News & Updates from Heritage Tours & Safaris

News & Updates from Heritage Tours & Safaris, iSimangaliso Wetland Park

Its December, we all bid farewell to the whales on their long journey home, and we welcome the turtles to our shore’s once more. We are proud to announce that Shoreline Boat & Walking Safaris  has won the turtle tour concession and the season has kicked off in full swing. Over the next four months scores of Loggerhead and Learherback turtles will be returning to their natal beaches of the iSimangaliso Wetlands Park to nest. Heritage Tours and Safaris is proud to be able to share this wonderful experience with our lucky guests for the forthcoming months. Witnessing a natural event such as this will leave a lasting memory that we are proud to be a part of.

With turtle season here it also means that we are drawing nearer to the end of another year. The summer holidays are fast approaching and we are getting ready give our arriving guests a great experience on the variety of tours we have on offer. To make the experience a unique one we have been implementing some new exciting features to our tours. We are the first to offer a free Wi-Fi service on our Hippo and Croc boat cruises which depart every two hours on the St. Lucia estuary. Guests can now instantly share their experience with others via social media in real time. We have also issued smart tablets to our guides to assist them on safaris to the different game reserves that they visit daily.

I sit here now writing this blog on one of our new smart tablets issued to our guides earlier this week. I dont consider myself a ” tech fundi ” but it really didn’t take me long to realize the advantages that this handy little piece of technology has to offer the tour experience of our guests. The tablets are able to house a variety of applications containing info on mammals, plants, birds and bird calls, which will be available at the touch of a button as quick reference for our guides on tour. We hope that having videos and images and sound clips to compare will enhance the experience that our guests have on safaris.

 

News & Updates from Heritage Tours & Safaris, Hluhluwe Imfolozi Game Reserve

The days are warming slowly but surely as we head toward summer but we are still waiting for the rains to arrive. We’ve had some localized downpours but nothing substantial enough to keep our rivers flowing and water pans full. It’s a good time for game viewing as animals seem to congregate around these temporary water sources in the game reserves. Guests have been treated to some stunning sightings over the past month on safari to the different game reserves. We have seen an increase in sightings of the elusive Leopard on night drives into the Western Shores of iSimangaliso. We have also had great sightings of these cats which included guests watching a Leopard catching its unsuspecting prey, in this case a Bushbuck, as they returned from their turtle tour in the early hours of the morning through the Eastern Shores reserve.

 

The Hluhluwe iMfolozi park as always delivers some spectacular game viewing opportunities as well as diversity of landscapes and scenery, its no wonder the response we get from our guests is ” this is better than Kruger”…. don’t say that too loudly though, we would like to keep it our little secret. From delivering countless sightings on a daily basis of the threatened and endangered Southern White Rhino, we have also had the pleasure of viewing the every rare Black Rhinos on a frequent basis. After the annual burns the reserve is slowly transforming into a lush green area which is attracting large groups of grazing animals with the likes of African Buffalo herds which seemed to be quite scarce during the winter months.

 

We have also seen an increase in Elephants sightings in the iMfolozi section, some special sightings recently included breeding herds of well over 100 animals and watching the large bulls wallowing in the temporary mud wallows formed by rain showers. Predators are always top of the list when it comes to guest requests, we have fortunately been able to deliver good sightings of the rare African Wild Dogs and Cheetah on a frequent basis as well as great sightings of the king of beasts, the Lion. Recent Lion sightings included entire prides resting, mating pairs and just this week a pride on a Zebra kill in the road, giving our guests a front row seat in viewing these powerful animals in action as they devour their prey.

We hope that you enjoy reading the first edition of our blog and we will continue sharing our experiences with you through future blogs and newsletters in the weeks to come. We would also like to wish all our readers a happy upcoming holiday season and wish you all safe travels on your journeys to and from your holiday destinations, some of which we hope includes St. Lucia, Hluhluwe Imfolozi and iSimangaliso Wetland Park.

Kind regards

Jonathan Webster (Ranger)
Heritage Tours and Safaris team.