Travel Guide West Coast National Park

From September to April, the migratory people dear to Jacques Perrin are here! Thousands of birds, on vacation from far away Siberia, offer themselves the African summer around the marvelous turquoise lagoon connected to the Saldanha Bay: nearly 140 feathered species in the heart of the action, on this territory of dunes and marshes of 30,000 hectares. Discover it by car (two possible entrances on R27; allow 4 hours; 9am-5pm) or on foot along the trails. This park was created in 1985 to protect the Langebaan lagoon and the islets to which tens of thousands of birds migrate every spring. Specialists estimate that it is the fourth most important bird sanctuary on the planet (flamingos, plovers, sand sanderlings, sandpipers, cormorants, gannets). In the lagoon, which is 16 km long and 4.5 km wide, there are considerable deposits of oyster shells varying in thickness from three to seven meters; according to scientists, a sudden change in the temperature of the sea water would have caused the death of these millions of mollusks. In August 1844, more than three hundred boats were counted at the same time in the bay; Malgas Island, covered with a ten-meter layer of guano, attracted all the European businessmen. It rains mainly between May and August. It is then the beginning of the most flowery spring: from the lagoon to Namaqualand, up north, the land is covered with flowers (daisies, gazanias, mesembryanthemaceous). During this period (August1 to September 30), the park management allows visitors access (from 9 am to 5 pm) to the wilderness section of Postberg (Oude Post dates from the time of Jan van Riebeeck). Summers are hot and dry, with the traditional morning mists.In 1995, geologist David Roberts discovered here the oldest footprints left byHomo sapiens. Fossilized in sandstone, these 20 cm long tracks were made 117,000 years ago, probably by a young woman of 1.60 m. By comparison, the footprints in the Chauvet cave in France have been dated to between 20,000 and 30,000 years ago.