In recent weeks I have been giving a lot of thought to what & how we here at SafariKZN.com do to encourage our ‘readers’ (that’s you) to visit KwaZulu Natal & South Africa in general.
I have spent thirty years visiting, traveling, holidaying & exploring, mainly, the province of KwaZulu Natal. It is where I met my wife on that very first trip back in 1994 & where her family still live & of course where we have many friends & connections. I started SafariKZN with my brother-in-law Tristan, who had self-taught himself how to build web sites, nearly twenty-five years ago. I was & still am a wannabe travel writer & wanted an outlet for my work. I was also surprised that the majority of people I met who had visited South Africa knew very little about KwaZulu Natal. The province is still relatively under visited by international tourists. Another big factor back when we started was learning how many people were & could be employed in the tourism sector. I was told all those years ago that something like every four new tourists created one new job. I wish those figures were readily available. Not everyone wants or can work in the tourism industry, but people need jobs where unemployment is high. And I have met some remarkable people in the industry carrying out a huge variety of work.
Cape Town has recently been in the news as it’s been voted the best value long haul destination for British tourists. Having been there a few times, I fully understand its appeal. And if you have watched the recent TV show here in the UK, Gary Barlows Wine Tour, you may well have been encouraged to visit. Gary & his friends & guests spent time in the Cape along with visits to Kruger National Park, probably the country’s second biggest draw, plus the city of Johannesburg. He even made me want to explore a little more. And I felt obliged to write to him & ask if he wants to join me & explore a little of KwaZulu Natal. In recent years I have seen several celebrities visiting & helping promote South Africa. I have written to many of them to encourage them to visit KwaZulu Natal. It was great to see a couple of foodie celebrities in KwaZulu Natal loving the food & of course doing their own cooking. There are also several TV wildlife documentaries to be viewed, filmed in KwaZulu Natal, across a variety of channels.
The reason that I mention Cape Town & other regions is that South Africa is a vast country with so many places to visit. And you can & should plan where possible to visit a few contrasting destinations. This year we have had clients mix in many places on their travels, and not just other province’s & cities in South Africa, but other African country’s. But our passion & real knowledge is in KwaZulu Natal & we still have many clients who just spend their time here. With the provinces hot summers & dry warm winters it’s an all-year-round destination & that includes its beaches. And just to mention among the wildlife, that includes all the iconic African wildlife, there are seasonal whales, turtles & when conditions are right a yearly sardine run known as the greatest shoal on earth. You will also have the chance of incredible rare encounters that include African wild dogs, cheetah & pangolin.
There really is something for everyone, of all ages here in KwaZulu Natal. When I look back & through my travel articles at all the places I have visited & the locations I have found myself in, I have to pinch myself. I have walked in parks & game reserves among all those iconic animals including elephants, rhinos, buffaloes, lions & leopards. I have even slept on mats in the Zululand wilderness on primitive trails under the stars. I have walked in the Drakensberg Mountains & spent time in the iSimangaliso Wetland Park, both UNESCO World Heritage Sites. In the Battlefields of the Anglo Zulu & Boer Wars I have stood in the footprints of some great people. And I must mention walking the filing location of the movie ‘Zulu’ in Royal Natal National Park. I never dreamt as a boy that I would visit the filming set of my favourite film. There is plenty of culture & heritage from the Zulu people plus people who have changed history like Nelson Mandela & Mahatma Ghandi. I have stayed on a houseboat, canoed, taken a shark cage dive & zip lined through mountain gorges. I even founded World Bunnychow Day because of my passion for this humble curry served in a loaf that was created in Durban, KwaZulu Natal.
Our web site is where we publish our stories & articles from our travels that offer first hand experiences, knowledge & advice to potential visitors. Buit on a nearly daily basis we are using social media to promote KwaZulu Natal & the huge variety of places visited. We continue to work hard to build our audiences. On Facebook, still our main platform, we share from where we have stayed & visited. On Twitter, we try to do the same, but X as it’s now known appears to be slowly sliding down hill with notable falls in our followers. Still relatively new to Instagram we post daily & share from our travels around KwaZulu Natal. And lastly TripAdvisor where I can be found & often answering questions in the South African forum. Could it be time to be influenced myself by the deep blue sky I often look up into on my travels & open a new social media account with the same name?
I guess I am a wannabe travel writer & influencer assuming there is no age limit. I always want to help anyone who is thinking of traveling to get the best from, what we regard as the best all round province in South Africa, KwaZulu Natal. And if I am influencing you through our web site & social media then maybe I am becoming an influencer? Please keep an eye on our web site & please also give us a follow on social media. We still get huge satisfaction from all interaction including shares, likes & comments.
Seeing celebrities like Gary Barlow loving eating & drinking, Mortimer & Whitehouse Gone Fishing, Nisha Katona meeting the people behind the bunnychow & Kevin Pietersen in the Zululand Wilderness would all help the cause. But more importantly let us get you there & sharing your stories with your friends.
Maybe my next venture, in the world of influencing, could be a pod cast? I better speak again to all those city, provincial & national tourism authorities & who knows maybe a celebrity or two. I have a couple of names in mind for a pod cast so watch this space…..
