Usutu Forest

The Usutu Forest covers a large part of Eswatini's western highveld with pine, planted from the 1950s onward and for a long period described as the largest hand-planted forest in Africa, running for tens of kilometres across the hills around Mhlambanyatsi. Fires in 2007 destroyed a large proportion and much of what stands now is replanting. Roads and firebreaks run through it and it is used for cycling and running.

What you actually see

• The scale - pine across tens of kilometres of the western highveld.
• The replanting - the growth put in after fires destroyed much of the forest in 2007.
• The forest roads - the network of tracks and firebreaks through the blocks.
• The highveld setting - cool hill country the plantations were planted on.

When to go

April to September is drier and cooler for cycling and walking. Summer mist sits over the highveld. Fire risk is high in the dry late winter.

Honest expectations

It is a commercial plantation, not natural forest, and the monoculture is monotonous. Logging operations close roads without notice. Fire risk restricts access in the dry season.

Nearby

Mhlambanyatsi is in the middle of it, and Mbabane is northeast.