About Mossel Bay

Mossel Bay sits on the Cape south coast at the western gateway to the Garden Route, and its identity is tied to the Post Office Tree, a milkwood under which a Portuguese sailor left letters for passing ships around 1500, a tradition the town still marks as one of the oldest surviving forms of postal exchange in the world. The Bartolomeu Dias Museum Complex commemorates the Portuguese navigator's 1488 landing here, the first recorded European landfall on the South African coast. The town's economy has long combined fishing and tourism with heavy industry, anchored by the PetroSA gas-to-liquids refinery that draws on offshore gas fields near the bay. Santos Beach and the Point give the town its holiday character, while the neighbouring resort village of Hartenbos, part of greater Mossel Bay, hosts much of the area's festival and community life.

Mossel Bay's spring opens with the multi-day Jeugkamp 2026 at Yellow Woods Camps and Conferences. Hikers can test themselves on the Tussen Koeke! 10km Hike through Groot Brakrivier, while The Bioscope Venue turns out for a Halloween night with Voelgoed Vrou. Triathletes take over the beachfront for the Isuzu Ironman 70.3 Mossel Bay in November, and music carries into the festive season with MosJazz at Santos Beach.