Thursday, February 2, 2017

Lake Naverone in the Underberg

About a 3 hour drive from Durban you will find yourself in a landscape that is majestic. The rolling hills of the Underberg is indescribable. The husband and I want to use our time in KZN as best as we can so a trip to the Underberg was on the bucket list.
 

Smaller lake next to Lake Naverone
 
I booked us a weekend at Lake Naverone, one of the best life choices I made last year :) The Lake is surrounded by a 400 hectare estate that will supply you with space for great outdoor fun or just a beautiful place to relax at. It has its own hiking trails or within a short drive you can hike at surrounding areas. You can book horse riding trips, do some birding or try your luck at catching some trout in the lake.

I was in awe about the beauty of this place. The mountains, the greenery and the thundershowers were perfection. I can imagine during winter time how pretty this place will be with snow on the mountains. Apparently is snows at Lake Naverone itself!

Our weekend view
 
The estate has 22 cottages that caters for small to big families. Check out their website for their rates and which cottage will suit you the best. We stayed at the Flufftail cottage. It's a well stocked self catering cottage with a inside fire place, outside weber and great views of the lake. They service the cottage twice a day so you can actually just sit on the terrace with a glass of wine the entire weekend and appreciate the beautiful surroundings.

We spent a lot of time in the window bay reading during thunder showers. It really was heaven on earth.

 
Flufftail cottage

 

Braai area at Flufftail cottage

 

Finished my book here :)
 
 
Each cottage comes with a rowing boat. You can also rent other boats and fishing equipment. The husband tried his luck with the fishing but I guess it's  fair to say that a few hours in the water won't cut it. (googling fly fishing also did not help :) )
 

Sundowners on the lake

Hoping to catch dinner

He did not catch anything but still looked great trying :)

 
We chose to do a hiking trail outside of Lake Naverone called "Three Pools". You buy a permit at Lake Naverone because you enter the National Park. It's a moderate hike of about 5km.  Great place to swim at is Champagne pool. Its about 500 m away from Three Pools. If you carry on with the trail you will reach the Bushman cave. Pack a  picnic and enjoy brunch or lunch here!
 


Champagne pool

Our weekend at Lake Naverone was the perfect spot to be active but also relax enough so that the new working week was easy to tackle.

There is a store about a 3 min drive from Lake Naverone that is well stocked if you forgot anything but I would say come prepared with all your groceries from your home base or shop at the shopping centre in Underberg. There are about four restaurants surrounding Lake Naverone but we never visited any of them.

 The staff at Lake Naverone were very friendly and helped us with all our questions about the hiking trails and even organised us another boat when a large tour group stole  borrowed ours :)

If you ever venture to the Underberg, Lake Naverone is not a spot to miss!

For more information visit their website
Like them on Facebook
Contact them at info@lakenaverone.co.za