I come off the Highveld escarpment and tumble into the summery, thundercloud-rich province of KZN, on a day when the mielie fields stand tall and wavy. It is as close to paradise as you get.
This road trip is a refresher - I want to reacquaint myself with some of the province’s smaller nature reserves and visit a few I haven’t been to before.
It’s been more than 15 years since my last visit to Spioenkop Dam. I stop at the office to pay my R50 conservation fee. Hanging on the wall is a relic from decades ago: a retro, hand-painted poster titled “Natal Grassland Birds”, showing species like blue crane, crowned crane and secretarybird. Someone has taken their ClemenGold sticker off a naartjie and stuck it to the well-worn tip box.
The boom goes up and I drive through, noting the classic Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife board showing the two clocks - the gate opening time of 6 am and closing time of 7 pm.
It’s a Tuesday and all is quiet along the dam edge, except for one family unpacking fishing rods, camping chairs and a cooler box from their SUV. I stroll to the nearest toilet to see if it’s presentable. A patch of tiles has fallen off one wall, a swallow has made a nest against the ceiling, and someone kicked holes in the stall doors (a fisherman who caught naught?), but the toilets are clean, with running water and toilet paper.
Sadly, the neglect of our underfunded and mismanaged provincial reserves has become par for the course. Therefore, I shall rejoice in the small victories: that toilet paper, for example.
Back outside, I watch a goliath heron filleting the shallows with its powerful beak. Around the dam, the reserve steams in the February heat, thorn bushes throttling the uneven gravel road (it’s best to come here in a bakkie). On the northern side of the dam looms the koppie that gives the reserve and
