Kruger Concessions

The Kruger Concessions and Private Reserves

The Kruger Private Reserves

Cobbled onto the western border of Kruger’s central sector is an array of privately owned game reserves, all of which greatly benefit from the transmigration of wildlife across the national park territory after fences were dismantled along the western boundary. These private reserves vie hotly with one another for the ultimate in luxury in terms of bushveld environs, personal service and sleeping quarters. All offer the services of field guides and trackers who conduct personalized walking trails with promises of close encounters with wild animals, and dawn, sunset and night drives in open 4x4 vehicles. The best way for visitors to gauge which of the lodges or tented camps appeals most to their taste is to trawl the Kruger hotels and lodges section of website, which have inviting photographs of intimate suites, private decks and plunge pools, and ethnically decorated lounges and dining areas.

SABI SANDS PRIVATE GAME RESERVE
One of the most well-known private sanctuaries is the Sabi Sands Game Reserve, defined by the Sabie River to the south and traversed by the Sand River. Within its borders is a phalanx of lodge establishments, comprising a self-catering family safari camp and a range of luxury, exclusive and premier safari lodges. Sabi Sabi Bush Lodge: Situated in the heart of the Sabi Sands with views onto a water hole, the décor of this lodge recreates the ambience of the mid-1900s. African wood sculptures are fashioned from tree trunks, branches and bark collected in the surrounding wilds. Suites with glass-fronted bathrooms open onto panoramic views of the bush and a spa offers heavenly treatments. Selati Camp: A historical railway theme gives the eight luxury thatched suites of this lodge their charming 19th-century flavour. Spot the collector’s pieces in each room after finding your way with the help of shunter’s lamps along the paths, and pore over the original steam engine nameplates, signals and other paraphernalia in the lounge. The camp, under spreading acacias lining the Msuthlu River, is located not far from the Selati railway line. Sabi Sabi Earth Lodge: Labelled the most ecologically sensitive lodge in Africa in terms of its design, it draws its inspiration from the architecture of the Middle Ages where buildings were excavated into the slope of their site. Encroached on by vegetation from every side, the textures, colours and shapes of nature have been harnessed by blending straw, stone and pigment into cement plaster. Natural wood sculptures by artist Geoffrey Armstrong occur throughout. Below ground level, one suite features a sculptural rough-hewn headboard created from a tree and its spreading branches.

THORNYBUSH RESERVE
Similarly, Thornybush Reserve has its range of family, exclusive and premier luxury lodges. At all of them, lavish personal attention and pampering remain paramount. African tribal dancing counts among the extras that are offered here. Royal Malewane: This is the flagship of Thornybush Reserve, accommodating a maximum of 16 guests in colonial splendour. Six suites are distinguished by Persian rugs, voluminous antique canopied beds and private viewing decks with plunge pools, while elevated walkways link the suites to the main lodge. VIPs wanting to sneak incognito to the reserve can make use of its helicopters and executive jets. Yes, we all wish … For the genuine monied set, the Royal Suite comes with its own chef, butler and masseuse. Eat your heart out.

THE OTHERS - A RESERVE ROUNDUP
The utter remoteness of Manyeleti Game Reserve – Shangaan for ‘place of the stars’ – encourages the more adventurous to join a rustic trails camp, where hikers shower under the Southern Cross and dine around a camp fire. Timbavati Game Reserve makes sure you commune closely with Nature by means of an overnight wilderness hike or a drive at sparrow’s peep to watch the copper sunrise, followed by a high-class breakfast. Kapama Game Reserve does things with a difference – it sends willing guests off on a dawn or dusk ramble on elephant-back. Andover Game Reserve and Letaba Ranch are examples of truly wild, undeveloped areas that are greatly benefiting from Kruger’s migratory wildlife trundling down ancient routes again to seek out fresh pastures. At Klaserie Nature Reserve you can choose East African style – billowing gauzy nets in safari tents on raised wooden platforms – or a tree-house lodge balanced in the branches. In the wild Umbabat Nature Reserve guests report sightings of leopard and lion from the seclusion and comfort of their private decks!

Exploring the Kruger Sector by Sector

Kruger is a vast territory with such diverseness in its habitats, scenery and wildlife distribution that it’s necessary to break the park into manageable chunks to make it easier for visitors to zero in on the experience they’re after. Every sector has its own ambience and factors giving it specific appeal. Kruger is often criticized for its extensive network of tarred roads detracting from a true wilderness feel to wildlife spotting. The park claims the tar allows for better road maintenance and also, the less dust churned up by countless wheels, the better it is for the environment. There are also multiple smaller side roads for visitors to explore, and the further north they venture, the more wild and untamed the environment becomes. Kruger’s roads are labelled using a code system of letters and numbers. Tarred major routes linking the main camps are prefixed with H, then the route number; secondary untarred (but wellmaintained) roads carry the prefix S followed by the route number.

SOUTHERN SECTOR
(Crocodile to Sabie rivers)
Often spoken of as ‘the Circus’ zone, Kruger’s southern quarter is the most accessible, with five entry gates. What is not contested, though, are concentrations of a great diversity of wildlife – lion, large numbers of white rhino, buffalo, wild dog and spotted hyena are some of the specials lurking in the bushveld.

CENTRAL SECTOR
(Sabie to Letaba rivers)
Half of the park’s lion population – around 60 lion prides – is believed to be concentrated in the great grassy plains of acacia and mopane bushveld occurring in this sector. Elephant, hippo and Nile crocodile love the rivers, and huge herds of ungulates – wildebeest, giraffe, Burchell’s zebra, waterbuck and sable antelope – attract predatory lion. Where the king of beasts prowls, wild dogs unfortunately stay away.

NORTHERN SECTOR
(Olifants to Shingwedzi to Limpopo)
The high-lying terrain and spectacular mountain scenery of northern Kruger forms a tract of untrammelled wilderness, distinctive in its fat greasy-grey baobabs and giant sandstone cliffs. It is for those who revel in isolation and solitude, and want to escape the circus of the south. The far north, lying between the Tropic of Capricorn just beyond Mopani Camp and the Luvuvhu and Limpopo rivers, is big beast country, lorded over by heavyweights such as elephant and buffalo, and shared by tsessebe, nyala, and sable and roan antelope. Lichtenstein’s hartebeest, which was hunted to extinction by 1886, was reintroduced from Malawi and exists here in small numbers. A long narrow snout and identifying horns that do a Zlike inward swoop make this an interesting animal to train your binoculars on. Careful spotting near Punda Maria could also reward you with sightings of wild dog. The tangled vegetation is lion and leopard habitat, and samango and vervet monkeys scamper through the treetops. The bird life is considered to be the best in Kruger because of the area’s proximity to countries further north. This sector is also distinguished by its heritage of ancient archaeological remains, embodied in the Iron Age site of Masorini Hill near Phalaborwa (west of Letaba) and the Thulamela archaeological site, southeast of Pafuri. The remains of a previous civilization dating to between 1200 and 1640 are evident in the series of loosely packed stone structures at Thulamela, where gold bangles, beads and royal ornaments as well as Indian glass beads and Chinese porcelain were discovered only in 1991. At Masorini, a reconstructed tribal village of thatched wattle-and-mud huts and smelting works provides evidence of a people who lived here in the 18th and 19th centuries. They mined and smelted ore in ovens to extract the iron, then, higher up the hill, worked the crude iron into spears, picks, axes, and other implements which were traded for grain and other commodities.

Kruger Landscapes and Ecozones

Rivers play a significant role in Kruger country, defining the north and south boundaries and also dividing the park decisively into four major landscapes – although the diversity of this territory embraces up to 35 identified landscape types. Of Kruger’s seven major rivers, five flow all year round. In the extreme north, the Limpopo separates South Africa and Zimbabwe; in the far south, the park bounds are marked by the Crocodile River. The Olifants River cuts right across the centre of Kruger with the Letaba splaying off at an angle, cutting a perfect triangular wedge in the middle of the park. Rainfall steadily decreases northward to the Limpopo boundary. Another distinctive feature is a north–south split that sees the west length of the park dominated by granitic rock, while the east length is characterized by volcanic basalt and shales. This basalt contains iron, magnesium, calcium and phosphate, all of which act as a rich nutrient base for the grasslands concentrated here. The basalt also holds water well, explaining why grazers (and their predators) are constantly drawn to this section of the park. The park’s rivers are an ever-present cause for concern to conservationists as agricultural, mining and forestry industries have taken a heavy toll, and their water flow has been substantially reduced over the years. Reassuringly, Kruger has a full-time presence of scientists researching its ecosystem, in collaboration with other scientific experts from around the world.

EXTREME SOUTHERN SECTOR
(between Crocodile and Sabie)
Distinctive to this area, particularly around the camps of Pretoriuskop, Berg-en-Dal and Malelane to the west, are rounded granite hills rising out of dense bush savannah, made up mainly of different types of Bushwillow (Combretum spp.) and Silver Cluster-leaf (Terminalia sericea) woodland. Petite and incredibly sure-footed klipspringer and mountain reedbuck love the rocky bouldered terrain. The cluster-leaf trees are easy to identify by the clutch of silvery silky-haired leaves carried on each stem; the tree often carries dried red-brown winged pods which degenerate into a twisted, tangled mass. Bushwillow species, notably Large-fruited (Combretum zeyheri) and Red Bushwillow (C. apiculatum), also carry pod-like winged fruit, this time with four papery wings. Pale green when young, they mature to brown. Other tree species that are conspicuous in this park sector are Horned Thorn (Acacia grandicornuta) with its thin, woody, sicklecurved pods, and the ubiquitous butterfly-leaved Mopane (Colophospermum mopane). The African landscape gets its splashes of colour via the Red Bauhinia (Bauhinia galpinii) – also known as pride-of-the-Kaap, its loveliness speaks for itself – and the Common Coral Tree (Erythrina lysistemon) whose tempestuous scarlet flowers have their field day on a virtually leafless tree. Coveted lucky beans are the fruit of this tree, nestled in long thin bubbled pods. The basalt soils in the east of this southern region around Lower Sabie Camp are covered in bushwillow and acacia savannah – Knob-thorn (Acacia nigrescens) and Delagoa Thorn (Acacia welwitschii) in particular. The Skukuza and Lower Sabie camps are established on river banks that are thickly clustered with tall spreading Natal Mahogany (Trichilia emetica), Sycamore Fig (Ficus sycomorus) and Sausage Tree (Kigelia africana).

CENTRAL SECTOR
(between Sabie and Olifants/Letaba)
Vast flat grasslands dotted with acacias characterize this well frequented zone of the Kruger. Mixed in with the knob-thorn acacias and mopane thicket is a dominance of Marula (Sclerocarya birrea) as well as Leadwood (Combretum imberbe) and Jackalberry (Diospyros mespiliformis) trees. The Olifants River, particularly, is lined with Ilala Palms (Hyphaene natalensis) and sycamore figs, while further south the Timbavati River is distinctive in its compressed-canopy Umbrella Thorns (Acacia tortilis) and Appleleaf, or Rain Trees (Lonchocarpus capassa). Just before the arrival of the summer rains, water forms at the foot of the so-called rain tree, the result of an insect that pierces the bark to suck the tree’s sap. In the process the insect discharges an equal amount of water, which drips down the trunk to collect at its base – hence its name. Between September and November, pretty purplish sprays of sweet-scented flowers grace the tree’s crown. The Lebombo hills along the Mozambique border are clothed in knob-thorn and marula bushveld with fronded ilala palms and, on rocky koppies, Lebombo Euphorbias (Euphorbia confinalis), straight bare stems topped by a dense, fleshy, candelabra-like mop.

NORTHERN SECTOR
(from Olifants to Limpopo)
The much less explored zone of Kruger between the Olifants and Shingwedzi rivers features mainly mopane savannah which increasingly becomes low mopane scrub as a result of the clay soils on chalky calcrete, overlying basalt bedrock. The mopane monotony is broken by various bushwillows such as the Common species (Combretum collinum) and red bushwillow, as well as the knob-thorn acacia. The Letaba and Shingwedzi camps are fringed with riverine trees such as ilala, apple-leaf and leadwood. From the Shingwedzi to the Limpopo in the extreme north, vegetation not experienced elsewhere in Kruger sets this area apart from the rest of the park. Labelled as baobab sandveld and sand forest, tree species include Pod Mahogany (Afzelia quanzensis), Sand Camwood (Baphia massaiensis) and Red Heartfruit (Hymenocardia ulmoides), whose little nut encircled by a rosy wing is similar to that of some cluster-leafs. The Zulu name for pod mahogany means ‘betrothed girl’, inspired by the pretty black seeds with their bright red tip contained within flat pods, and alluding to the red head-dress worn by Zulu women before marriage. The sand camwood, from October to January, is covered in delicate white jasmine-scented flowers. Mopane Aloes (Aloe littoralis) stand on tall untidy pedestals, spiky arms crowned by a branched head of coral flowers, while some gnarled giant baobabs are estimated to be 4000 years old. Growing along the eastern border are Ana, or Apple-ring Thorn Trees (Acacia albida) and the Transvaal Mustard Tree (Salvadora angustifolia).

The History of the Kruger

Kruger, Stevenson-Hamilton and Grobler
The reserve’s origins go back to the unlikely figure of Paul Kruger, a sixth-generation staunch Afrikaner who became the president of the South African Republic in 1883. In spite of his cultural heritage and, indeed, his own initial stubborn resistance, it dawned painfully on him that his Voortrekker forebears had been responsible for the decimation of enormous populations of game during hunting forays in the Transvaal from the 1830s onward. Needless to say, it took from 1884, when the idea was broached, to 1898 to found the Sabi Game Reserve, cradled by the Crocodile and Sabie rivers. Enter the man most credited with laying the foundations of the park as it is now, Lieutenant-Colonel James Stevenson-Hamilton. He was appointed head ranger by Paul Kruger in 1902 and outstripped his contemporaries with a vision that was way ahead of its time. Making himself a slew of enemies, Stevenson-Hamilton ruthlessly took on illegal squatters, poachers and cavalier hunters, earning himself the nickname Sikhukhuza by the local Tsonga. Translated variously as ‘he who levels the ground’ (some say ‘sweeps clean’) or ‘he who turns everything upside down’, the name has evolved over time into ‘Skukuza’ which today is the name of Kruger’s main camp and headquarters. In the 44 years that Stevenson-Hamilton headed up the reserve, he battled constantly to change the entrenched attitudes of hunters, miners and agriculturalists who believed that the land should be subdivided into farms, grazing areas and land for industry. He succeeded in extending the reserve to the Olifants River (roughly the halfway mark of today’s Kruger National Park). In the same year, 1903, the government agreed to protect a huge tract of land lining the Lebombo mountains – from the Letaba River, which joins the Olifants River, to the Luvuvhu River in the extreme north. This was given the name Shingwedzi Game Reserve. It was only when public awareness grew, perceptions improved and the opinions of even certain government members were swayed that Stevenson-Hamilton had any further joy. In 1926, Minister of Lands Piet Grobler eventually introduced the National Parks Act, and the Sabi and Shingwedzi game reserves, together with the land in between, became the Kruger National Park. It was not much different then from today’s full extent of the park.

Greater Limpopo Transfrontier Park
In December 2002, the signing of an international treaty between three heads of state involved a ground-breaking move to merge the national reserves of three African countries. And so the seeds were sown for the establishment of the Greater Limpopo Transfrontier Park which, when all the fences have been lowered between the three countries to promote unrestricted movement of people and migration of wildlife across the borders, will be one of the largest sanctuaries in the world. The treaty proclaimed the linking of Kruger with Mozambique’s Limpopo National Park and Zimbabwe’s Gonarezhou National Park as well as its Manjinji Pan Sanctuary and Malipati Safari Area, adding up to a total area of around 35,000km2 (13,515 sq miles). It will comprise 58% South African, 24% Mozambican and 18% Zimbabwean territory. Bridging areas, consisting of the Sengwe communal land in Zimbabwe and Kruger’s northernmost wedge between the Luvuvhu and Limpopo rivers – today the Makuleke Concession area – are also part of the transfrontier park. In a historic agreement a few years ago, the Makuleke people were granted the rights to their ancestral lands, defined by these two rivers. Today, in partnership with park authorities and also Wilderness Safaris, who have built a luxury tented lodge in the Makuleke/ Pafuri area, the Makuleke people have undergone extensive training in conservation matters. They also participate in the management of the area, benefiting from tourism and community development projects. The transfrontier park will take a number of years to become fully operational. In the meantime, the Pafuri border post with Mozambique opened in 2002 together with a symbolic removal of fencing between the Shingwedzi River and the new border post. Then in December 2005, the Giriyondo border post with Mozambique was opened and a 30km (181⁄2-mile) section of fencing was removed, this time south of Shingwedzi. Kruger has been able to find an alternative solution to its burgeoning elephant population by translocating surplus numbers into Mozambique, at the same time hoping to encourage natural transmigration between the two countries; it appears this is happening successfully. Ten white rhino were also introduced into the Limpopo National Park. It is unfortunate that Zimbabwe’s economic crisis is hampering that country’s progress in terms of infrastructure and facilities, and the lack of a direct road network at the time of writing was making it difficult for visitors to cross into Gonarezhou. Poaching is also an issue that won’t quite go away, creating ongoing headaches for park officials in all three countries.