iSimangaliso Wetland Park, South Africa's third largest park, is located in Northern KwaZulu-Natal and encompasses eight interlinking ecosystems and a huge range of habitats. The core of iSimangaliso, Lake St Lucia, was declared a game reserve more than 100 years ago - Africa's first protected area.

The park now consists of 220 kilometres of coastline and beaches (one third of KwaZulu-Natal's coast) as well as huge swamp forests, three large lake systems (Kosi Bay, Lake St Lucia and Lake Sibaya), linked game reserves and the world's highest density of black rhino.

It's startlingly beautiful and a treasure trove of creatures, with more than half of South Africa's bird species (526), around 2000 flowering plants, all of South Africa's mangrove types, the top frog count in the country, massive vegetated coastal dunes (among the highest in the world), 110 butterfly species, five turtle species and 700-year-old fishing traditions which continue to this day. It's not... read more