He casually walked past our car at about 3m distance and all our jaws just dropped

After our adventures in Drakensberg and Coffee Bay, we drove our Ford Figo to the very start of the infamous Garden Route. The Tuinroute is one of the most visited and most beautiful areas in South Africa. We spent four days driving through this amazing landscape. Our first two stops where Port Elizabeth and Jeffrey’s Bay. Find out in this post what to do here and how to enjoy these destination as much as possible. Making them an essential and unforgettable part of your South African adventure.

Why Port Elizabeth?

This city marks the beginning (or the end) of the Garden Route. Every traveler can find something to do here. Possible activities include:

• Diving with Ragged-Tooth Sharks
• Surfing on the golden beaches
• Wandering through the dunes of Summerstrand
• Climbing the Donkin Reserve Lighthouse
• Running or walking along Marine Drive
• Sunbathing on Kings Beach
• Partying in BeerShack or White Tiger
• Watching a Rugby match
• Visiting Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium
• Devouring Ribs straight from the Braai in Cubata
• Spotting wildlife on your self-drive Safari in Addo Elephant Park
• Shopping at GreenAcres or Walmers mall

Why Jeffrey’s Bay?

Jeffrey’s Bay is the surf capital of South Africa. It is ranked as the 2nd best surfing spot in the world. If you surf, you go to Jeffrey’s Bay. It’s a simple as that. Famous for the annual World Surf League, where the best of the best face off each other on the infamous Super Tubes on Dolphins beach. Activities include:

• Surfing
• Chilling
• Relaxing
• Drinking
• Surfing

Getting There?

By Air

Port Elizabeth has an international Airport but most long distance intercontinental flights will make a stop in Cape Town or Johannesburg. Known as the Ten Minutes Airport since it is only a 10 min drive from almost all important areas in the city. This includes the business district but also the beach, the center of town and the suburbs.

By Land

There are busses from all major cities to PE so it’s easy to get to without a car. If you are driving around yourself just follow the N2 from either direction (Cape Town or East London) and it will take you straight into the intersection closest to the city. Most of the city’s main sights and areas are along the coastline. Getting around is a matter of flagging down one of the many shuttle busses that drive back and forth along Marine and Beach Drive.

From Port Elizabeth it is only about an hour along the N2 to get to Jeffrey’s bay. You can also catch a shuttle bus in the improvised shuttle bus station underneath the highway intersection bridges. Just shout out your destinations and eventually you’ll end up in the correct minivan.

Lodging/Eating

Lodging PE

There are undoubtedly a lot of great options in PE, it is a big city after all. But the places in Humewood and Summerstrand are probably the best. They are located closest to the main beaches and best places to eat, wander around and shop.

However we stayed at the same hostel I stayed at last time I was in PE: The Lungile Backpackers Lodge. It’s a huge villa with a small garden and pool. It has a great common room and several dorms and private rooms. If you are on a tight budget: in summer they have one or two little tents in the garden you can sleep in if you have your own sleeping bag. They are ideally located at the edge of Humewood, close to Kings beach. They also offer a few free parking spots to guests.

Lodging Jeffrey’s Bay

Stay at Island Vibe. Don’t even look for something else. The cozy hostel is well-organized, clean and has above all a great atmosphere. It is located at the beach and with an amazing view over the ocean. Ask any backpacker that traveled through and they will tell you great stories about this place. The relaxed surf vibe and great parties at night make it an ideal stop. They have closed of free parking for your car.

They offer surfing lessons and many other activities and organised trips to explore the beaches and the national parks in the area.

Eating

Port Elizabeth has some amazing places to eat. There are many game reserve in the larger city area, so in many restaurants you can try a slightly more exotic piece of meat. In the shopping malls and all around town you can find the usual fast food places but if you want to enjoy some KFC with a view go to the Boardwalk.

In the Boardwalk you can find many more great places but most are part of a chain of some sort. If you want something more local you can go to the infamous Cubata to gorge yourself on ribs or chicken from the braai. If you want something more fancy, do go and check out Ginger. They serve delicious high cuisine for great prices. There is also great seafood all over town!

Drinking

Asides from great food and atmosphere PE is also a great place to go out for a drink. Many nights will even end up with your putting on your dancing shoes. Our favorites include the following:

Bars

• BeerShack: a place where I spent multiple vague nights in PE. They serve a great choice of beers, some of them home-brewed. You can try out 4 or 5 of them for a great price. They also serve great food and we enjoyed a juicy Kudu steak there. At night the place gets full and turns into a fun mix of tourist and locals looking for a great time.
• White Tiger: right next door to BeerShack and a great place to start the night drinking, until you suddenly realize it’s two hours later and you’re dancing your ass off.

Clubs

Night Clubs are all over town and it depends on the night which ones are alive or dead. Best method is to ask the locals or even the bartenders which is the best one to go. You can also ask the cab driver, but chances are they will drop you off at a specific club that tips them for bringing customers.

J-Bay

In Jeffrey’s Bay just hang out in the common room of the Island Vibe hostel and order yourself a Savanna or beer. Join in playing beer pong and get to know the other travelers.

Our Activities

Aside from enjoying the party scene in PE and the Island Vibe hostel in J-Bay, we visited some other sites. In PE we walked around the center but the Donkin Reserve and it’s Lighthouse are honestly about the only interesting things to see. We wandered along Marine Drive and went onto Shark Rock Pier. The beaches are amazing but it was not that warm at the time, so we did not go into the ocean.

In J-Bay we only stayed for one night so we just saw the beach and enjoyed the view.

Our Experiences

Wildfire

The night before we arrived in Port Elizabeth we spent in East-London in the Sugar Shack. Since (for once) we did not go out late, we all got up fresh and rested to start our drive. Within 20 minutes after leaving the backseat was deeply asleep. The drive went pretty smoothly on the N2, but not far from PE there was suddenly a traffic jam.

The traffic was not moving for more than 20 minutes so we got out and started asking around what was going on. Apparently an accident caused a car to go off the road into the bush and catch fire. Subsequently a big part of that very dry bush caught fire and the entire highway area ahead was covered in a thick smoke. So all traffic was diverted to a dirt road next to the highway until we were past the place of the accident.

Lungile

Eventually we did arrive at the Lungile Backpackers Lodge and checked into our dorm room. Lungile means “It’s All Good” and has like a Hakuna Matata vibe around it. We decided to ride that wave and took it easy for the rest of the day. We drove the car into the center and parked it not far from the city hall.

After looking around the main street, we walked up to the Donkin Reserve. A memorial that the rich Donkin Family set up to the Lady Elizabeth Donkin that lent her name to the city. We admired the revamped artwork (done for the 2010 FIFA world cup) and climbed up to the very top of the lighthouse. From there we took in the view over the bay and tried not to get blown of by the strong wind.

Kudu, Beer & Dancing

We drove back to the hostel and asked if we could eat some slightly more exotic steak somewhere. I was surprised when they said BeerShack, a bar where I’d had some great times last time I was in PE. So we walked down and we all ordered a Kudu steak and a tasting board of their home brewed and local beers. There are over 25 different ones you can try out and we got 5 small glasses for a very reasonable price.

After our meal and beers we walked back up to the hostel to empty one of our bottles of rum. Once in the mood we walked right back down the BeerShack and ordered some more different beers. Eventually the place got crowded and we moved next door to White Tiger. We danced there for a couple of hours and after took a rather pricey cab to another club where we ended up only staying for one drink. After a great night, being not sober at all, we took a cab home and fall asleep like rocks.

Addo Elephants

The next morning only Willem has the clarity of mind to hoard us all out of bed at a reasonable hour. We packed our stuff but I only really came to my senses once we arrived at the entrance of the Addo Elephant National Park. We paid our entrances, and realized we did not even have breakfast or bought water. So we dumped all our coins into the vending machine to get the much-needed hydration.

We started our self drive safari with an animal spotting sheet and a pen ready to start ticking of. We almost drove into some wild boars and not 5 minutes later we spotted our first huge elephant. He casually walked past our car at about 3m distance and all our jaws just dropped. Excited we drove around for a couple of hours spotting all kinds of animals. Zebras, kudu, hartebeest, turtles, mongooses, boars, ostriches and a lot more elephants were all pointed a with enthusiastic fingers.

Lions or No Lions

There were whispers among the visitors that lions had been spotted not far ahead. So we drove like crazy to the reported location. We apparently arrived a minute to late and they had already disappeared back into the bush. We called off the hunt and drove to the Main Camp and enjoyed some delicious flambéed steak in the Cattle Baron Grill.

Island Vibe

After our late lunch we drove another hour and a half to Jeffrey’s Bay. We arrived at the Island Vibe hostel and dropped our luggage in our dorm. We got a warm welcome and chilled out for a while in the seats and hammocks outside with a cold Savana. Eventually we went onto the beach for 5 minutes before it got dark but it was too cold to actually go swimming.

We ate at the hostels together with most of the other guests and started drinking in the nice bar area of the hostel. After playing some cards we started mingling, played some beer pong and had a great night. I met a group of people who we’re volunteering in the same private game reserve that I had two years before. Happy, drunk and exhausted we all went to bed one by one.