Whilst staying at Grootbos, we took the opportunity to take a marine tour from Gansbaai in search of the marine big 5. We saw the three above, but it was the wrong time of year for whales and the dolphins had gone missing.
The highlight of our trip was that our boat was used by a conservation team to release nine injured penguins back into the wild to rejoin their colony. The penguins had been hurt in attacks by seals and sharks before being rescued and rehabilitated. The penguin population has been much depleted by human intervention, for example their nesting material has been harvested for use as fertiliser. Local charities are now providing nesting boxes.
The seal colony thrives with 60,000 members, which can be smelt from some distance away, so we held our noses as we watched their swimming skills. The sharks we saw were being attracted by a cage diving boat. The divers were more visible than the sharks !
Shilli-Fully Travels 