Lanimo...dal piacere in atto desto.

Beauty awakens the soul to act.

Dante Alighieri

PRIVATE WALKING HOLIDAYS IN ITALY

SINCE 1998
girosole.com
SMART TRAVELLER
The
Blog
BOULDERS BEACH
DISAPPEARING
ACT
Brave the icy waters of Boulders Beach for a face-to-
face experience with the endangered African penguin
A
frican penguins sounds like an
oxymoron the hottest continent
on Earth paired with the fl ightless
birds most commonly associated with
Antarctica, the worlds coldest.
The frigid waters of Boulders Beach just
a stones throw from Cape Town, in Simons
Im so transxed by the Town, South Africa clearly didnt get the
hottest continent memo, since each gently
penguins swimming lapping wave is freezing me right down to
my marrow.
around me that Ive Knee-deep in the sea, I imagine my bone-
china fibulas and tibias shattering should I
completely forgotten about accidentally bang my shin on one of these
the icy water.Instead, enormous, ancient granite boulders that
protrude like monstrous molars from the
I dive under the surface gum line of sand and sea.
OK, maybe Im being a little dramatic, but
and slip through the sea nobody else is foolish enough to join me in
as they zoom beside the water at this time of year. Its one thing
to see penguins on land, but I want to swim
me like bullets with them. Other visitors seem content to
60 natgeotraveller.co.uk
shiver on the picturesque, powder-white
beach under the setting sun, as I wade
around in search of the elusive fl ightless
birds whose shadows zip beneath the waters
surface, just on the periphery of my vision,
before disappearing entirely.
African penguins, sometimes known
as jackass penguins due to their bizarre,
donkey-like, braying bird calls, have declined
in numbers by more than 96% since the pre-
industrial era, and 83% in just over 50 years.
Commercial fisheries and climate change
are making the penguins prey more scarce,
while habitat destruction is leaving colonies
exposed to predators, heat stress and
flooding. The birds get entangled and drown
in fishing gear too, and since they live
along a major global oil transportation route
they are also victims of oil spills, which are
slicking the slippery path to their extinction.
In 1910, there were an estimated 1.5
million African penguins. By 1956, when
 SMART TRAVELLER

ost ead
VISIT US ONLINE AT From a cinematic roadtrip across the USA to Belfasts creative
NATGEOTRAVELLER.CO.UK revitalisation here are our most popular online posts
With daily updates, including a
blog every Tuesday and our Travel
Video of the Week each Friday,
get your online fix of National
CITY LIFE
Geographic Traveller (UK) Belfast
With its creative,
entrepreneurial
streak bubbling
underneath, Belfasts
the first full census was conducted, theyd revitalisation as one
been decimated to 150,000 breeding pairs. of the UKs most
In 2009 that number dropped to just 26,000, vibrant cities is
and by 2010 just a hundred years later rewarding visitors
the African penguin was classified
as endangered.
These birds only live in southwestern
Africa from Namibia to Port
Elizabeth with just three
LIKE THIS? READ mainland colonies. Despite
MORE ABOUT SOUTH a sizeable population drop at
AFRICA ONLINE Boulders Beach from 3,900
in 2005 to 2,100 in 2011 this
CITY LIFE: DURBAN is still the most wonderfully
A beach resort, gritty accessible place to see them. HOT TOPIC
metropolis and bastion of That said, when the rest of the The rise of
vibrant Zulu culture. day-trippers pack their towels tourismophobia
More than just a
and start to leave, as twilight Theres a wave of
post-safari seaside
shadows diffuse and fade, so protests in Europe
stop-off, the South
African coastal gem is too do my hopes of watching that dont stem from ECUADOR
on the rise them underwater. cultural or religious The hothouse heart of the jungle
Just as Im about to quit, divisions, but Stepping into Yasuni National Park isnt a
SLEEP: CAPE TOWN though, I notice a little tail instead from toe-dip into wilderness. Its a full-on dive into
From caravans on a disappearing into a gap unhappy locals the rainforest, where the air is heavy with the
rooftop to restored between two mammoth stones. targeting tourists scent of wet leaves, and the darkness of night
Dutch farmhouses, Cape
A quick clamber over a few
Towns hotels and
boulders, a couple of stubbed
resorts are as majestic
and varied as its
toes, and one inelegant slide BLOG
famous scenery down a wet rock, finds me Guadeloupe: There
splashing into a secluded part she blows
FALLING FOR of the bay, just as the last raft Fascinating flora is glimpsed amid
TUGELA FALLS of penguins comes in from the the sulphurous fumes while
A hairy ascent of the sea for the evening. climbing an active volcano on the
worlds second highest
Im so transfixed by the Caribbean island of Basse-Terre
waterfall is worth it
penguins swimming around
for the fleeting view
at the top
me that Ive completely
forgotten about the icy TRAVEL VIDEO OF
water. Instead, I dive under THE WEEK
the surface and slip through USA
the sea as they zoom beside me like bullets. In our most popular
These 10 minutes of sub-aquatic spectacle video, we take a road
are worth the wait, but then, almost as trip across the USA
quickly as they appeared, theyre gone. with videographer
At least I had a good look at them while I Ben Rogan
had the chance. If our grandchildren are to
see them too, we must similarly examine
our impact on the planet, bringing wildlife
like African penguins out of the peripheries
and into sharp focus, before they disappear
Search for NatGeoTravelUK on...
entirely. JAMES DRAVEN
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Jan/Feb 2018 61