Estcourt, South Africa: KwaZulu-Natal Midlands Travel Guide

Estcourt sits in the uThukela District of KwaZulu-Natal, in the green, rolling country South Africans simply call the Midlands. The town grew up on the banks of the Bushmans River, roughly 180 km inland from Durban and about 60 km south of Ladysmith, on the corridor that today carries the N3 between the coast and Johannesburg. It began life in the 1840s as a frontier outpost known as Bushman’s River Post, and was renamed in 1863 after Thomas Estcourt, the English parliamentarian who backed the Byrne emigration scheme that brought British settlers to Natal. Sandstone farmhouses, wide thornveld valleys and the blue wall of the Drakensberg rising to the west still give the district the feel of a place where the interior begins.

Its position made Estcourt strategically important, and that history is written all over the surrounding landscape. Fort Durnford was raised above the river in 1874, and within a generation the countryside north and west of town became one of the most fought-over corners of the Anglo-Boer War: Colenso, Chieveley, Frere and Spioenkop all lie within an easy morning’s drive. Today the same roads lead to game reserves, San rock-art shelters and some of the highest peaks in southern Africa. For travellers on a Palace Tours luxury rail journey, this is the stretch of KwaZulu-Natal where the scenery changes character — highveld grassland giving way to escarpment, battlefield and bushveld before the descent to the Indian Ocean.

What to see in Estcourt

• Fort Durnford — The stone fort above the Bushmans River, built in 1874 and named for Colonel Anthony Durnford, now serves as the town’s museum, with rooms devoted to Zulu material culture, colonial settlement and the region’s natural history.
• Wagendrift Dam and Moor Park Nature Reserve — A short drive from the centre of town, this dam on the Bushmans River is ringed by a small reserve where zebra, blesbok and other plains antelope graze the hillsides. It is a favourite spot for sailing, fishing and easy walking trails with escarpment views.
• Weenen Game Reserve — East of Estcourt, this thornveld reserve protects white rhino, buffalo, giraffe, eland and one of the country’s important herds of relocated game, in a landscape of aloes and acacia unlike anything in the mountains nearby.
• Giant’s Castle — The best-known section of the uKhahlamba-Drakensberg, roughly an hour west, famed for its eland herds, its vulture hide and the Main Caves, where several hundred San paintings survive beneath an overhang.
• Injisuthi — The remote northern corner of Giant’s Castle, gateway to the highest ground in South Africa, including Mafadi on the Lesotho border. Even a half-day walk from the camp delivers extraordinary rock scenery.
• Spioenkop — The hilltop battlefield of January 1900, where Boer and British forces fought a brutal engagement at close quarters. Winston Churchill, Mohandas Gandhi and Louis Botha were all in the field that day. The adjoining dam and nature reserve make it an easy combined visit.
• Chieveley and Frere — Just north of town, the line of rail where an armoured train was ambushed in November 1899 and a young war correspondent named Churchill was taken prisoner. Colenso, with its riverside memorials, is a few minutes further on.
• Kamberg Rock Art Centre — South-west of Estcourt, the guided walk to Game Pass Shelter reaches paintings so significant to the interpretation of San belief that researchers nicknamed the panel the Rosetta Stone of rock art.
• Ardmore Ceramic Art — In the Champagne Valley below the peaks, a studio whose exuberant hand-modelled animal ceramics have carried KwaZulu-Natal craft into museum collections around the world.

What to eat in Estcourt

Estcourt is, to most South Africans, a food town first: the Eskort works here have been curing bacon and making sausage since the early twentieth century, and the name is a fixture in kitchens across the country. Eat the way the district does and you will find thick-cut bacon at breakfast, coils of boerewors over coals at lunch, and biltong and drywors sold by weight at the farm stalls along the N3. Slow-cooked potjiekos, stewed in a three-legged pot, is still the standard for a long Midlands afternoon.

Zulu home cooking runs alongside it and is well worth seeking out: phutu, the crumbly maize meal, served with spiced chakalaka or sour milk; umngqusho, samp and beans simmered soft; amadumbe, the earthy taro-like tuber of the province. Trout from the Midlands streams, farm cheeses and cured meats appear on every country menu, and dessert almost inevitably means melktert or koeksisters. Durban’s great contribution, the hollowed-loaf curry called bunny chow, is never far away either — and there is usually a bottle of Amarula, the local cream liqueur, waiting at the end of the meal.

Shopping and crafts

KwaZulu-Natal has one of the strongest craft traditions in the country. Look for Zulu beadwork, whose colour combinations carry real meaning, and for the tightly coiled ilala palm baskets woven by hand and prized by collectors. Ardmore’s ceramics are the district’s signature piece, and the studios and farm shops of the Midlands Meander, running south towards Nottingham Road and Howick, sell pottery, leather, woven mohair, cheese and preserves within an hour’s drive.

Best time to visit

The dry winter months from April to September are the classic season: cool, clear, low-humidity days, thin bush and concentrated game viewing in the reserves, with the chance of snow on the high Drakensberg. Nights can drop close to freezing, so pack accordingly. The summer months from November to March turn the Midlands intensely green and are the best time for waterfalls and wildflowers, but bring hot afternoons and dramatic thunderstorms that can close mountain paths at short notice. Spring and autumn are the quiet compromise, and often the most comfortable.

Good to know

• Estcourt lies at roughly 1,150 m above sea level and the surrounding district is malaria-free, which makes it an easy safari region for families and first-time visitors to Africa.
• Distances are deceptive. The battlefields, the Drakensberg and the game reserves all sit within about 100 km of town, but mountain roads are slow — plan on a full day for each.
• Rock-art sites at Kamberg and Giant’s Castle are visited on guided walks only, and numbers are limited. Book ahead through Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife rather than arriving on spec.
• Winter mornings in the reserves are genuinely cold and afternoons warm quickly. Layers, a windproof jacket and proper walking shoes cover almost every eventuality.
• The battlefields reward a guide. The ground reads as ordinary farmland until someone explains where the lines stood, and the difference in the experience is enormous.

Seeing this region by luxury train

The most comfortable way to travel this part of KwaZulu-Natal is by rail. Palace Tours arranges journeys aboard South Africa’s finest trains, where wood-panelled suites, observation cars and unhurried table service replace the long drive, and excursions to game reserves, battlefields and cultural sites are handled for you. Speak to our specialists about combining Estcourt and the Midlands with Pretoria, the Drakensberg and the coast at Durban.