CHASING WATERFALLS

There are some afternoons that will linger with you long, long after the sun has set. They might not be marked by a life-changing event but thereʼll be something about them that your memory refuses to let go of, and itʼs to this afternoon, or rather, to a place and a moment in an afternoon, that your mind often returns.

One such time and place that refuses to leave me is a sunny half-hour on a rainy Wild Coast day, and a large slab of sandstone on the Mphahlane River. Itʼs likely a river youʼve never heard of – and thatʼs precisely what made this afternoon so special. While rain clouds dissolved into patches of blue sky and water slipped over a gentle gradient into an idyllic pool, I settled down on a rock – its mild warmth seeping into my skin – and marvelled: ʻThis place is exquisite…and nobody else in the world knows that it exists.ʼ

Thatʼs not entirely true, of course – for generations the children of nearby Sigidi village have played here. But as weʼd approached the river it was barely visible, tucked