Storms River Walks and Hikes

About Storms River Walks and Hikes

Start: Storms River village
Finish: Storms River village
Duration: 4 km to 8 km
Fitness: easy to moderate
Our tip: the Baz bus stops in the village, for those without transport

The village of Storms River is often confused with the Storms River Mouth. They are close so the confusion is understandable. People tend to speak about the two interchangeably when, in fact, Storms River, or Stormsrivier as it is also known, is a little village just off the N2 outside the Storms River camp of the Tsitsikamma National Park.

As such it functions as a gateway to the Tsitsikamma National Park (the first turn off to the Tsitsikamma National Park takes you through the village).

The village is named after the Storms River that winds its way to the east of Storms River village, culminating in a breathtaking river mouth within the Tsitsikamma park.

Interestingly, were the river mouth not so spectacular the town could just have easily been called Witteklip, after the Witteklip River that runs very close to the town's western perimeter.

The ambient little town's tree-shaded lanes offers places to stay, a couple of grocery stores, a hotel and a number of tourist activities like white-river rafting down the Storms River, and the Tsitsikamma Canopy Tours.

In the area are a number of fairly easy hikes:

Ratel Trail or nature walk is a 4.2 km walk that will take you about an hour and a half to complete, but there are shorter versions of the circular walk if you do not have the time. The walk surrounds the famous Tsitsikamma Big Tree, which you will find east of the village on the N2 (a huge 36 metre-high yellowwood). There are three interlinking routes – a green (1km), yellow (2.6km) and red route (4.2 km), each of which follows a slightly different route through the forest.

Plaatbos Trail follows a route through high indigenous forests south of the N2 in the Plaatbos Nature Reserve. There are again four options – green (5 km), red (7.8 km), and yellow (8 km). All the routes begin and end at the Forrestry Office in Storms River village (pick up a map of the hikes here). The most exciting is the yellow trail as it includes the Storms River Bridge and the picnic site (take swimming costumes).

Goesa Trail is a short walk, only 2 km, through indigenous forests. It starts at the SANParks office in the village.