Sodwana Bay

Sodwana Bay unfurls along the remote Maputaland coast of northern KwaZulu-Natal, deep inside the iSimangaliso Wetland Park — South Africa's first UNESCO World Heritage Site, inscribed in 1999. There is little here but a forest-backed dune, a fishing camp, and a beach where 4x4s launch dive boats straight through the surf. Yet those boats reach a string of reefs — known simply by their distance from the launch, from Two-Mile to Nine-Mile — that draw an estimated 35,000 divers a year and rank the bay among the country's finest dive sites.

Warmed by the tropical Agulhas Current, the reefs are said to be Africa's most southerly coral reefs, and count among the most southerly in the world (though not, as is sometimes claimed, the southernmost on Earth). More than 1,200 fish species have been recorded here, alongside diverse hard and soft corals, turtles, rays and, in summer, whale sharks and manta rays. In 2000 a resident population of coelacanths — an ancient lineage once thought extinct for tens of millions of years — was found in the offshore Jesser Canyon, sealing Sodwana's reputation as a marine treasure.

The diving runs year-round: the warm season is roughly October to May, with visibility usually at its best from about March to May. Loggerhead and leatherback turtles haul ashore to nest between November and February, while humpback whales pass offshore on their winter migration. One practical note: this is the Maputaland coast, an intermediate malaria-risk area, so travellers should seek current medical advice before visiting.