The magnificent Black Rocks are a huge draw card in northwestern Angola. In the last of our three-part series on Angola, Dale Morris explores an enormous cave and visits one of Africa’s biggest waterfalls.

“Sorry folks, we have to turn back,” Martin le Roux, our bearded guide to Angola announces over the convoy radio. “A flood has destroyed the track since my last visit. We have to return to the highway and find another route down to a very special bay I want us to camp at tonight.”

Martin has just got out of our bakkie and halted the eight-car convoy near the town of Sumbe in northwestern Angola.

And a good thing he did too, because the road, if one could call it that, disappears into a very steep set of drainage channels and deep cracks in the earth.

Fortunately, we can all turn around on the steep and uneven terrain and within half an hour are trundling down towards the sea on a much better track.

“The locals must have forged this new route down. I’m so glad they did, and so will you when you see where I’m taking you,” Martin promises.

Of course, he is right. The secret little beach at which our group arrive is magnificent. Giant striated sandstone cliffs of the most brilliant orange glow as if lit up from inside by the big red sun dipping into the Atlantic Ocean.

The sea laps at the sands and a warm breeze ruffle the flames of our beach braai.

And there’s no one else around. It’s only us.