Integrating communities and conservation is one of the Nedbank-funded Green Trust’s cornerstone principles. Rondevlei Nature Reserve on the Cape Flats is a fine example of this.

Situated on the Cape Flats, Rondevlei offers kilometres of natural respite for the surrounding communities. It’s come a long way; it was not always as community-friendly as it is today.

Graeme Arendse (28) who grew up two blocks from the reserve thought it was a ‘no go zone’ until he visited it through his school outing at the age of nine.

“We were taken into this dark museum and then on a walk but it wasn’t an exciting feeling so I didn’t want to come back,” he recalls.

But come back he did - to the exciting new era of Rondevlei, as a tour guide and business partner in Imvubu Nature Tours, a community-owned guiding company based at Rondevlei and launched in 2002.

Arendse now leads the birding trails at Rondevlei which has 231 bird species, including African Fish Eagles, Greater Flamingoes (in the winter months they migrate here to feed) and Great White Pelicans.
 
Leading the guided plant walks is Joy Bennett (28), a qualified horticulturist from the Cape Flats and a partner in Imvubu Nature Tours. One of the walks explores traditional medicinal, cultural and culinary plants.

Imvubu also offers boat trips on the vlei when the levels are high enough and visitors can book into their Island Bush Camp for a night. It has bunk beds and a hot shower and it’s a great environmental adventure in the midst of the urban sprawl.

This year The Green Trust funded the capture and translocation of two more female hippos to increase
the number of hippos at Rondevlei to four.

One of the best hippo vantage points is a tall viewing tower outside Imvubu’s office which overlooks the 286-hectare nature reserve and the whole of the Cape Flats.

“Look! There are the hippos,” Dean Arendse (13) from Grassy Park points to the unmistakable tracks in the mud some distance from the tower.  

Many of the 6 000 children who visit this environmental oasis every year, have only seen hippos in books until they come to Rondevlei.

Imvubu Nature Tours can be contacted on 021 706 0842 or 082 537 0827. E-mail: info@imvubu.co.za
Website: www.imvubu.co.za