaaimans Bridge outside Wilderness (especially when the Choo Tjoe still ran), Outeniqua Pass in George and the Dias Museum in Mossel Bay.  I left one out on purpose.  Probably (one of) the biggest icon on the Garden Route must be the Knysna Heads and, directly linked to it, the Knysna Lagoon – which is actually an estuary.

The Eastern Head is mostly a upmarket residential area where most of the houses have views we can only dream of.  The Western Head area is part of the Featherbed Nature Reserve so the area is protected and not developed.  Thank goodness.

Another view site just down the road gives one this magnificent view of the lagoon with Leisure Isle in the middle and the town in the distance.  It was a greyish day so I just slapped it with a bit of HDR for the effect. 

The West Coast and Namakwaland is famous for their spring flowers while a number of reserves in the southern Cape, one of these being the Baviaanskloof Wilderness Area, are UNESCO World Heritage Sites as it is where the Cape Floral Kingdom occurs.  Living in Port Elizabeth it’s not always possible to do the trek west to go and view flowers but a few weeks ago I realized that it’s not  necessary.

About 40 kilometers west of Port Elizabeth is the Van Stadens Wildflower Reserve, a 500 hectare open space next to the Van Stadens River gorge.  The reserve covers the gorge’s southern wooded slopes, a large plateau to the east and the northern river banks, each with its own vegetation types.  The reserve is covered in various hiking trails ranging from a short 500 meter trail to longer ones up to 11 kilometers.  Some of the trails are also suitable for mountain bikers while there are also gravel roads accessible to cars in the plateau section.  The flowers, especially the flowering proteas, in the reserve is stunning at the moment.  Enjoy the display.