Bags packed, camera charged and weather report checked!
That was how my weekend began. In desperate need of a quick escape to nature and a breath of fresh air, we were all set and ready for a family camping trip. Inspired by [highlight] This is KZN [/highlight] a community of travel bloggers showcasing the best of KZN, we opted to explore our own home ground rather than spend all our time travelling somewhere far. [highlight] Lake Eland Game Reserve [/highlight] is situated just over 2 hours from Durban, in the magnificent Oribi Gorge, and was just what the doctor ordered.
Lake Eland Game Reserve was definitely the tranquil retreat that we were looking for but don’t be fooled! Behind the scenes, this reserve is a buzz of activity with tons of different experiences on offer. After setting up camp in a lovely spot by a small lake, discussions began! Everybody was dead set on doing the famous zip line tour. The tour consists of 14 zip line slides which start at the top of the Oribi Gorge and is 4.5 km in length.

As fun as that sounded, it wasn’t exactly by cup of tea and my sister and I opted to rather do a horse ride through the reserve…in our defence, this was probably a lot more dangerous than zip lining.
Everybody thoroughly enjoyed their zip line tour but the horse ride was definitely a great choice as we were able to get really close to a large herd of wildebeest as well as eland and tons of blesbok. They even have a tame blesbok named Gemma that lives with the horses! She was such a treat and would come to us to have her head scratched (and then head-butt us when we stopped).
Having had our adventure for the day, we decided it was time to do what we came here to do…relax and enjoy the scenery! As the reserve has no dangerous animals, we headed out on a little walk along one of their many scenic paths. Well, everybody else was walking, I was trailing behind marvelling at the golden light of the setting sun and snapping 101 photographs of it.
Some of the other experiences worth checking out at Lake Eland Game Reserve are the 80m suspension bridge, bushman caves, mountain bike trails and the 4×4 trail. Unfortunately, we didn’t have time to do it all but that just gives us a reason to go back.
Adventure activities, quality family time and a truly serene and magnificent environment, we definitely hit the weekend away jackpot!
For some KwaZulu Natal travel inspiration, check out the [highlight] This is KZN website [/highlight].