Durban- Water City Of The Zulu Kingdom

Durban is one of the busiest ports of South Africa and its third largest city. With an ethnic population, beaches, and opportunities for tourist activities like hiking or water-sports like surfing or snorkeling, the water city of Durban makes for great vacation tour.

Durban or eThekwini in Zulu has tourist attractions ranging from the simple yet exciting rides on Zulu rickshaws along the waterfronts to deep diving in the sea. The city is home to a rich flora and fauna, with bio reserves like the Sea water Aquarium and the Croc world.

Location

This city of Durban is in the Zulu kingdom – KwaZulu Natal, in South Africa. It’s at about 570 kilometers from Johannesburg while Cape Town is about 1,600 kilometers from here, to the west.

Climate

The city has a warm subtropical climate where summers are hot and humid. Winters are mild with temperature around 15 degrees Celsius. Durban is ideal for visiting in any time of the year.

Transport

Durban has regular flight services from other cities of KwaZulu Natal and only few destinations have direct flights to Durban like Mauritius and Swaziland and more recently, Dubai. Other international flights reach here through cities like Johannesburg or Cape Town.

There are inter-city trains as well, connecting Durban to major destinations like Kimberley, Johannesburg to name a few. Durban is connected by train to Port Elizabeth or East London through Bloemfontein, where you would need to change trains to go further to these destinations. There are trains connecting the city to its suburbs as well such as Pinetown and other resort areas.

A number of inter-city buses too operate here.  Durban has an advantage being the entry point to KwaZulu-Natal Province and to the north Eastern Cape Province as all the national carriers operate here as well.

There are taxis that you can hire or metered cabs that you can call to your pick up points. Shared or combi taxi too run here. The public mostly commutes on shared taxis or buses which ply on fixed routes.  For adventure, you could try tuk-tuks or Zulu rickshaws.

Tourist attractions

Durban is a water-city, popular among tourists for its magnificent beaches. Golden Mile, this is what the long stretch of beaches along the Indian Ocean is called. There are museums and art galleries such as the Kwa Muhle Museum that reflects the history of the place and the Durban Art Gallery that also is a platform for young artists to show their talents.

If you are a sports person, you could go surfing, snorkeling, and sea diving or even hiking. There are a number of bio reserves here. On the banks of the river Umengi, to the north of the city, is the Umengi River Bird Park inhabited by a wide variety of birds, coming even from places as far as Southeast Asia and Australia such as Lories and Aras. The Vernon Crookes Nature Reserve is again home to rich biodiversity. There’s the crocodile breeding farm known as the Croc World.

Shopping in this city could turn out to be fun to, especially at the Victoria market and the Essenwood Craft Market, provided you have the patience to search and pick up a good authentic item and if you can bargain well.

For some adventure, you can go on an excursion to the suburbs or one of the Zulu villages to get an idea of the traditional Zulu life.

You could arrange your stay in one of the many hotels in the city or to the quieter sea resorts.

Even as Durban develops as a modern city and while there are concerns of the consequence of rapid industrialization on the environment here, it hasn’t yet lost its charm as one of the favourite South African tourist destination.