How many times doesn’t this sort of thing happen? To my knowledge, there are only 2 National Parks in South Africa that Cassia and I haven’t visited and one of them, the Bontebok NP, is a mere 2 hour leisurely drive down the road from our townhouse in Woodbridge Island, Cape Town. It lies on the banks of the Breede river, just outside the historic Western Cape town of Swellendam and was proclaimed in 1931, probably to protect the last remaining Bontebok left in the wild. It is also the smallest of South Africa’s 20 national parks.

So last weekend, Cassia and I decided to rectify this and pay a visit both to the Bontebok NP and Grootvadersbosch Nature Reserve which is a patch of South West Cape indigenous forest situated in the Langeberg about 35 kms north-east of Swellendam. We left Cape Town on Saturday morning and, unfortunately, only arrived in the Bontebok NP at midday during a very hot day, after stopping off for a breakfast omelette at the Rooiberg Wine Estate. On the way into the Park and on the road down to the river and Lang Elsie’s kraal rest camp, we had good sightings of Grey Rhebok and Bontebok.

Although very hot, we were able to pick up a few birds including good sightings of Cloud Cisticola.

On reaching the river, we decided to get some shade in the lunchtime heat, so we parked the vehicle and took a walk along one of the riverside trails through the riverine bush towards the viewing platform. We saw some of the usuals associated with riverine habitat but particularly enjoyed sightings of Brimstone Canary, Swee Waxbill and Olive Woodpecker amongst others.

We then took the Western road towards the picnic area to get some height for a photo of  Lang Elsie’s Kraal rest camp before taking the eastern loop out, where we had good sightings of Bontebok again as well as picking up Agulhas long-billed Lark and Cape (Agulhas) Clapper Lark.

With the temperature sitting in the mid to late 30s, we then headed back to Swellendam and our B&B for the weekend – Cypress Cottage in the main street. Cypress cottage must have the coldest swimming pool water in Swellendam but in the excessive heat that we had over the weekend, it was a welcome way to cool off – after the initial heart stopping moments! That evening we stopped in at the Swellendam Municipal Cottages where a group of Cape Bird Club members were staying and had a sundowner with them before heading down to the “Full Stop” Pub in main street for a light dinner, a couple of beers and the pleasure of watching the Stormers take out the Bulls at Loftus!

On Sunday morning, we took a drive up the valley to Grootvadersbosch Nature Reserve. The Reserve is situated in the Langeberg and consists of about 250ha of indigenous forest and some mountain fynbos. It lies in the transitional zone between the winter and all year round rainfall regions and contains most of the typical forest tree species but also some exotic tree species planted at the turn of the last century, particularly the impressive Californian redwoods. It also contains some of the most westerly Bushbuck to be seen in South Africa (and we saw one). Just under 200 bird species have been recorded here and we were out to target some of the forest specials.

The forest lies in a steep valley, so it’s all steep down and then steep up. As we only started on the down at about 10 ish on Sunday morning, it was already starting to get hot. We set off down the Redwoods road into the forest and noted that things were very quiet with very few birds calling and so we were hoping to bump into a feeding-party. On the way down to the stream at the bottom of the valley, we saw some of the forest usuals including Forest Canary, Southern Boubou, Cape White-eyes, Cape Batis, Olive Woodpecker etc. Unfortunately, with the dark and dappled light in the forest and the distance of some of the birds, most of the images are of poor quality.

After crossing the stream, we started the slog up on the other side of the valley towards the bird hide. We picked up 2 good birds on the way to the hide, Grey Cuckooshrike and Lesser Honeyguide. Unfortunately, both were some distance away and only very poor images were obtained.

After collecting those two, we stumbled on the majestic but exotic Californian Redwoods. After a couple of photos there and amongst the ferns at the stream source, we moved on up with a flock of Red-winged Starlings clattering in the canopy above (Raptor somewhere overhead?) and Cape Batises buzzing around in the mid-stratum. We emerged puffing from the forest and took a sweaty climb up to the first part of the mountain fynbos in the midday heat (mid 30s) to seek out Victorin’s Warbler. We located 2 pairs calling within 50 metres of emerging from the forest in dense mountain fynbos. They were calling from so close, that we probably could have reached out and touched them, but for the life of us, we could not see them!

Eventually, we gave up and trekked back to the car park and camp site at the entrance. after rehydrating, we took a leisurely drive back to Swellendam ( the “Full Stop” was closed so a cleansing draught was out), had a glass of wine in the coldest pool in Swellendam and closed the day out with a glorious evening up the road at an outdoor restaurant that served a great pasta.  What a great long weekend!