Saint Lucia, South Africa

An Africa as Wild as Zulu


beach hazard
Bathers enter one of the closest beaches to Santa Lucia, even so, with a warning of the threat of sharks, crocodiles and hippos.
rhino duo
Adult white rhinoceros and a calf, two specimens of the many that inhabit the Hluluwe-Infolozi National Park.
Indian Mermaid
The Sbongile bather at the edge of the Indian Ocean.
weight crossing
White rhino crossing a dirt road from PN Hluluwe-Infolozi.
by detour
Cruise boat about to leave the main stream of the Umfolozi River, near Santa Lucia.
lookout
Hippopotamus controls the passage of one of the Umfolozi River cruise boats through its territory.
Sipho Mtshalo
One of the guides that show the fauna of PN Hluluwe-Infolozi to visitors.
their africa
Elephants roam the green slope of PN Hluluwe-Infolozi.
an easy sighting
PN visitor Hluluwe-Infolozi observes an elephant about to cross a park road.
Indian delight
Precious, Phindile, Sbongile and Stozi relax in the sea next to Santa Lucia.
Umfolosi river below
Boat approaches the silted mouth of the Umfolozi River.
small adjustment
Couple getting a haircut during a long amateur photo production.
amphibious sunset
Hippos share the Umfolosi River in the vicinity of Santa Lucia.
On the eminence of the coast of Mozambique, the province of KwaZulu-Natal is home to an unexpected South Africa. Deserted beaches full of dunes, vast estuarine swamps and hills covered with fog fill this wild land also bathed by the Indian Ocean. It is shared by the subjects of the always proud Zulu nation and one of the most prolific and diverse fauna on the African continent.

The first time that Isimangaliso national park's scenery caught our attention was in a television documentary prolific in aerial images.

The helicopter surprised herds that, far below, plowed through undulating pastures and the muddy water of swamps. They were crocodiles, suspicious buffaloes by the hundreds, hippos by the dozen, pink, like the leggy flamingos.

The third largest protected area in South Africa, Isimangaliso occupies an untamed immensity of marshes in a condominium with savannah and dunes that, over 300 km, almost enter the Indian Ocean into the interior.

Even called Lake St. Lucia, this landscape actually turns out to be the long winding estuary of the Umfolozi River, one of the largest in Africa, added by UNESCO in 1999 to its glorious World Heritage list.

Until some time ago, PN Isimangaliso was called the Greater Santa Lucia Wetlands Park. It is precisely at Saint Lucia that we arrive aboard the Nomad truck, coming from the high and rainy areas of Swaziland and the Lesotho frosts.

Alberthram TENK Engle, the guide and driver, and Ricardo Juris, the cook and assistant, were well acquainted with the village's holidaying aura, associated by South Africans with both rest and adventure.

In agreement, the sunny afternoon is still halfway through, they park the vehicle and inform through the microphone they used to communicate with the passengers: “Okay, folks, now it's time to settle down. Around four-thirty, we went out for showers.”

The Windy but Very Bathing Coast of Jabula Beach

We were happy to join the group. Twenty minutes after the hour, we were already facing an endless beach, Jabula. A wooden panel catches our attention.

It takes us back to something that had surprised and frustrated us years before in north-east Australia, Queensland, where bathing beaches proved rare.

Jabula Beach, Kwazulu Natal, South Africa

Bathers enter one of the closest beaches to Santa Lucia, even so, with a warning of the threat of sharks, crocodiles and hippos.

The faunal nuisance of the sharks present in a large part of the coast of South Africa was not enough, in the warning, they were also joined by the threat of crocodiles and hippos.

In more remote areas of the park, also from elephants, rhinos and leopards. There, where we were, the first three appeared from time to time. It was something that didn't seem to worry a growing band of South African bathers eager for the pleasures of the sea.

If the South Africans – Tenk and Ricardo involved – ignored the threat, who were we to despise them. We slip into the darkened and somewhat frantic threshold of the Indian Ocean. The tide had gone out so that the depth of the water was visibly diminishing and precipitating the successive crashing of waves.

Bather at Jabula beach, Kwazulu Natal, South Africa

The Sbongile bather at the edge of the Indian Ocean.

We felt that, on the whole, this would keep us safe from sharks and crocodiles, in those parts, on the Nile, not marine like their counterparts on the Big Island.

We weren't seeing hippos emerging from the middle of those successive waves either, and the beach was still full of people.

Supposedly safe, we continued to jump against the waves, drill through them and, whenever possible, ride them, in a delicious aquatic exercise with which we made up for the days before spent at the PN Kruger, the Blyde river canyon and other iconic but far from the sea.

Tenk and Ricardo, who are also used to life along the fishing coast in the vicinity of Cape Agulhas and in need of alleviating the stress caused by the responsibility for the journey and for the group, dived and splashed with us and to match.

The wind that blew along the coast, from south to north, swept the outside. In synergy with the tepidity of the Indian water, he postponed the end of the bath for a good twenty minutes.

Bathers on Jabula beach, Kwazulu Natal, South Africa

Couple getting a haircut during a long amateur photo production.

When we returned to dry land, the seafront was already a kind of recreational park, full of families and their young offspring, couples and Zulu teenage friends, all given up to an invigorating conviviality on the soaked sand and unfurled spaces.

The sun soon fell behind the opposite forest and the beach abruptly cooled. Tenk waved us back to “Tommy”, the truck we were following.

Hluluwe-Infolozi National Park: Indian to Interior Kwazulu-Natal

We had dinner at the Shonalanga Inn, where we had checked in, with an ethnic show and a small lesson in Zulu dialect. Soon after, still early, we retired to the room that we had.

The next day, we would explore the Hluluwe-Infolozi National Park departing before dawn.

Taking into account the temperature of the past afternoon, the latitude at which we were and the proximity of the coast, we would hardly anticipate it, but as soon as we put our nose out of the room it was quite cold.

Two guides from the park received us and distributed us to the jeeps they were driving, with blankets, in case we were not going to freeze on the way.

The trip to the northwest interior took nearly an hour. Upon arrival, during the day, while guide Sipho Mtshalo explained to us what we were going to find in the park, we were able to contemplate it with eyes to see. We were in charge of what the group immediately identified as an Eddie Murphy lookalike.

PN Guide Hluluwe-Infolozi, Kwazulu Natal, South Africa

One of the guides that show the fauna of PN Hluluwe-Infolozi to visitors.

A clone of the actor, himself the creator of jokes after jokes but that, due to the closed and monotone way he spoke, no one could understand.

Much like Murphy in “A Prince in New York”, Sipho proved to be, more than sure, something vain. He was buttoned up immaculately in the blue trench coat that served as his uniform, with a small South African flag sewn over his heart.

Combined it with a fur hat, adventurous enough but elegant, of course. Well, as he confessed to us, Sipho already had a good part of what he wanted in his life, including four women and – he still boasted – many cows.

Even so, after just a few minutes, he was already insinuating himself shamelessly with one of the two Austrian participants on the trip. Jackie is not amused again. Let him see as much as he can without getting rude. Sipho conforms.

Finally, he was able to concentrate on the mission he was in charge of: detecting the park's fauna and telling us about its eccentricities.

Hluluwe-Infolozi, an Ancient Wilderness of South Africa

Hluluwe-Infolozi is Africa's oldest nature reserve. Dotted with shrubby hills, it's also the only state park in South Africa where visitors can see all the animals of the ever coveted Big Five.

Elephants, PN Hluluwe-Infolozi, Kwazulu Natal, South Africa

Elephants roam the green slope of PN Hluluwe-Infolozi.

We soon came across rhinos, herds of buffaloes and elephants. Sipho's companion guide even brought the jeep that was driving too close to some of the pachyderms. One of them, furious at the insult, forced him into an emergency reverse gear.

Lions, we saw them from afar, from a viewpoint that we shared with several families afrikaans, in the company of men forty and fifty who, despite it being just after ten in the morning and leading the families through the park, slurped beer at a strong pace.

After three and a half days at PN Kruger, Hluluwe-Infolozi did not add worlds and backgrounds to the safari history we already brought and which we continued to enrich. The park, however, is home to one of the largest populations of white rhinos in the world.

Rhinoceros, PN Hluluwe-Infolozi, Kwazulu Natal, South Africa

White rhino crossing a dirt road from PN Hluluwe-Infolozi.

Without wasting almost any time in their search, we were dazzled by several specimens just a few meters away.

Combined with the spacious and gentle settings of those African confines and the smiling and caricatured character of Sipho, this gift ended up making up for the painful night awakening and the sleepy and frigid lethargy in which we found ourselves until the sun rose over the horizon.

Elephants, PN Hluluwe-Infolozi, Kwazulu Natal, South Africa

PN visitor Hluluwe-Infolozi observes an elephant about to cross a park road.

We return to Santa Lucia around lunchtime and take the opportunity to investigate more of those places. If in Swaziland we were surprised by the predominance of Galp service stations, we should have already foreseen that the Portuguese Discoveries also in the Zulu coastal lands must have left a mark.

The Catastrophic Passage of Alvares Cabral to Largo

A little more than half a century after Bartolomeu Dias rounded Cabo das Tormentas, the Portuguese ship “São Bento” came from Cochim commanded by Fernão de Alvares Cabral (son of Pedro Alvares Cabral) and was overloaded.

It sank at the mouth of the Msikaba River, near the present-day city of Port Edward. Inspired by the abundance of yellowish dunes, the surviving crew for the first time christened the region at the mouth of the Umfolozi River the Rio dos Medos de Ouro.

Later, the navigator and cartographer Manuel Perestrello, renamed the Santa Lucia area, on this saint's day. The name ended up “borrowed” from the northernmost area of ​​Zululand we were walking through, the unofficial region once led by the famous and respected King Shaka kaSezangakhone, better known as Shaka Zulu.

Isimingaliso National Park: the Lush Umfolozi River Estuary

Finally, we dedicated ourselves to the Isimingaliso National Park. Lacking the means for a comprehensive incursion into the amphibious immensity, we board one of the boats that travels along the Umfolozi River to the eminence of the Indian Ocean and then back.

By that time, the sun was approaching the horizon once more.

Boat on Umfolosi River, Kwazulu Natal, South Africa

Boat approaches the silted mouth of the Umfolozi River.

It gilded the water on the west side and, on the contrary, warmed the green of the vegetation. At the same time, the thick skin of the countless hippos that had taken over the river was fierce, indifferent to the Nile crocodiles and the bull sharks that also proliferated there.

From the top of the deck, we saw them all, including the sunken fins of opportunistic marine predators that had become used to brackish water and to ambush prey in the shallow stream.

Hippopotamus, Umfolozi River, Kwazulu Natal, South Africa

Hippopotamus controls the passage of one of the Umfolozi River cruise boats through its territory.

At a certain point, between riverside cane fields and a forest dotted with fan palms and the like, the Umfolozi bumps into the sediment barrier that long ago robbed it of the Indian Ocean.

Then, with the big star falling behind the ocean and several hippos yawning with inertia and delight, the pilot reverses gear.

Hippopotamus, Umfolozi River, Kwazulu Natal, South Africa

Hippos share the Umfolosi River in the vicinity of Santa Lucia.

As we return to the embarkation point, thousands of fluttering swallows rip through the twilight above. And a second group of Zulu youths secure passengers with displays of warrior dances.

His display is rich in the attack and defense movements that made life so difficult for rival tribes in southern Africa, the South Africa's first settlers, the Voortrekkers (pioneers) boers from which Tenk and Ricardo are proud to descend.

And to the British who followed and who, at the cost of much blood and even more effort, aggregated and dominated the entire country, including the wild and tribal Zululand that had dazzled us for several days.

 

This article was created with the support of NOMADTOURS.CO.ZA and created during a 20-day South African Explorer itinerary between Johannesburg and Cape Town passing through Swaziland and Lesotho,

Table Mountain, South Africa

At the Adamastor Monster Table

From the earliest times of the Discoveries to the present, Table Mountain has always stood out above the South African immensity South African and the surrounding ocean. The centuries passed and Cape Town expanded at his feet. The Capetonians and the visiting outsiders got used to contemplating, ascending and venerating this imposing and mythical plateau.
Graaf-Reinet, South Africa

A Boer Spear in South Africa

In early colonial times, Dutch explorers and settlers were terrified of the Karoo, a region of great heat, great cold, great floods and severe droughts. Until the Dutch East India Company founded Graaf-Reinet there. Since then, the fourth oldest city in the rainbow nation it thrived at a fascinating crossroads in its history.
Cape Cross, Namíbia

The Most Turbulent of the African Colonies

Diogo Cão landed in this cape of Africa in 1486, installed a pattern and turned around. The immediate coastline to the north and south was German, South African, and finally Namibian. Indifferent to successive transfers of nationality, one of the largest seal colonies in the world has maintained its hold there and animates it with deafening marine barks and endless tantrums.
NP Gorongosa, Mozambique

The Heart of Mozambique's Wildlife Shows Signs of Life

Gorongosa was home to one of the most exuberant ecosystems in Africa, but from 1980 to 1992 it succumbed to the Civil War waged between FRELIMO and RENAMO. Greg Carr, Voice Mail's millionaire inventor received a message from the Mozambican ambassador to the UN challenging him to support Mozambique. For the good of the country and humanity, Carr pledged to resurrect the stunning national park that the Portuguese colonial government had created there.
Lüderitz, Namibia

Wilkommen in Africa

Chancellor Bismarck has always disdained overseas possessions. Against his will and all odds, in the middle of the Race for Africa, merchant Adolf Lüderitz forced Germany to take over an inhospitable corner of the continent. The homonymous city prospered and preserves one of the most eccentric heritages of the Germanic empire.
PN Hwange, Zimbabwe

The Legacy of the Late Cecil Lion

On July 1, 2015, Walter Palmer, a dentist and trophy hunter from Minnesota killed Cecil, Zimbabwe's most famous lion. The slaughter generated a viral wave of outrage. As we saw in PN Hwange, nearly two years later, Cecil's descendants thrive.
Miranda, Brazil

Maria dos Jacarés: the Pantanal shelters such Creatures

Eurides Fátima de Barros was born in the interior of the Miranda region. 38 years ago, he settled in a small business on the side of BR262 that crosses the Pantanal and gained an affinity with the alligators that lived on his doorstep. Disgusted that once upon a time the creatures were being slaughtered there, she began to take care of them. Now known as Maria dos Jacarés, she named each of the animals after a soccer player or coach. It also makes sure they recognize your calls.
Cape of Good Hope - Cape of Good Hope NP, South Africa

On the edge of the Old End of the World

We arrived where great Africa yielded to the domains of the “Mostrengo” Adamastor and the Portuguese navigators trembled like sticks. There, where Earth was, after all, far from ending, the sailors' hope of rounding the tenebrous Cape was challenged by the same storms that continue to ravage there.
Lake Manyara NP, Tanzania

Hemingway's Favorite Africa

Situated on the western edge of the Rift Valley, Lake Manyara National Park is one of the smallest but charming and richest in Europe. wild life of Tanzania. In 1933, between hunting and literary discussions, Ernest Hemingway dedicated a month of his troubled life to him. He narrated those adventurous safari days in “The Green Hills of Africa".
Iberá Wetlands, Argentina

The Pantanal of the Pampas

On the world map, south of the famous brazilian wetland, a little-known flooded region appears, but almost as vast and rich in biodiversity. the Guarani expression Y bera defines it as “shining waters”. The adjective fits more than its strong luminance.
Masai Mara, Kenya

A Journey Through the Masai Lands

The Mara savannah became famous for the confrontation between millions of herbivores and their predators. But, in a reckless communion with wildlife, it is the Masai humans who stand out there.
Savuti, Botswana

Savuti's Elephant-Eating Lions

A patch of the Kalahari Desert dries up or is irrigated depending on the region's tectonic whims. In Savuti, lions have become used to depending on themselves and prey on the largest animals in the savannah.
Robben Island, South Africa

The Island off the Apartheid

Bartolomeu Dias was the first European to glimpse Robben Island, when crossing the Cape of Storms. Over the centuries, the colonists turned it into an asylum and prison. Nelson Mandela left in 1982 after eighteen years in prison. Twelve years later, he became South Africa's first black president.
Cape Town, South Africa

In the End: the Cape

The crossing of Cabo das Tormentas, led by Bartolomeu Dias, transformed this almost southern tip of Africa into an unavoidable scale. And, over time, in Cape Town, one of the meeting points of civilizations and monumental cities on the face of the Earth.
Garden Route, South Africa

The Garden Coast of South Africa

Extending over more than 200km of natural coastline, the Garden Route zigzags through forests, beaches, lakes, gorges and splendid natural parks. We travel from east to west, along the dramatic bottoms of the African continent.
Panorama Route, South Africa

On the South African Panorama Route

We drive from the deep meanders of the Blyde River to the picturesque ex-colonial settlement of Pilgrim's Rest and the Sudwala Caves. Mile after mile, the province of Mpumalanga reveals its grandeur.
Pilgrim's Rest, South Africa

Pilgrimage to the Mining Legacy of the Old Transvaal

The region north of the Vaal River has been home to two major gold rushes. The second began in 1870, but it was not until the XNUMXth century that the introduction of electricity and industrial machinery generated substantial wealth. Enough to establish a mint, a bank, dozens of other businesses and the homes of the South African national monument Pilgrim's Rest.
Kruger National Park, South Africa

The Ancient National Park of South Africa

Part of its current area was already protected before the turn of the 1926th century. Declared the first national park in the Rainbow Nation in XNUMX, the Kruger National Park has continued to expand. Today, the XNUMXth largest in Africa, it is home to the coveted Big Five and a multitude of other species.
Residents walk along the trail that runs through plantations above the UP4
City
Gurué, Mozambique, Part 1

Through the Mozambican Lands of Tea

The Portuguese founded Gurué in the 1930th century and, from XNUMX onwards, flooded it with camellia sinensis the foothills of the Namuli Mountains. Later, they renamed it Vila Junqueiro, in honor of its main promoter. With the independence of Mozambique and the civil war, the town regressed. It continues to stand out for the lush green imposing mountains and teak landscapes.
Skipper of one of the bangkas at Raymen Beach Resort during a break from sailing
Beach
Islands Guimaras  e  Ave Maria, Philippines

Towards Ave Maria Island, in a Philippines full of Grace

Discovering the Western Visayas archipelago, we set aside a day to travel from Iloilo along the northwest coast of Guimaras. The beach tour along one of the Philippines’ countless pristine coastlines ends on the stunning Ave Maria Island.
A campfire lights up and warms the night, next to Reilly's Rock Hilltop Lodge,
safari
Mlilwane Wildlife Sanctuary, eSwatini

The Fire That Revived eSwatini's Wildlife

By the middle of the last century, overhunting was wiping out much of the kingdom of Swaziland’s wildlife. Ted Reilly, the son of the pioneer settler who owned Mlilwane, took action. In 1961, he created the first protected area of ​​the Big Game Parks he later founded. He also preserved the Swazi term for the small fires that lightning has long caused.
Braga or Braka or Brakra in Nepal
Annapurna (circuit)
Annapurna Circuit: 6th – Braga, Nepal

The Ancient Nepal of Braga

Four days of walking later, we slept at 3.519 meters from Braga (Braka). Upon arrival, only the name is familiar to us. Faced with the mystical charm of the town, arranged around one of the oldest and most revered Buddhist monasteries on the Annapurna circuit, we continued our journey there. acclimatization with ascent to Ice Lake (4620m).
Visitors at Talisay Ruins, Negros Island, Philippines
Architecture & Design
Talisay City, Philippines

Monument to a Luso-Philippine Love

At the end of the 11th century, Mariano Lacson, a Filipino farmer, and Maria Braga, a Portuguese woman from Macau, fell in love and got married. During the pregnancy of what would be her 2th child, Maria succumbed to a fall. Destroyed, Mariano built a mansion in his honor. In the midst of World War II, the mansion was set on fire, but the elegant ruins that endured perpetuate their tragic relationship.
Full Dog Mushing
Aventura
Seward, Alaska

The Alaskan Dog Mushing Summer

It's almost 30 degrees and the glaciers are melting. In Alaska, entrepreneurs have little time to get rich. Until the end of August, dog mushing cannot stop.
Australia Day, Perth, Australian Flag
Ceremonies and Festivities
Perth, Australia

Australia Day: In Honor of the Foundation, Mourning for Invasion

26/1 is a controversial date in Australia. While British settlers celebrate it with barbecues and lots of beer, Aborigines celebrate the fact that they haven't been completely wiped out.
Vegetables, Little India, Sari Singapore, Singapore
Cities
Little India, Singapore

The Sari Singapore of Little India

There are thousands of inhabitants instead of the 1.3 billion of the mother country, but Little India, a neighborhood in tiny Singapore, does not lack soul. No soul, no smell of Bollywood curry and music.
Beverage Machines, Japan
Lunch time
Japan

The Beverage Machines Empire

There are more than 5 million ultra-tech light boxes spread across the country and many more exuberant cans and bottles of appealing drinks. The Japanese have long since stopped resisting them.
Tiredness in shades of green
Culture
Suzdal, Russia

The Suzdal Cucumber Celebrations

With summer and warm weather, the Russian city of Suzdal relaxes from its ancient religious orthodoxy. The old town is also famous for having the best cucumbers in the nation. When July arrives, it turns the newly harvested into a real festival.
Reindeer Racing, Kings Cup, Inari, Finland
Sport
Inari, Finland

The Wackiest Race on the Top of the World

Finland's Lapps have been competing in the tow of their reindeer for centuries. In the final of the Kings Cup - Porokuninkuusajot - , they face each other at great speed, well above the Arctic Circle and well below zero.
Aurora lights up the Pisang Valley, Nepal.
Traveling
Annapurna Circuit: 3rd- Upper Banana, Nepal

An Unexpected Snowy Aurora

At the first glimmers of light, the sight of the white mantle that had covered the village during the night dazzles us. With one of the toughest walks on the Annapurna Circuit ahead of us, we postponed the match as much as possible. Annoyed, we left Upper Pisang towards Escort when the last snow faded.
Resident of Dali, Yunnan, China
Ethnic
Dali, China

The Surrealist China of Dali

Embedded in a magical lakeside setting, the ancient capital of the Bai people has remained, until some time ago, a refuge for the backpacker community of travelers. The social and economic changes of China they fomented the invasion of Chinese to discover the southwest corner of the nation.
sunlight photography, sun, lights
Got2Globe Photo Portfolio
Natural Light (Part 2)

One Sun, So Many Lights

Most travel photos are taken in sunlight. Sunlight and weather form a capricious interaction. Learn how to predict, detect and use at its best.
Sunset at Flat Lake, Louisiana
History
Atchafalaya Basin, Louisiana, USA  

The Great Swamp of the Deep South

For some reason the indigenous people called it “long river”. At one point, the Atchafalaya spills out into a swamp made up of canal-connected lagoons dotted with cypress, oak and tupelo trees. We explored it, between Lafayette and Morgan, Louisiana, on the way to its mouth on the Gulf of Mexico.
Solovestsky Autumn
Islands
Solovetsky Islands, Russia

The Mother Island of the Gulag Archipelago

It hosted one of Russia's most powerful Orthodox religious domains, but Lenin and Stalin turned it into a gulag. With the fall of the USSR, Solovestky regains his peace and spirituality.
Horses under a snow, Iceland Never Ending Snow Island Fire
Winter White
Husavik a Myvatn, Iceland

Endless Snow on the Island of Fire

When, in mid-May, Iceland already enjoys some sun warmth but the cold and snow persist, the inhabitants give in to an intriguing summer anxiety.
Almada Negreiros, Roça Saudade, Sao Tome
Literature
Saudade, São Tomé, São Tomé and Principe

Almada Negreiros: From Saudade to Eternity

Almada Negreiros was born in April 1893, on a farm in the interior of São Tomé. Upon discovering his origins, we believe that the luxuriant exuberance in which he began to grow oxygenated his fruitful creativity.
Pitões das Junias, Montalegre, Portugal
Nature
Montalegre, Portugal

Through Alto do Barroso, Top of Trás-os-Montes

we moved from Terras de Bouro for those of Barroso. Based in Montalegre, we wander around the discovery of Paredes do Rio, Tourém, Pitões das Júnias and its monastery, stunning villages on the border of Portugal. If it is true that Barroso has had more inhabitants, visitors should not miss it.
Girl plays with leaves on the shore of the Great Lake at Catherine Palace
Autumn
Saint Petersburg, Russia

Golden Days Before the Storm

Aside from the political and military events precipitated by Russia, from mid-September onwards, autumn takes over the country. In previous years, when visiting Saint Petersburg, we witnessed how the cultural and northern capital was covered in a resplendent yellow-orange. A dazzling light that hardly matches the political and military gloom that had spread in the meantime.
Jeep drives along a road lined with dagger cacti
Natural Parks
PN Washington Slagbaai, Bonaire

The Thorny Top of Bonaire

The Washington Slagbaai National Park occupies a rugged, cactus-filled expanse in the northwest corner of Bonaire. During the slave-owning era, the Dutch used it as their main production base, producing salt, goat meat, timber and other commodities. In the late 70s, in order to protect its unique biomes and landscapes, they declared it a nature sanctuary.
Saida Ksar Ouled Soltane, festival of the ksour, tataouine, tunisia
UNESCO World Heritage
Tataouine, Tunisia

Festival of the Ksour: Sand Castles That Don't Collapse

The ksour were built as fortifications by the Berbers of North Africa. They resisted Arab invasions and centuries of erosion. Every year, the Festival of the Ksour pays them the due homage.
Heroes Acre Monument, Zimbabwe
Characters
Harare, Zimbabwewe

The Last Rales of Surreal Mugabué

In 2015, Zimbabwe's first lady Grace Mugabe said the 91-year-old president would rule until the age of 100 in a special wheelchair. Shortly thereafter, it began to insinuate itself into his succession. But in recent days, the generals have finally precipitated the removal of Robert Mugabe, who has replaced him with former Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa.
Boat and helmsman, Cayo Los Pájaros, Los Haitises, Dominican Republic
Beaches
Samaná PeninsulaLos Haitises National Park Dominican Republic

From the Samaná Peninsula to the Dominican Haitises

In the northeast corner of the Dominican Republic, where Caribbean nature still triumphs, we face an Atlantic much more vigorous than expected in these parts. There we ride on a communal basis to the famous Limón waterfall, cross the bay of Samaná and penetrate the remote and exuberant “land of the mountains” that encloses it.
Madu River: owner of a Fish SPA, with feet inside the doctor fish pond
Religion
Madu River and Lagoon, Sri Lanka

Along the Course of the Sinhala Buddhism

For having hidden and protected a tooth of Buddha, a tiny island in the Madu lagoon received an evocative temple and is considered sacred. O Maduganga immense all around, in turn, it has become one of the most praised wetlands in Sri Lanka.
Flam Railway composition below a waterfall, Norway.
On Rails
Nesbyen to Flam, Norway

Flam Railway: Sublime Norway from the First to the Last Station

By road and aboard the Flam Railway, on one of the steepest railway routes in the world, we reach Flam and the entrance to the Sognefjord, the largest, deepest and most revered of the Scandinavian fjords. From the starting point to the last station, this monumental Norway that we have unveiled is confirmed.
San Cristobal de Las Casas, Chiapas, Zapatismo, Mexico, San Nicolau Cathedral
Society
San Cristobal de Las Casas, Mexico

The Home Sweet Home of Mexican Social Conscience

Mayan, mestizo and Hispanic, Zapatista and tourist, country and cosmopolitan, San Cristobal has no hands to measure. In it, Mexican and expatriate backpacker visitors and political activists share a common ideological demand.
Daily life
Arduous Professions

the bread the devil kneaded

Work is essential to most lives. But, certain jobs impose a degree of effort, monotony or danger that only a few chosen ones can measure up to.
Flock of flamingos, Laguna Oviedo, Dominican Republic
Wildlife
Oviedo Lagoon, Dominican Republic

The Dead Sea (nothing) of the Dominican Republic

The hypersalinity of the Laguna de Oviedo fluctuates depending on evaporation and water supplied by rain and the flow coming from the neighboring mountain range of Bahoruco. The natives of the region estimate that, as a rule, it has three times the level of sea salt. There, we discover prolific colonies of flamingos and iguanas, among many other species that make up one of the most exuberant ecosystems on the island of Hispaniola.
Napali Coast and Waimea Canyon, Kauai, Hawaii Wrinkles
Scenic Flights
napali coast, Hawaii

Hawaii's Dazzling Wrinkles

Kauai is the greenest and rainiest island in the Hawaiian archipelago. It is also the oldest. As we explore its Napalo Coast by land, sea and air, we are amazed to see how the passage of millennia has only favored it.