Here are some photos of our 2018 stay at the River View Cottages. The captions explain what is being shown. This was the relatively hot time of the year – early March.
Our main “discovery” was the Trail #3, shown in the first image below. It is actually quite long and steep – we only walked a short portion of it but near the start of the trail were a number of succulents (Aloe speciosa, Senecio articulatus and the short Aloe microstigma) that were easier to see than on the other trails (shown in the bottom part of the map). Doing all of these trails at a “botanical exploration pace” would require a couple of days. Note that good hikers, seeing only the trail in front of them, could do all of this in a few hours. But to look for cryptic plants, take photos of them, and then proceed, takes much longer.
Around the entrance to Trail #3 we had easy access to many, many Aloe microstigma that appear to be adept colonizers of disturbed land (near the road). Unlike the Aloe ferox and Aloe speciosa these Aloes do not grow tall. We had seen huge patches of these Aloe across the river but could not cross the river to see them.
Some more photos from 2018 are below. See the figure captions for explanations.
THE NATURALIST'S TRAVEL PAGE 