It was a great experience to dive into Xhosa Culture

the prices of meals and especially beers are exorbitant

This community owned eco lodge is worth every bit of the effort to get there! Warm, friendly staff, spectacular location (beyond words), and delicious well priced meals. We woke up every morning to the most beautiful sunrises and watched dolphins riding the waves as the sun set. Fantastic family holiday. We have visited before and will most definitely visit again!

Rocket showers didn't work well the first couple of days but these were quickly fixed. Thank you!

the magical location, authentic Xhosa experience, the amazing staff, the environment which fosters friendships and connection, the space which is slow and peaceful and beautiful

The 500 m walk to get to the lodge or the alternate route which was bordering on impossible to get your car around- if you have a lot of luggage it is a huge challenge

I wish we had more than 1 night here. The community is very nice and there are several activities to do around. We used this as a starting point for our wild coast hike between Bulungula to Mdumbi, with a stop at Coffee Bay in between. This is one of the hidden gems of the Wild Coast. There is a nice beach around. Lots of food options for vegetarians and very kind staff. We took a private ride for R1400 and it took almost 4 hours from the Umtata airport because the roads were very poor due to the recent rains when we visited. However, normally a ride is about 2.5 hours we heard.

The scenery was great & the overall quietness

THE BEDS!! Very uncomfortable

Very nice located at the beautiful bulungula beach. Well equipped kitchen and space to make barbecue outside. The local ladies who are responsible for the kitchen and public spaces are very friendly and take so much effort to keep the space clean and comfortable. Toilets and showers have been always clean. Beautiful view.

Unfortunately we were disappointed by a lot of issues. First the outside space needs a make over: some of the hammocks were not useable because they had big holes and the furnitures around the bonfire are very shabby with not enough pillows to sit. The rooms were tidy but a little shelf or additional furniture would help to put things out of the baggage. Furthermore the Homepage advertises as a XHOSA COMMUNITY-OWNED lodge, which is not true. The stuff who is working there is from the Xhosa community and super friendly and lovely but the manager not. I was staying with some locals at the Lodge and the Manager was not really attentive or friendly to us. My friends offered drum evenings for the guests which the owner didn’t appreciate. Please not that we were also not able to rent wetsuits there, even if there were a bunch of them hanging outside. In the end we had a little surprise on our bill when they told us to pay 15 Rand per night extra for parking our car, which nobody told us in the beginning. With a lot of discussion they deleted the extra expense. All in all the place deserves a little bit more love and passion to run it, as the location is so beautiful but the lodge doesn’t do it’s justice to all this beauty. There is more potential!

Coming here is a life experience, not just a holiday. If you love broadening your mind, talking to diverse people and a community feeling, you will enjoy Bulungula. The community owns this lodge and everyone is friendly towards visitors. There is interaction with the community as vilagers are entitled to make use of the communal space and do so at times. There is also interaction with other travellers during optional communal meals. For these, expect hearty food, always catering for vegetarians too. And if you can get the cook to make Bulungula apple crumble (a unique version), your culinary experience will be well-rounded. The community offers several excursions according to skill and culture. The reception staff (always available, patien, helpfult and friendly) books these for you. It is best to rely on this process as getting into discussion and negotiations with proponents themselves can get sticky. I highly recommend visiting the traditional healer, a humble but vastly knowledgeable and wise man very much in tune with nature. In fact, emerging into an open yet secluded spot in the forest he frequents for medicine, left me with an 'Avatar'-feeling. He is very special. Thus is no luxury lodge, in fact, upon your return home you will be able boast being able to launch a rocket to get your own hot water, but your stay will show you a different outlook on life. To me, that's the point of travelling and Bulungula went a long way to satisfying my adventurous spirit at a time that overseas travel was impossible. The countryside around is breath-taking and our hikes were highly rewarding. You can always have a pristine bathroom again at home for countless days, but when will you have another hot shower in a large open-air bathroom at the edge of a forest, surrounded by abundant greenery while watching birds in the trees above you?

Staff, as lovely as they are, do not check booking.com bookings frequently. Easy to solve: just follow up with a phone call or insistent emails. Find details on their website.

The views are spectacular. The rocket showers are an experience and the Xhosa bread is divine! The staff are super friendly and you are made to feel at home.

Despite booking & paying 3 months in advance, on arrival our booking could not be found. The lady on duty was not able to resolve. Finally we were assisted by guests (2 x bikers) who offered us their accommodation and opted for a tent instead.

location location location!!!

The place is nice,very different from the usual guest houses. The community is welcoming with so much love and great ocean view

The place is a bit far. +-2hours from the coffee bay Tar road

The area is beautiful, great way of connecting with nature.

-The reception lady was unfriendly, checked us into an uncomfortable tent when we booked a room, we fortunately were able to request this to be changed. -The property could work on the cleanliness, the food was not that great. -No orientation was given. - they should mention that the roads are gravel and not friendly for smaller cars - overall staff experience was terrible, ended up having to cut our stay short, and booked the rest of our stay with another accommodation.

The drop toilets smelled really bad.

The location is perfect since is to deep rural and the rooms bring back that African sprit together with warm nice showers

Difficult to reach the place if is ruining and roads bad expecially if not driving SUV

Was nice to be there with a lot of our friends. The kitchen was good 😋 but not the quickest one 🤷‍♂️. But in holiday in South Africa 🇿🇦 you as a customer you have this time. At the end of our holiday when they create the invoice 🧾 they must think 🤔 💭 about to do a quicker strategy for it .

No , that was all as we know and the reason about we come more times back in Bulungula lodges

Our rondawel rooms were absolutely PERFECT. Great, comfortable beds, spotlessly clean, fantastic view. We loved spending time with the locals in a comfortable, natural setting. The food was fantastic!! The rocket showers worked very well.

The communal kitchen was always clean, but it did not smell so great.

Everything

Nothing

Amazing location on the beach. So many cultural experiences to do. Wish we could have stayed longer

The drive to it is hard and a 4x4 is recommended. Don’t drive at night.

Incredible view, and by beautiful, authentic accommodation. Vert rural, with little signal in most places. Beautiful outdoor shower.

Relatively weak water pressure for hot water in some of the showers.