One of the most fantastic places to visit in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa is the seaside town of St Lucia. It is only 3 hours north of Durban and has to be one of the most incredibly located towns. St Lucia sits right in the middle of a national park (iSimangaliso Wetland Park) so you get a holiday that incorporates the beach and wildlife. I recommend renting an AirBnB in town and using that as your base to explore the area. There are a few restaurants in town and the Ski Boat Club down by the estuary is also a good place to eat. St Lucia town itself is small and you can easily walk everywhere, however, you need to be careful at night as both Hippos and Leopards are often spotted in the town. In fact, while we were having dinner one evening, three Hippos strolled up the main road and past the restaurant! The main beach at St Lucia is Jabula Beach which is an easy 5 minute drive from town, it is a massive beach and a good place to hang out for a few hours to cool off in the sea.

A must-do in St Lucia is to take a boat trip up the St Lucia Estuary. There are many providers to choose from and they all cost about the same. Many let you buy drinks on board so I would choose one of those. On the boat trip we saw many different groups of Hippos, which made us realise why they were so prevalent in the town! There are a lot of crocodiles at St Lucia, however, we only saw one sunbathing on the side of the river. We also saw many birds including thousands of weaver birds building their nests.

Since St Lucia is right in iSimangaliso Wetland Park we spent a full day exploring part of it. The official gate to get into the rest of the park is a few minutes drive north of the town and you pay to enter (only about NZ$7pp) and you can pick up a map. This park is absolutely fantastic and we saw so much wildlife. We found that the best time to see the animals waas nearer to the end of the day when it was a bit cooler. We saw buffalo, zebras, warthog, many monkeys, wildebeest, kudu, waterbuck and hippo. We also saw Rhinos and it was interesting to note that they had been dehorned in order to protect them from poachers.

While driving through the park we stopped at Cape Vidal, which is a fantastic beach to spend some time at. During low tide you can snorkel, but during high tide you need to be a bit careful as it is quite rough. The beach is gorgeous and flanked by sand dunes. It is a great place to go for a walk and then to take a dip. Make sure you keep your car completely shut and locked as there are monkeys everywhere! You can stay in the cabins at Cape Vidal (which I did when I was much younger) but we were advised that they are now incredibly run down and not nice to stay in anymore.

While in the area we decided to add a trip to Hluhluwe–iMfolozi Park, which is only a 1 hour drive from St Lucia. For Hluhluwe–iMfolozi Park we had booked to stay at Mpila Camp in their self-catering lodges and I highly recommend this as they are very reasonably priced and are great value for money. You will need to stop for supplies as they do not sell much at all at the Mpila Camp shop (just ice-creams and souvenirs etc). We stopped in Mtubatuba, however, it was hard to find the supplies we wanted and it was a difficult place to shop, I recommend stocking up in St Lucia if you’re coming from there, or Richard’s Bay if you are coming from Durban. Remember to buy ice as due to electricity restrictions in South Africa, there is no electricity overnight at Mpila Camp – so plan accordingly. Mpila Camp itself is located right in the park, it is fenced for Elephants but any other wildlife can and does wander in, so at night you need to be alert.

For the most part we just went on our own game drives around the park which was a great way to see a lot of sights, you can buy a map from the store at Mpila Camp. Even without a guide we saw an incredible amount of wildlife, even getting in the way of a couple of massive elephants trying to cross the road one evening. The best time, by far, to see wildlife was in the early evening, even better than the early morning, so you can keep your sleep ins! We saw giraffes on a number of occasions as well as plenty of rhino. We also saw massive herds of buffalo, zebra, wildebeest, impala and many other antelope. We paid for one evening for a trip with a guide in a safari vehicle for a few hours which was a really good experience in order to pick his brain about the area. There are also lions and leopards in the park, however, we did not see any, hopefully next time!

Overall, our time in St Lucia and Hluhluwe–iMfolozi Park was magical and I cannot recommend it more for any trip to South Africa. Hluhluwe–iMfolozi Park is a great rival for Kruger National Park if you prefer a more chilled and less touristy experience. Due to the exchange rate, it’s an incredibly reasonable place to visit, I mean just check out the cost summary below!

Here is a breakdown of our costs for 2 people for 6 days: