Here’s some news about eco-friendly safari camps and ‘green’ safari lodges that go the extra mile take care of the environment:

Garonga Safari Camp

Garonga Safari Camp in the Makalali Reserve (not too far from Kruger National Park) ensures that all rubbish is separated and foodstuffs are used for warthogs and kudu in winter.  They also have a water system whereby all used water is pumped into filtration pits and after 2 years is suitable for release to be drunk by animals.  They have started to grow their own organic vegetable garden (baboon-proof at the moment) which will find their way onto guest’s plates at Garonga Safari Camp and supplement staff rations.

Jaci’s Safari Lodge & Jaci’s Tree Lodge, Madikwe Game Reserve

 An exciting indigenous tree nursery project has been initiated by Jaci’s - by teaching the community to collect seeds and germinate indigenous trees for resale both within and outside of the Madikwe Game Reserve. This project has gained significant success and has generated valuable funds to be used within the greater scheme of the community driven waste management solution, including the benefit of planting over 300 trees in the game reserve.

 Ant’s Nest & Ant’s Hill, Waterberg

The objective of the Ant Collection is to create sustainable tourism by means of conserving the environment around us, enriching the lives of our guests and staff alike as well as uplifting the community and providing as much skills development to the locals as possible

Motswari Safari Lodge, Timbavati, nr Kruger

 Getting passed as a ‘Fair Trade in Tourism’  product is tangible evidence of commitment to the land and its people. It’s not an easy process, so any lodge that goes through it really wants to demonstrate fair trade practices. Motswari was particularly commended by Fair Trade in Tourism for their investments in community health and education and the maintenance of a family-friendly staff village, which is a critical strategy for combating HIV/AIDS in the game lodge industry.

If you want to know more about these places contact me at: safaritart@wydahtours.com 

Travelling is what I do best but I am a travel writer that is always getting lost! Finding Thandeka Lodge somewhere up a long track near the blink-and-you-miss-it town of Bela Bela, would have been much harder without “Bossy“. Bossy is the female voice on the Nokia Navigator GPS phone that my travelling companion Toni has on her Vodakom contract. Bossy told us exactly where to go and when we’d gone past our chosen point, she kept her calm even when we ignored her.  We did at times tell her to shut up and sometimes she heard us.

Once we’d arrived at Thandeka, we let Bossy have some rest for a couple of days, although we felt she was itching to come on the 4×4 game drive just so she could tell Vernon (Thandeka’s manager),  a thing or two about finding your way around.  I suspect she would have been out of her depth, because Vernon is no novice in the bush, he’s a guide trainer and in this terrain, I have no doubt that Vernon would have kicked Bossy’s ass.

What a pleasure to be with a ranger who asks what you are interested in, rather than just repeats lots of dry facts and figures. Vernon used to teach bush survival skills and sent his students into the wilds to cope alone for a couple of days. I’m sure I would do what one of his student’s admitted to years afterwards; finding himself on the border of the reserve and seeing a pineapple farm beyond, he persuaded the workers to lob over a few juicy ones, and then pretended to be starving when he tracked his way back to camp. Finding the edge of Thandeka Game Reserve wouldn’t be that difficult, as it is not huge, but contains just enough animals to make the game drive interesting.

Vernon and his wife Lorriaan manage Thandeka Lodge and their hospitality experience shows. I felt well hosted with a sense of a friendship developing, and this is more difficult than it sounds when you have to be nice to people all the time. I couldn’t do it, but they love their job and their presence makes a stay at Thandeka memorable.

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Decor: Eclectic unresolved mix of Afro, European, Bali, Persian and the smart home décor shop in the mall.

Food:  Refined, inventive and very tasty.

Staff: Hosts and rangers treat you like family, while the African staff tend to stay behind the scenes.

Position: Perhaps one of the best placed in Welgevonden for access to all areas of the park.

Game Experience: Thick bush and rocky terrain means this is a genuine seek and find safari for the Big Five, lots of antelopes, baboons, warthog, rhino, wildebeest, ele’s and lots more.

The old cliché about a place being a home away from home, relates perfectly to Shibula Lodge. It’s got your cosy lounge with sofas of brown leather softened over time and splashes of colour from newly upholstered chairs that co-ordinate with the blinds and the throw and scatter cushions of shiny sateen. It’s got your hosts waiting to greet you like long lost friends and a logs blazing in the fireplace on cold winter nights.

Shibula feels like home, except that my loved ones don’t welcome me back with a moist face towel on arrival (refreshingly cold in summer and piping hot in winter), nor do I have a Jacuzzi or splash pool sunk into the terrace outside my bedroom, or elephants in my back yard. I don’t have a resident leopard either, which stalks around on the rocky escarpment opposite the lodge, or lions padding along the path to the man-made waterhole in front of the deck. Perhaps it’s not that much like home after all.

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Game Experience: Play hide and seek with the Big Five in this bushy, hilly reserve.

Rangers: Ask for Justinus by name and you will get a top guide who’s funny too.

Decor: Mediaeval heavy metal with 21^st century twist - very masculine but very luxurious with private Jacuzzi sunk into each deck.

Food: Fabulous in look and taste. Lots of game meat and yummy veggie options too.

Staff: Stunning staff, all amazingly helpful with meal room service that had Frans trotting up and down the long paths delivering a 4-course meal (one course at a time), with a big smile.

Sediba was conceived through an overabundance of testosterone. It is a bastion of a place, built with huge burnished rocks that litter the surface of the hillsides in the Welgevonden Game Reserve, just 3 hours north of Johannesburg.

Sediba is a man’s world. It’s like a mediaeval fortress with a giant double doorway that creaks open to reveal a huge dark bedroom. The metal-studded doors close behind you with a ‘Hummer’ of a clunk. Iron wheel-shaped chandeliers criss-crossed with beaten metal, hang from the rafters on monster chains, and cast-iron holders for flaming torches are fixed on exterior walls.

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Nedile Lodge Overview:

Game Experience: Riaan the Ranger’s party trick is finding lion and leopard in 38,000 hectares of Big Five reserve.

Decor: It doesn’t get more traditional safari than this; wood, stone, thatch and African artefacts harmoniously combined in tones of brown.

Food: Delicious dinners with local game meats a speciality, but unmemorable lunches.

Extras: one of the best views in the reserve is from the enticing rock swimming pool

The view from Nedile lodge is fantastic. From every room, deck and even the swimming pool, you look across the top of about twenty rolling hills that disappear into a far distance. This feels like a million miles from civilization because there are no other lights to be seen in the dead of night. In reality, it’s a mere morning’s drive from Johannesburg in the Welgevonden Game Reserve of the Waterberg Mountains.

This is Big Five game country, but such is the thickness of the bush, the rockiness of the terrain and the height of the grass, that finding them can be tricky. I sometimes talk about ‘soft safari’ where the animals are almost guaranteed, well this is ‘hard safari’, where searching for the animals and the anticipation this creates, is part of the process. This means that when you see a herd of elephant or some antelopes leaping across the track, an elegant giraffe wrapping its tongue around acacia thorn branches or a white rhino and calf, it’s a treat. One thing you are sure to see are ubiquitous impala - the most successful animal in the bush - and warthog families snufflin in the earth. These handsome piggies usually nibble the grass on their knees because their short neck is a design flaw and they can’t quite reach the ground. I adore I these little critters.

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Ka’Ingo Overview

Game Experience: See lots of game like lion, rhino, buffalo and elephant, giraffe, lots of buck and snuffling warthog.
Decor: Inviting beds and a bright refurbishment in progress as I left.
Food: Malawian’s are renowned for being great chefs and there are two at Ka’Ingo. Taste some of the best meat in SA, especially game like kudu, eland and wildebeest from the local butcher.
Staff: Staff at Ka’Ingo are a really happy bunch - it seems they really like working here and it shows.
Spa: Ask for Elizabeth and you will experience an unforgettable massage.
Kids: They are welcome here. One extended family of 35 take over the whole place once a year, but bringing that many isn’t a pre-requisite. 

Spafari is the latest buzz word in African safari travel and it refers to a holiday where you can combine spa and safari. If both elements can provide pleasure in an equal measures, then I reckon you’ve hit the jackpot. That’s how I felt at Ka’Ingo.

First thing to happen was a hand massage - this was just a ‘welcome to Ka’Ingo’ reminder that safari is no longer just about watching animals. This spa offers the lot, but if they have a lot of guests book quickly ‘cause you really don’t want to miss a massage from Lizzie. She has magic hands that seek out all those knots then firmly makes them a thing of the past.

Can you imagine lying on the massage bed then hearing lions roar just a few hundred metres away? That’s what happened this morning, except I wasn’t on the massage bed, I was still under my duvet. The pair of male lions that I’d seen on yesterday’s afternoon game drive, were giving it all they had. For over an hour they took turns to roar in a way that only lions know how. It’s the kind of noise that makes the ground vibrate and your heart miss a beat.

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