ESSENTIALS

Paul Bloomfield was a guest of TravelLocal

(0117 325 7898; travellocal.com), whose online platform connects travellers with local tour operators. A 10-day itinerary on the Elephant Coast, visiting St Lucia, HluhluweiMfolozi Park, Kosi Bay and Manyoni, costs from £1,705. The price includes accommodation, some meals, excursions and car hire, but not flights.

British Airways (ba.com) flies HeathrowDurban three times a week, with return fares from £757.

than hippos. Oh but, they say, rhinos have poor eyesight. And that’s a relief how? In any case, peering through the greenery, Zephian identified relatively docile whites, and for 10 breathless minutes we shared air with a quartet of horned mammal-tanks.

Such priceless moments demonstrate why walking in the African bush is like performing in front of a large audience: invigoratingly terrifying. Because among the crowd of impala, wildebeest, warthog and zebra lurk some very, very fierce critics. Fluff your lines and you could face more than a career-threatening catcall. That said, the objective here isn’t to find big beasts – though elephants, hippos and more rhinos all made appearances. Rather, it’s what is now dubbed “mindfulness”, though that buzzword was decades away when iMfolozi’s wilderness trails were conceived in the Fifties.

In any case, after three days the closest I’d come to a spotted or maned predator was a leopard tortoise lumbering across our path – unless you count quaking behind canvas as mournful leonine huffs wafted around our tents. Perhaps that would change at my last destination, Manyoni Private Game Reserve, an hour’s drive to the north. There, just seven small lodges stud archetypal safari terrain – forested hills, riverine woodland, savannah – populated by the Big Five plus cheetah and wild dog. My own stylish base, Mavela, provided luxury that might bust budgets elsewhere in Africa. Indeed, the Elephant Coast as a whole offers startlingly good value, thanks only partly to a favourable sterling-rand exchange rate; park fees and accommodation are largely cheaper than in more-touristed spots.

Having dropped bags in my expansive “tent”, and glancing at the pool-with-a-view en route, I hopped in an open-topped Land Rover for the first of four safaris curated by Nico and Alec, young guides with stiletto-sharp eyes. Over successive morning and evening drives, two points became apparent. First, though Manyoni doesn’t boast the game density of, say, Ngorongoro or even Kruger – you won’t hit a leopard every five yards – it offers a commensurately intimate experience: in three days we met just two other safari vehicles. Second, even without constant cat sightings, the wildlife is enchanting, not least the spectacular avifauna (Manyoni means “place of birds” in Zulu). Think you’re not a twitcher? Wait until you set eyes on a dazzling emerald-and-gold little bee-eater, or admire a lilac-breasted roller performing its eponymous aerial acrobatics, or smirk at clueless-looking “Bob Marley chickens” – crested guineafowl. Even starlings sport shimmering cobalt-blue plumage.

Not that heart-stopping animal encounters are off the menu. On the contrary: animals are the menu – at least, for a pair of cheetahs that streaked across our path to dispatch an impala. Elsewhere, an immodest five-ton bull elephant showered at a trail-side waterhole, rhinos rumbled into the scrub and ostrich parents shepherded their fluffy brood.

A livid moon still hung high as we set out on our final morning game drive. I exchanged yawns with three cheetah cubs, and as the bush awoke under dawn’s peachy glow, giraffes gathered and zebras crossed.

Then – as if to order, just before the end of my South African sojourn – a black-maned male lion made his entrance, padding past languidly with the insouciance of the reserve’s undisputed apex predator. Humpback whales before breakfast, rhino before supper, lions before lunch: just a selection of the amuse-bouches served on the Elephant Coast.