KEY POINTS:
One of South Africa's leading conservationists is creating a rumble in the jungle with his plans to reinvent the safari.
The idea of a safari holiday has always left me slightly cold; gawping at some poor animal surrounded by safari trucks was not my idea of a good time.
Or so I thought. And yet, here I am, wearing khaki shorts and sitting in a truck in the purple African twilight, utterly transfixed by the sight of three lions stalking a herd of wildebeest. A sudden storm has turned the sky the colour of an angry bruise and, illuminated by occasional flashes of lightning, we watch the trio, two males and a female, stealthily taking up their positions, ready for the attack. It is, possibly, one of the most beautiful and thrilling things I've seen.
If you were going to do only one safari in your life, you could make a strong case for choosing Londolozi. In the private Sabi Sand reserve, on the western border of the Kruger National Park, it is one of the original safari lodges and has a reputation for offering some of the best game viewing in the world.
I am here as a guest of Dave Varty, who built the lodge in 1972 on land his family had owned since the 1920s. Londolozi was based on a principle so simple it seems eye-poppingly obvious, but which at that time was considered pioneering; take care of the land and it will take care of the wildlife, which in turn will create opportunities for the local people.
Having established that this model could work, Varty decided to replicate it elsewhere; in 1992 he went on to found CC Africa, which is now the biggest safari operator on the continent, running more than 40 lodges in six countries.
"We know how to find the Big Five. And we've proved that taking rich people to see animals makes money. So what's next?" says Dave, as he starts up the jeep and we head back to the lodge - our headlamps reflecting startled eyes in the darkness, the heady smell of animal hides and warm earth on the wind.
The answer, it seems, is right back where he started. Having scaled down his involvement with CC Africa, Dave cut his remaining ties with the company last month when he took back the keys to Londolozi to run it, once again, as a family concern with his wife Shan, and his children Boyd and Bronwyn.
Varty insists that his departure from CC Africa was amicable, but it's clear a certain amount of disillusionment was behind the decision. "Corporations can lose sight of their origins. It can get lost, who we are, what we stand for," he says.
By getting his hands back on Londolozi, Varty hopes once again to make a statement that will be as revolutionary as it was when the lodge first opened 35 years ago. His aim is to "redefine the essence of a safari", with an emphasis on the interpretive side of game viewing rather than on "running a boutique hotel in the bush".
There are also plans to introduce "extreme tracking", whereby a ranger and guests will track an animal on foot; the way Dave and his father used to hunt lions when he was a boy, only without the shooting bit - an activity he admits will suit only more adventurous guests, comprising as it does "long periods of walking interspersed with short bursts of terror".
In the meantime, a 10 million Rand ($1.9 million) refurbishment of the four camps that comprise Londolozi is under way. The guest rooms are being renovated and three top-of-the-range suites built overlooking the Sand River.
In the autumn a "Life Centre" will open, offering yoga and massage in rooms looking out onto the bush. This will be followed by a restaurant in the staff village, where guests will be able to come to the bar and have a drink with the lodge staff and rangers.
But it's clear that discussing bathroom upgrades is not where Varty's heart lies.
"You can have a bath anywhere in the world! But you can't see this..." he sweeps his arm out towards the bushveld. He has an impressive and endearing ability to turn almost every conversation to conservation.
When his son Boyd was attacked by a crocodile while swimming in a lake five years ago, Dave's response to the situation was idiosyncratic: though obviously a doting parent, he is quoted in a local media report as saying it was "a good sign", as it proved that local crocodile populations were recovering from near-extinction.
It's this kind of single-mindedness that has won him some of his greatest victories. Shortly after his release from prison, Nelson Mandela came to stay at Londolozi. Dave took the opportunity to share his vision of how proper land use could contribute to the future prosperity of the country and successfully campaigned for the removal of the fences between Mozambique, Zimbabwe and South Africa, creating one of the world's largest trans-frontier conservation parks.
Now, he is campaigning for a 70km wilderness corridor that will link the Kruger National Park with the source of its rivers in the Drakensburg mountains.
Dave drives us to the boundary of the park. We stop at a high wire fence. "On one side of this fence you've got the most successful game lodges in the world," he says. "On the other side you've got human devastation on an enormous scale. You can't have a game reserve located in a sea of poverty. People need to benefit from the wildlife."
In Varty's opinion, giving handouts to local schools or providing employment, while laudable, will not solve South Africa's social problems. This is something he wants to address at a more fundamental level.
"We've created a lot of individuals earning a good living at Londolozi ... We must make it the responsibility of individuals to improve the lot of their families."
He plans to do this by employing a career guidance expert and social worker to carry out interviews with the staff and their families, to find out how they live and what their aspirations are, for themselves and their children. There will also be the possibility of educational loans for those who want to study. Nutrition experts will be brought in to talk about diet and a computer room has been created. "There will be no handouts. We will give people the opportunity to solve their own problems," he adds.
Dave believes if he can make this model work in his own community, then he can convince people to replicate it elsewhere in South Africa, much as he exported his original safari model. When I ask him whether the size of the task ahead daunts him, he shakes his head energetically: "Any country that's emerged from a mess is alive with possibility. We are a creative nation. We have the opportunities to learn from the mistakes of the first world and create our own model."
On our final afternoon, we drive to the open grassland on the edge of the reserve. The tracker, Solly, spots a cheetah camouflaged in the bushes. Silently, gracefully, the cat leaps onto a fallen tree trunk and sits still, sniffing the wind, seemingly oblivious to our presence.
We watch him for 15 minutes, hardly daring to breathe. Eventually the cheetah yawns, stretches and stalks off into the dying light, melting into the long grass.
- OBSERVER
Getting there
House of Travel has a Luxury Londolozi Package from $6875 per person twin share. This includes three nights accommodation at the superb Varty Camp in Londolozi Game Reserve including all meals and with return transfers, one night in Johannesburg and return airfares from Auckland/Wellington/Christchurch to Johannesburg.
If you have a little more time to explore you could also add on a six-night package which includes three nights in the beautiful waterfront city of Cape Town, followed by a four-day tour along the Magical Garden Route, all based in four-star accommodation. This includes internal flights, accommodation, transfers and the four-day tour. Prices from $3170 per person twin share.
Further information
For further details contact House of Travel on 0800 838 747 or visit www.houseoftravel.co.nz. You can find out more about Londolozi on its website at www.londolozi.com.
