Umlalazi
Nature Reserve is open daily:
05h00 - 22h00
An entrance fee to the Umlalazi Nature Reserve is payable
but visitors staying
outside the Reserve can
pay once
and receive a temporary entrance card.
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The
Umlalazi Nature Reserve makes up the northern
section of the Siyaya Coastal Park - about
42 kms of unspoilt coastline, which stretches from the mouth
of the Mlalazi River to the southern boundary of the Amatikulu
Nature Reserve.
It covers serveral habitats including beaches which are popular
for swimming, surfing and fishing and lagoons, dune forests
and grasslands.
The Umlalazi Nature Reserve (1 028 hectares) offers accommodation
in self-catering chalets and camp sites as well as picnic
sites and a network of trails where visitors can view a wide
range of creatures - great and small - from the fascinating
fiddler crabs and mudskippers which inhabit the mangrove swamp
to a roaming herd of zebras and duikers.
There
is a range of hiking trails in and around the Umlalazi Nature
Reserve. A short trail of about 15 minutes through one of
the best examples of Mangrove Forest to be
seen in South Africa, starts at the parking area at the lagoon
and takes the visitor past John Dunn's Pool.
This forest is inhabited by a number of strange creatures
of which the fiddler crabs are perhaps the best known.
Male fiddler crabs have an enlarged claw, which is used both
for displaying to attract females as well as in combat with
other males.
During mating season the mangrove forest is alive with gaiety
as the little males beckon to females with their enlarged
claws. Also worth looking out for is the mudskipper - a little
amphibious fish - which can often be seen skittering over
the mud surface searching for insects and small crustaceans
to eat.
In the winter months this is the place to spot the Mangrove
Kingfisher. Energetic hikers can continue on the trail which
connects with the road to the mudflats which is often an excellent
birding area.
The circular Siyaya Coastal Dune Forest Trail starts
at the parking area for south beach and follows the coastal
forest adjacent to the Siyaya stream. Bushbuck, red, grey
and blue duiker can be seen on this trail.
The Mlalazi River mouth trail is about 8kms
long but takes one along the beautiful winding river until
it enters the ocean at Port Durnford.
The trail starts on the footpath linking north beach with
the parking area at the lagoon.
If hikers are returning along the beach they are advised to
first check out the beach so they can recognise where to exit
on their return.
Just outside the Reserve is the Raphia
Palm Forest which can be included easily in one
of the trails through the Reserve.
There is a boardwalk through the swamp forest which provides
easy access to the heart of the colony of palms where the
prime specimens create an awesome cathedral-like effect. The
Palmnut vulture is often seen nesting near the top of the
raphia palms.
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