Author: Focus Online Dev

Warmest greetings again from Tuningi Safari Lodge.
Another chilly month has come and gone….. This month I have thought it a good idea to let someone else do the talking. I want you all to read about our fabulous lodge from a guest’s perspective. I would really like to thank Peter Davis for the fabulous review on his visit to Tuningi that he posted on the Travelgurus website.
I am sure that you are going to start planning your next holiday the minute you have finished reading it:

Posted under: Bush, Destinations, South Africa 

Peter Davies

We recently lived in a charming town called Simsbury in Connecticut. Our yard (as the Yanks like to call their gardens) was visited by squirrel, deer, chipmunk, fox and once, as we were about to stroll to a school bus stop, a large black bear. We drove to the bus stop that day.

Our neighbour in this rural idyll was the guy who voiced Pumbaa in the Lion King movie. Ernie Sabella is his name, and he would put on the bumbling warthog’s voice and quote his well-loved lines to entertain our girls. Understandably, we cannot encounter warthogs without being reminded of our kindly ex-neighbour.

On a recent trip to Tuningi Safari Lodge, the first sightings of the creatures sparked delighted cries of “Ernie” from the girls. Then we saw a warthog impaled high in the forked branches of a marula tree …

Our guide Gavin cut the engine and we settled back in that perfect post-dawn bush silence. A wheeling pair of raucous crows buzzed the marula tree, closing in on the carcass. Suddenly, a glint of gold and coal flashed through the high grass and a muscular leopard scaled the lower reaches of the tree in an easy bound. She was halfway up the trunk before the crows fled, and the big cat dropped effortlessly back to the veld.

Thankfully, this glimpse of leopard enthralled the girls, banishing any panicky thoughts pertaining to Pumbaa’s fate. It also enabled us to tick off the Big Five. Not bad for a three-day stay. We also saw shy gemsbok, black rhino, brown hyena and aardvark – everything really, apart from the elusive wild dogs, one of Madikwe’s success stories.

Madikwe is a group of up market lodges studded throughout 750 malaria-free hectares of bush hugging the Botswana border. Tuningi is the most child friendly of the lodges – an easy four-hour drive from Gauteng or one hour in a small plane. Managerial duo Heidi and Gavin ensure that even though the food and lodging is of an immaculate five-star standard, there is a homeliness you don’t always find at the top end of the game lodge business. This is important to us.

There’s nothing worse than treading on eggshells at some Ferrari-safari type lodge where you are just another invoice and children are to be neither seen nor heard. During our three nights at Tuningi, we met people from England, Spain, Gauteng and Italy. The Italian mum wept gently like George Harrison’s guitar when we came within prodding distance of a pride of lions that languidly surrounded the vehicle. I empathized to a degree with the mama’s muffled sobs. Despite the primal thrill of being in the hub of the lion laager, and no matter what the rangers say to the contrary, I’m uncomfortably aware of how simple it would be for one of those beasts to leap into the vehicle and devour its occupants.

So often the entire bush experience depends on the guile and skill – or lack thereof – of the ranger. Some are glorified taxi drivers, who do little more than wait for sharper guides to locate game and then crash the party.

Gavin is no taxi driver. His self-published books of photographs in the lodge speak of a deep love of African wildlife. His game drives are meticulously constructed – painstakingly following tracks, testing the wind, drawing on his knowledge of every inch of the reserve. Gavin was generous with this knowledge too, which fascinated the younger bushwhackers. Did you know that the black rhino’s teeth snip branches at an exact 45° angle? Or the giraffe sleeps for just 20 minutes a day? Neither did I.

On our extensive travels in America, we often encountering a rack ’em, pack ’em and stack ’em attitude. There is something refreshingly genuine about the warmth and hospitality you get in South Africa. Usually, though, the standard of the up market bush experience is so high it can be difficult to tell lodges apart, to detect a unique selling point.

Let’s consider Tuningi: Five-star cuisine? Check. After the post-game drive breakfast, a waitress appears with the lunch menu. As lunch debris is swept from the table, pencils are tapped against notepads for dinner orders.

Luxurious chalets? Check. Just 16 guests are accommodated in double-volume thatched rooms with fireplace, outside shower, outsize oval bath, bed wide enough to set sail and classy, understated Afro-chic decor. Two log fires in the main lodge. Enticing bar and rim-flow with views through to private water hole.

Boma dinner? Check. A jewel of the game lodge experience, at Tuningi these dinners are held under the vast canopy of an ancient fig tree.

Private water hole? Check. Obliging game congregate at dawn and dusk to offer gawking guests the wildlife equivalent of a pole dance. It’s accessed down a winding, wooden walkway. On check-in, we were treated to a herd of 20 or so elephants cooling themselves.

Yes, Tuningi ticks all the boxes, but its overt family friendliness is what sets it apart. Children are nurtured as the next generation of bush lovers. The girls spent their final morning hand painting Tuningi T-shirts. They adorned the back with intact warthogs – a family of four trotting snout-to-tail on terra firma – not half-eaten ones in marula trees.

The human Pumbaa should check this place out. Ernie Sabella has never been to Africa to savour the savannah-soaked adventures of his animated alter ego. He is one of the many millions of foreigners oblivious to the singular delights this nation has to offer. We South Africans should never become blasé about the utterly unique experience that places like Tuningi offer.

We’ll be drawing Ernie’s attention to Tuningi shortly. – Peter Davies

Well, what more can we say????
Have a great month until we chat again and please remember to keep in touch with us through Face Book.
Kind regards!
Heidi and the incredible T-team

For enquiries please contact: reservations@madikwecollection.com

Hallo everyone!

Greetings once again from the beautiful Tuningi Lodge and all of us lucky people who live here.

Although Winter finally arrived with force two days ago, the month of May is arguably the most beautiful time of the year in the South African bushveld. The climate is hard to beat anywhere else in the world. The days are clear and sunny and are pleasantly warm instead of hot. Only at sundowner time do you need to slip into something warm to keep you comfortable.

Insect numbers start to dwindle and there is no more moth with your mouthful of merlot or other flying surprises in your starters. Most of the snakes have gone off to find a spot to curl up for the colder Winter months and all the animals are in top condition with full bellies and shining coats. In most of our opinions, May is definitely the best month to come for a visit!

It has been a month filled with special occasions like the Easter weekend, a romantic engagement and the return of lots of our favourite guests (especially Jim and Isobel from Scottish Life), hosting a fantastic bush braai with the local marimba band providing the back ground music, handing over loads of presents and sports gear to the grade R class of our local school, and lots more!

The Game drives have been as amazing as ever! I asked Christo to tell you about his most amazing day.

Greetings, from a cold and windy Madikwe. It is now official Winter has finely laid its icy claws on us but don’t for one moment think a little bit of cold weather is going to stop us from finding the most amazing sightings in Madikwe.

This month turned out to be one of my luckiest so far, it finally happened and after almost a year in the field I finally achieved the Grand slam, to see the big 5 (Lion, Leopard, Elephant, Rhino and Buffalo) in one drive! It all started with a trip up North towards Tlou dam. First we found a big herd of buffalo just leisurely grassing and got to spend some time with them before the whole herd of ± 200 got swallowed up by the thick sickle bush on their way towards Tlou dam.

We made our way to the dam and as we drove on to the dam wall the first Elephants started to make their way towards the water and they just kept on coming. We were in luck as there were two family groups that came to the water at the same time. Few things are more amazing than to sit and watch and of course listen to about 50 elephants quenching their thirst, like one of my guests said “this makes the 17 hour flight so worth while, this is exactly how I pictured Africa”.

Well what she didn’t now was that it was far from over, because two White Rhino’s also joined in on the fun at the dam.

As the Elephants moved off back in to the bush we went for sundowners at Nick’s View South at the foot of Tshwene Tshwene Mountain which gives one a breathtaking view of the sun setting over the Enselbergs (islands of rock) and the waste plains surrounding them. We packed up our sundowners and were just heading off when the call on the radio came in “INKWE”.

Now if you are a ranger in Madikwe that one word will send your heart racing! Inkwe means Leopard and when ever you hear that on the radio everything stops and all become deadly quite. No matter what you are busy with, there can be an Elephant bull with a torn off ear (that will usually upset them even more) trying to disassemble your land cruisers’ engine, it doesn’t matter; all you are waiting for is the update on the location of this particular Inkwe.

So off we went hoping with all hopes that, that leopard would have some how got stuck or glued to the spot where it was seen at first, because so often you get there and the other rangers will show you exactly where the leopard was lying just a minute before you got there. Argh, GONE! But not this time. We got there and she was still lying on the rocks, we had to use our binoculars but we got a pretty good view of her. Some guests even saw glimpses of her two small cubs. A huge added bonus! We will definitely keep a look out for them in the future.

With the weight of the world off my shoulders, we took the road home and then it happened again. Lions were called in over the radio and it dawned on me, could this be my lucky day? Would the lions still be there by the time I got to them? How big will my disappointment be if I got there and someone told me exactly where they were lying just a minute before I got there? I tried to promise myself that this time I will not shoot the poor unlucky ranger with the bad news in the kneecap with a very powerful high calibre rifle… again.

But as we came around the bend in the road there they were, a sub adult male and female lying just off the road with the rest of the pride a bit back and obscured by bushes. But that is all I needed, my first Grand slam the big 5 in one drive!!

But of course besides all my ramblings about the big 5 we also had our fare share of the other game species and they can provide you with just as much entertainment as any of the big 5.

Big news in the park is that the alpha female in the bigger one of our Wild dog packs is now heavily pregnant and it looks like they want to start denning on one of the Enselbergs in the west of the park. That would of course be great news for us as we can then keep a close eye on them and hopefully the puppies as well.

Well that is a little look into the excitement we as rangers had this month. We look forward to seeing you and sharing our passion for the bush with you.

Till next time, keep it on the wild side.
Christo

Well, that is all from me as well!
If you are so lucky to come and visit us in the next three months, do not forget to pack your beanie, gloves, woollen socks and a nice big warm jacket. From our side, we will keep the fires going, cook some hearty stews, fill up the hot water bottles and pour as much red wine as you may need to warm you up from the inside.

Also look out for our amazing specials on the website- (Stay three nights and fly from Jhb to Madikwe for FREE) and follow us on Face Book and Twitter for daily updates on our Game viewing!

Warmest regards
Heidi and the fabulous T-team.

For enquiries please contact :

Hallo everyone!

We hope you are all doing well!
Although it is supposed to be Autumn at the moment, the leaves are actually still not turning into the usual bright reds, yellows and oranges that is normal for April. The reason for this being that it just has not stopped raining for a moment! The entire reserve is still bright green, extremely dense and wet, as if in the middle of the Summer months. The dams are even fuller than they were in the middle of the normal rainy season! The upside of this, of course, is that the animals are going to have a fantastic winter with no food or thirst problems what so ever. The only thing they will have to do is keep warm!

I asked Grant to tell you about the game drive sightings in April and our wonderful new toy- the camera at the water hole…

“Well what can I say besides wet, wet, wet. Three weeks ago we had a 150mm in a few hours during the night. Good for the dams but not so good for the game drives. We were limited to only a few roads that are drivable in the rainy season. Everything is still so green and the spotting of animals is still very difficult. At least we know our sightings around the big dams will be good during the winter. The landscapes around the big dams are something out of this world with all the water in and around the dams. The elephants enjoy it as well with their swimming sessions. The picture below is of Thlou Dam, this is one of the dams in the north.

The last three weeks we had amazing lion sightings from lions hunting to lions mating. The wild dogs also made sure we saw them in their full glory as we followed them one morning and witnessed a kill from the start to the finish.

I have to tell you guys that we had the most amazing sunsets ever over the last few weeks. So here are a few sunset shots to make you long for Tuningi and Madikwe again.

The cubs that you guys met in the previous newsletter are still alive and doing very well! The three moms joined forces so they consist out of three females with eight youngsters. Will keep you posted on what the little rascals get up to. We had a few very misty mornings as well and we can feel winter is really creeping up on us. Even the animals were moving slower than normal.

You guys must go onto our facebook page and have a look at our album called Tuningi cam. We have a Bushnell camera trap at the waterhole to capture those elusive animals at night, or during the day. We have seen some interesting animals at the waterhole like black rhino and hyena.

 

We will update the album every three to four days. So keep checking back. The lioness with her small cubs also made her appearance again at the waterhole and we witnessed her hunting hereon numerous occasions. Well that is what happened on our side the last few weeks. Remember always expect the unexpected. That is why we love it here. You never know what you will encounter.

 

 

Hope to see you guys back at Tuningi soon.
Cheers
Grant”

Well, as you can see, our newest Tuningi song goes something like this: “Never mind the weather, as long as we’re together”…..
Remember to follow us on Face Book for updates, interesting happenings, special rates and fabulous photos captured by our new video cam!
Keep well until we chat again
Kindest regards
Heidi and the fabulous T-team

For enquiries please contact :

As always, friendly Bush Greetings to all of you!

What an amazing time we once again had at Tuningi this past month, with more return guests than ever, out of the ordinary rain storms, even more out of the ordinary visitors and fantastic game viewing all on the cards.

Last night, 135 mm of rain came gushing down, turning every thinkable road in the Park into a flowing river and filling every single dam in the Reserve completely to its capacity. Needless to say, this is a fantastic bonus at this time of the year as we can now be certain that there will be more than enough water around in the upcoming dry months as well as beautiful green grass for all to eat, even in Winter!

 

On the topic of strange guests checking in…. We welcomed the Agrizzi family back to Tuningi for the fifth time this month, only this time they had a brand new edition to the family! Although it is completely against the rules to bring pets into the Game Reserve, they had special permission to bring their baby monkey with them, seeing that he is in training to help disabled people who can’t help themselves.( almost like a guide dog for the Blind).

Although we are all completely against taming wild animals, we could not help falling for the little oak’s charms and noticing how helpful he was with passing on stuff to Granny and realizing that he could really mean a lot to a helpless old pensioner.

We also had great fun with all the kids coming back to visit, and tried to teach them as much as we could about Mother Nature again. We spent time with loads of elephants at the Little Tuningi swimming pool and went on fabulous kiddies drives, not only looking for the big animals, but also stopping to get out and study the little things like the interesting dung beetle behavior.

And over to Gavin to give you his report on the famously fabulous game viewing in Madikwe:

Rangers Report

Hello once again everybody from a season changing Madikwe Game Reserve.
Yip, winter is on the way, as you go out on the morning Safari the morning freshness is addictive as the earthy smells and bird song greets you as the sun slowly rises over the Dwarsberg mountains.

So this month has got to be the month of the lion cubs, and the leopards of Madikwe…..
There are currently 4 different lionesses with 9 cubs in total running around the lodge, with one of the lionesses frequenting the lodge at the waterhole on a regular basis. All the cubs are almost all of the same age (+/- 8 weeks), so they are soooo cute !!

The other females are regularly found on the safaris, and the Kgala males are extremely proud of their progeny as they are spending more and more time on the ridge making sure that no other males enter the territory and commit infanticide.

As far as the southern prides are doing, they are going from strength to strength with the young Marupengs now reaching sub-adult status, and seem to have an uncanny knack of climbing trees, which makes for some awesome photography opportunities. The Mica Pride are also doing exceptionally well, but are being forced further west into the Tshabalala and Marupeng Territory due to the 2 Naledi males moving in from the east, which has been causing some friction between the two prides.

The wild dogs have been doing exactly what they are supposed to do, and that is to give us rangers a huge challenge to locate them. If you have ever been on a safari looking for the wild dogs, you will understand how difficult it can be to find them, BUT if you do…… The sightings of the 2nd most endangered carnivore in Africa is something that us rangers get very excited for, as you are almost guaranteed to see them hunting at extreme speed as they chase down the impalas of the MadikweBushveld, culminating in the most efficient team work you have ever witnessed in the natural world.

Ok…finally the stars of the show are about to impress you all, as the elusive spotted cat which is the PINNACLE of every safari has been making regular appearances this month.
Every guest that comes to Tuningi asks this question… “Are there leopard sightings in this park ?”, and our response is yes, yes, yes and getting better !!!
We have been working on the young male from the north west of the park for almost two years now, and I think we have finally cracked him (habituated him to the vehicles).
So……eat your heart out Sabi Sands!!!!

 

There is another leopard from the southeast of the park which is also providing us with some awesome sightings, as she loves to climb trees, and is becoming a real star in the Madikwe Game reserve, as all the rangers from all over the park are on a constant mission to track her down to find their guests the “ultimate animal” in the savannas of Africa!!

So that is another successful month at Tuningi Safari Lodge as far as the game report goes…..
DON’T HESITATE TO BOOK NOW!!!!
See you all soon on our SAFARI WAGONS where Myself, Grant and Christo would love to show you around this magical place we call home !!

Lots of warm bush regards,
Gavin

And that is it from me too!
Come knowing what you want to see.
And see what you do not know.
Lose track of days.
Discover endless tranquility.
Take it all in.
Through your eyes, your ears, your hands, your soul.
And leave with a new found sense of discovery.
A nagging urge to return.
Tuningi Safari Lodge.

Hope to see you soon!
Kindest regards
Heidi and the Fabulous T-team

P.S. If you want to read more: Go to www.mysafari.com to read a beautiful publishing about Madikwe Game Reserve and our Lodges.
Also remember to book your photographic Safari at Tuningi with Gerry vd Walt in May! There are still a few places left.
And lastly; follow us on Face Book and Twitter for daily updates on all the excitement that is TUNINGI!

For enquiries please contact :

 

 

Greetings from the lovely Bushveld in Africa once again!

With February being famous for being the month of love, we have once again been astounded by the way our lovely continent can effortlessly touch people’s hearts! Almost every single guest who visits our Lodge leaves with a promise to return as soon as they possibly can! This is because they all realize that they have fallen unashamedly in love with Africa during their brief visit. How privileged we are to be able to play a part in this kind of love affair time and time again.

As always, we got to meet and spoil so many people. The grown-ups enjoyed the game drives, fabulous food and wine, a massage or two and of course the peace and quiet while we were entertaining their kids, painting t-shirts, creating all kinds of arty animals out of clay and going on treasure hunts! We have to admit though that this month the Mundi family took working with play dough to a whole new level, by using natural sticks, leaves and stones to support their brilliant creations. We will most definitely try and keep up the good work!

I asked Grant to tell you more about the game drives:
This was another good month at Tuningi. The sightings were out of this world once again, especially the big cats. We had lions playing in water, climbing trees and a leopard stalking and catching a water terrapin one night.

I must say that the spotting of the game is quite difficult with all the tall grass and thick bush. Despite this we had exiting times on safari. One morning after a hefty thunderstorm we decided to go south in search of the South Western lion pride. We found them on the main road playing in a huge puddle of water. It was like we were watching the swamp lions of the Delta

 

A few days after this eventful morning one of the Lionesses in the north decided to show her brand new cubs. We think that they are not even 2 months old yet. We felt so honored that she had the confidence to bring out her cubs and share this special moment with us. She has been hanging around lately so we get to see her quite often.

Not long after our great afternoon with the cubs we spent about 2 hours all on our own with the South Western pride again. They had just finished a zebra kill and decided to cool off again. Even mom joined in on the fun.

On a more serious note ……we witnessed the two Naledi brothers tugged into one another on a cloudy afternoon. They are with two females in the east at the moment and there was no love lost between the brothers. When it comes to the females, male lions want them all for themselves, sometimes to extreme results of injury. Luckily they normally recover sooner than seems possible. Till next time!

Cheers, Grant

Join Photo-Africa as we set out to photograph one of the most endangered animals in Africa. The Madikwe Game Reserve is, apart from being one of the premiere Big 5 reserves in South Africa, one of the best places to see and photograph the charismatic African Wild Dog in the wild.

From 5 to 9 May 2011, Tuningi Safari Lodge will play host to our photographic safari with the main goal of photographing Madikwe’s Wild Dogs.

And on that note, we say goodbye till next month! We hope that you will also get a chance to come and visit soon. Just consider yourself warned… you will be hooked in no time at all!

Warmest regards,
Heidi and the fabulous T-team

P.S If you can’t wait a whole month to hear from us again, please add us on Face Book as your friend and follow our daily updates! You will be amazed….

For enquiries please contact :

Greetings to all of you once again from Tuningi Safari Lodge.

It is difficult to find the correct words to describe the awesome beauty of the bush in the Madikwe Game Reserve in its present state.

Even for us, who have been living here for a couple of years, and who’s wealth is already measured in gorgeous sunsets, the dense green shrubs, the colourful flowers waving at us around each corner, the brilliance and abundance of hundreds of buzzing insects and the unusual sight of overflowing water holes, renders us absolutely speechless! And to think, that we were desperately begging for rain not even three months ago. As the saying goes: ‘Be careful what you wish for!’ Just in the past two months we have measured much more than 200ml of hard rain bucketing down.

The most wonderful thing though is that we never had to cancel a single game drive because of bad weather and that the sightings were still out of this world, despite the denseness of the bush. The muddy roads created lots of fun for rangers and guests alike as most people love to test their 4×4 skills every time they get a chance!

We saw more cats than ever before- especially the elusive leopard…

 

Lions were also easier to spot than normal as they were trying to avoid the long wet grass and rather chose to walk around on the dryer open roads. Our favourite lions at the moment are the Tshabalala females with their handsome, playful cubs. They are just the cutest, loving family around!

 

 

One would imagine that the rhino’s would be hiding, with all the talk of rhino poaching going on, but they seem to pop out all over the place, enjoying the lovely green grass and abundance of miniature yellow flowers as a special little treat!

We were even lucky enough to be entertained by the hugely endangered black rhino one day! He was standing out in an open clearing sniffing the air as if it was the most normal thing to do! With them being browsers and not grazers like the white rhino, you only ever get to spot them in the densest parts of the park. What a treat to be able to really get a good look at the curled lip which differentiates it from its white counterpart. He actually came casually walking right up to the vehicle for an in depth investigation and then ran off with a last disgusted snort in the air, leaving all of us speechless for minutes!

Tlou dam as well as Vlei pan, which two months ago offered little more than a mud bath to the animals, are absolute hives of activity at the moment. You can find big herds of everything moving around the dams at almost any given moment, just enjoying the nice fresh water of taking a cooling bath in the terrible heat. The baby elephants, especially, cannot get enough of swimming and playing in the beautiful deep clean water at Tlou dam.

And last but not the least-
Our chefs were also having a great time experimenting with the giant edible mushrooms growing on the termite mounds after a big rain storm. These giant mushrooms are the epitome of every vegetarian meal! You can cut big fat steaks out of them and fry them in butter, garlic and cream and it will top any juicy rump steak grilled to perfection in a Michelin star restaurant!!

On that note, I wish you a wonderful month of February with lots of lovely, romantic moments around Valentine’s Day! In fact, why don’t you pick up the phone, make that booking and bring your partner over to Tuningi for an exciting, romantic weekend she will remember for the rest of her life???

 

Hope to see you all soon!
Kindest regards
Heidi and the fabulous T-team.

P.S If you can’t wait a whole month to hear from us again, please add us on Face Book as your friend and follow our daily updates! You will be amazed….

For enquiries please contact :

 

Warmest greetings to you all once again!

We hope that you have had a wonderful Christmas, a fabulous holiday, and that a brilliant new year full of love and prosperity is lying ahead of you.

We, here at Tuningi had a very busy, happy festive season with lots of return guests yet again, coming to spend their second or third visit with us. No words can describe our delight when a familiar face appears around the corner for ‘check-in’! It constantly feels like old friends and family coming to see us. In our opinion, this is a sure message that we are doing something right…..

This is why we will let you, our treasured guests, do the talking this month. Here with, the last two pages of Tuningi’s visitor’s book for your perusal:

“Amazing, wonderful and special place. Thank you so very much for such a warm welcome!” – Regards, Liz Camisa ( Travel)

“This is such an amazing place. It reinforces that I am African and belong in Africa. Thank you to all the amazing staff. The elephant experience we had was incredible. Thank you for an amazing weekend.” – Kugan Govender

 

 

“ Dear Heidi, Gavin and all the Tuningi Staff; Thank you for 3 spectacular days here. Your gracious hosting, knowledge of all around us, coupled with the beauty and wonder of Africa have given us an experience we will surely love to repeat ( and spread word of to our friends in the US). Thank you for opening our eyes to this part of Africa” – Susan, Tim, Racheal and Leah Yashar-Brown

 

“When it is snowing in Sweden, we enjoy all the animals and the wonderful atmosphere here at Tuningi! Thanks!” – Katikka Stahl

“Today was the best day in my life! I saw one of the wild dog’s pack. There was 8 wild dogs. My dad is going to be very jealous!” – Nanna Stahl 10 years

“On Wednesday I went to a Lodge and it was so nice there. Me and my family saw giraffes, lions, hyena, elephant, zebras, Kudo and a rhino but we did not see a leopard and a buffalo. The best of all was the pool because it was our own pool!” – Ebba Stahl 7 years

“Fourteen lions in one day. Amazing! Thank you so much for an unforgettable experience. We WILL be back!” – The Lewittes Family, New York

 

 

“Once again we had such a wonderful time. Staff from A –Z couldn’t be better, so friendly, made us feel so at home. Food excellent and beautiful presentations. Well done! I’m always so proud to bring family and friends from overseas to Tuningi. You make such a good impression of South-Africa every time. May you all be blessed!” – Lilian and Frank Bertchy

“Words can never describe the joy you gave each and every one of us during our Christmas vacation to South Africa. Tuningi Lodge is as close to heaven as it gets. Way exceeding our expectations. The generosity and warmth of Management and ALL staff was truly what made our family fill our memory bank with times and experiences we shall always cherish. Thank you for sharing your home and your hospitality. You all are the best. We hope that one day you will come to the States so we can return your generosity. Happy New Year – It has been a New Years Eve we will never ever forget!!” – Lots of love, Teresa and Gus Smith

 

“Once again we had such a wonderful time. Staff from A –Z couldn’t be better, so friendly, made us feel so at home. Food excellent and beautiful presentations. Well done! I’m always so proud to bring family and friends from overseas to Tuningi. You make such a good impression of South-Africa every time. May you all be blessed!” – Lilian and Frank Bertchy

“Words can never describe the joy you gave each and every one of us during our Christmas vacation to South Africa. Tuningi Lodge is as close to heaven as it gets. Way exceeding our expectations. The generosity and warmth of Management and ALL staff was truly what made our family fill our memory bank with times and experiences we shall always cherish. Thank you for sharing your home and your hospitality. You all are the best. We hope that one day you will come to the States so we can return your generosity. Happy New Year – It has been a New Years Eve we will never ever forget!!” – Lots of love, Teresa and Gus Smith

 

Well, there you have had your say. What more can WE say???

Keep well, and pick up the phone as soon as you have secured the dates of your next holiday. We are all waiting to see you again!

Kind regards
The Fabulous, Friendly T-team

For enquiries please contact :

 

Warmest greetings to you all once again!

At last! It rained! Maybe not as much as we were hoping for, but enough to turn the whole reserve from dusty and grey, to lush and bright green!

The most wonderful thing about the month of November in the bush is that the Impalas start dropping their babies. We all wait with the greatest anticipation to spot the first one of the season. One day there will be none, and the next day they seem to be all over the place. This creates havoc amongst the predators as all of a sudden easy food appears around every corner!

We have been up to all kinds of adventures this month!
For our year end function, we all went to Sun City for the day. It was great to just spend some fabulous quality time together as a team, out of our natural surroundings!

We came back revived and ready to take on another year with passion and enthusiasm.

We also organised a fantastic evening in the middle of the bush, with members of the philarmonic orchestra to come and play for us! This was to raise money to help stop rhino poaching in our country. To date 285 rhinos have already been killed for their horns this year alone! This means almost one every single day. We managed to raise almost R70 000 on the evening and used the money to set up and kit out a professional anti-poaching unit in Madikwe!

 

Last week we invited 20 grade six pupils from the Tswaragano Primary school near Zeerust to our Lodge. We educated them about conservation, animal habits and how a Lodge operates and treated them to a fabulous lunch and we also visited our favourite pre-school in Suppingstad to deliver buckets of sweets, lots of clothes and shoes and some Christmas crackers just for fun.

By now you must be wondering if we ever had the time to get out on game drive to see the animals! Well, we obviously did!

Christo will tell you more about that side of things:

Wow what an amazing 5 months it has been at Tuningi. Madikwe is such an amazing place, even after 5 months out in the veld almost every day, I can be sure there will be something that will leave me in awe of nature as has happened a few times in the last month.

Slowly but surely the drought is losing its grip on Madikwe, we haven’t had plenty of rain yet, but with the rain we had we can already see a big change in the veld. It is amazing how grateful this part of the country is of rain, only a small shower and the grass grows centimetres a day.

The wonderful news in the park is that the wild dogs has started running again, our small pack has three pups and now numbers 8 in total and our bigger pack now numbers 16 dogs in total! The last month we have had some amazing wild dog sightings, especially since the smaller pack seems to favour our lodge and the surrounding ridge.

It is also with great excitement that we welcome back all the migrant birds, needless to say that our birding is exquisite at the moment. Grant and I were lucky to stumble upon this Wahlberg’s Eagle in a pale form (quite rarely seen).

As always our lion sightings have been spectacular in the last month, Makwepa pan (a little pan fed by a solar pump that was Gavin’s idea) has really played a big part in many of our lion sightings and we regularly find either the Kgala males or the Chabalala females in the vicinity of the pan.

 

Another animal we have seen more of lately is the mythical and legendary Black Rhino (or more politically correct) the Hooked-lip rhino (or even more politically correct Dicerosbicornis). But enough of politics, these animals are slowly moving back to their previous home ranges and territories as the bushes and shrubs they feed on start sprouting new fresh leaves after the fire we had in the winter, thus making it easier for us as we now know where to go look for them again.

Well that was just a small glimpse in to what we get up to, if I have to mention all the wonderful and amazing sightings we have seen just in the last month I will probably get sued by the board of newsletter distributers (???) or someone that owns the internet (???) as it is just too much to mention.

Well we hope to see you at Tuningi soon to get a personal glimpse of the wonderful game viewing Madikwe has to offer.

Christo

Well, we won’t be chatting again until after Christmas.
We really hope that you will all have a fabulous festive season and that some of you will be joining us here at the Lodge for your Christmas holidays.

Keep well and kind regards
The adventurous T-team

For enquiries please contact :

 

Warmest greetings to all of you once again!

What a fabulous month September has been! With it being a dry month, with lots of dust in the air, the sunsets were even more spectacular than at other times of the year. Needless to say, our Rangers have been clicking away with their cameras like there is no tomorrow and surely produced some award winning photos!

Once again, we have been spoilt with lots and lots of return visitors. We have loved every minute of it. The greatest challenge for us is to see to it that each visit out-shines the previous one! At the lodge, we think up all kinds of new dishes to cook and more and more exciting things for the kids to do.

On the other side, the rangers go to even more extreme lengths to show our guests the rarest, the most extravagant, the cutest, the noisiest, etc animals on the planet.

This month Gavin tells us all about the best sightings of the month:

Ranger’s Report September 2010

Hello everybody,

This month has been a hectic one, the bush is getting extremely dry at the moment, and with suicide month looming, it will only get drier until the first rains fall, hopefully towards the end of October.

So with it being so dry the game viewing is very good because you are able to see quite far into the bush and able to spot the animals a little easier. The waterholes are cooking with huge herds of buffalo, rhino and elephant on a daily basis, as they come to quench their thirsts and to cool off in the mud as the daytime temperatures are reaching the early 30’s already.

The sightings of elephants at the lodge’s waterhole is also extremely active as 5 or 6 herds a day are passing by, which allows for our guests to get up close to them by viewing them from the deck. We were very lucky one night as we watched in amazement as 200+ buffalo joined us for a boma dinner under the African stars and our famous Fig Tree (FicusTuningii – lodges name).

As for the lions, well…..
Lion sightings in Madikwe are probably the best you will see anywhere in the world. The Mica pride are slowly moving their territory closer to the lodge from the east, as there is a new coalition of males which seems to be pushing their way in. The females don’t enjoy this too much as they have had 2 youngsters – “The Jabulani cubs” which could be under threat from the new males, therefore are forced to move in on the “Tchabalala” females territory. They came together two mornings ago at an elephant carcass, and there was a huge amount of roaring and scent marking to re-establish the boundaries. The Mica pride won this battle, as they outnumber the Tchabalala’s two to one.

The Tchaba pride to the north west have been intercepted by the Kgala males, which were in their oestrus cycle 2 weeks ago, so hopefully we will have brand new cubs in about 105 days from now !!!

On a more serious note, the Mateya male found his way into one of our sister lodge’s fence boundaries last week, and was seen laying on the pathway in front of one of the rooms….yip there were guests in that room, luckily the ranger found him before he found the ranger !! So we were called in to help get him out of the camp, but it was not as easy as it seemed, as he managed to find the thickest bush to hide under preventing us from shooting him with an anesthetic dart. We eventually got him under, and removed him from the lodge, where we later brought our guests to have a closer look at this magnificent animal as he was recovering from the drug. It was a great opportunity for the guests to touch the male lion and have a look from close up.

The wild dogs have still been elusive to say the least but we did manage to see them on a few occasions as they came to hunt around the Vlei pan area. We have confirmed that the big pack of 12 adults have now got 5 pups and that they are starting to run with the adults as they go in search of food.

The smaller pack of 7 adults are still in the Dwarsberg mountains to the south of the reserve, and we have only confirmed 1 puppy so far but I am sure there are more… Watch this space next month, as we will definitely see the dogs more often from now on!!

 

The cheetah has also made a welcome appearance in the last week with a couple of sightings around the airstrip and to the north west of the Park.

And just to finish and put the icing on the cake……
Christo had a huge stroke of luck when he located on a PANGOLIN !! Yes this is his first ever sighting in his career to give you an idea of the rarity of this animal, generally because of its shy and nocturnal behavior.

 

OK, that is it for this month.
Summer is in the air, the birds are returning from their migrations, the trees are blooming and the first baby Red Hartebeests have been born………………
Book now and join us in very exciting times ahead!!!

 

Lots of warm bush greetings,

 

GAVIN

Well, there you have it once again!
Please come and visit us soon! We can’t wait to see you again!
Kind regards
The Fabulous T-team!

PS : Don’t forget to check out the kiddies’ works of art!!

For enquiries please contact :

 

Warm greetings to you all!

Spring is in the air and life is just beautiful! August has been a terrific month for us here at the Lodge with lots and lots of old friends returning for a second or even third visit! We welcomed back people like the Barnards, Summerlees, Rebuffos, Varneys, Piechotas, Gomersall, Heuslers, Adams’, Shonborns and Kurlands.

No words can describe our delight when a familiar face enters our front door! We immediately go to our archives and dig up photos and memories of a previous visit and obviously try to turn the return visit into an even more memorable occasion than the previous one. A great example of this is of little Erin Kurland who took three years to come back! How wonderful to see that gorgeous girl again. We first met her when she was only three years old. How she has grown!

For those of you who have not been to Tuningi…… Come soon! Such a lot of return guests should show you that we are doing something right!

It is of course not just the Lodge, the service and the friendly staff that secure return bookings, it also has a lot to do with the amazing job our highly qualified Game Rangers do in showing off the abundance of game in the Reserve.

August seemed to produce the most fabulous lion sightings with some very awkward behavior like climbing trees, wrestling, taking mud baths, pretending to be leopard, killing enormous antelope, etc. Here are some guest photos.

Some more detail on the sightings from Grant:

We have been extremely lucky this month with animals around the lodge. With no rain and no water in the small pans around us the elephants, buffalo lions and even black rhino were regular visitors to our waterhole at the lodge.

But the most exiting of them all was when the Kgala Etali brothers killed a big eland bull just outside the lodge. I actually woke up one morning around 3:00 from the commotion outside. We only saw the evidence on the morning drive.

Eland are the largest antelope and can weigh up to Kg 850. They didn’t even move the carcass into shade or cover. I just think it was to heavy and knowing male lions they are very lazy.

We had fantastic interaction between the boys and a lioness that joined the feast after two days. The great thing about this sighting was we could see how everything disappeared gradually and how the scavengers were waiting patiently for the boys to finish up and go. Even the vultures were hanging around in the surrounding trees. Sadly they never got a chance to get down for some real action. At one stage one of the males used the vehicle to stalk a snooping spotted hyena. Lions in general hate hyenas but male lions have an obsessive grudge against them but most of the time the hyenas are one step ahead.

In the afternoons there was very little action and we mostly saw them eating early morning and in the evenings. For the rest of the time they were digesting in a deep sleep. They were there for about 5 days before they decided that they had enough. They really did a good job of finishing the carcass.

The only they left was the head and vertebrae and a few ribs. We went back on the fifth morning and found a few hyenas chomping away on the bones. These guys have extremely powerful jaw muscles and are capable of cracking open some really big bones.

That is more or less how this Madikwe CSI scene unfolded with all the evidence disappearing in front of us.

One afternoon we had the most bizarre sighting of black lions at one of the dams in the north. We arrived there and found three lions buried in the mud busy eating something. We couldn’t see what it was but we gathered that some antelope was thirsty and got stuck in the mud. In nature it works like this: one’s loss is the other one’s gain.

 

We went for sundowners with the idea to return to the dam and hopefully the lions would be out of the mud, and oh boy were they out in full force and feeling really sorry for themselves. This just goes to show that lions do scavenge as well.

We all thought that these lions woould never be the same again but we saw them the other day and they do look a little better.

Will chat soon
Grant

Well, if you are still not convinced that you should come and visit us soonest, I rest my case!
Have a wonderful September until we chat again!
Warmest regards
The fabulous T-team

For enquiries please contact :

Warmest greetings to all of you once again

As always, time has flown by as quick as lightning. It feels like just last week that we have sent out our last news letter.. I think it is because nowadays we are all communicating regularly on Facebook.
It is just wonderful to be in contact with so many of you on such a regular basis. We just love seeing our Lodge and some of your game drive experiences featured on your photo albums. Those of you that have not joined us yet, please do so right away! You will be updated with all the best sightings of the week, the who’s who of the lion prides, the cutest new baby photo’s, the politics of the wild dog packs, the elephant escapades, the best holiday deals, our chefs latest food trends and much, much more!

July was as wonderful and exciting as every other month of the year.

The only big difference was that South Africa ended the World Cup of Soccer in GREAT style and that we celebrated Nelson Mandela (MADIBA)’s ninety second birthday on the 18th of July. All South Africans joined in a notion of ‘DO GOOD FOR 67 MINUTES” to honour this incredible man.

We at Tuningi made vetkoek and minced beef for the children at our pet- project at Suppingstad pre-school and took some hot chocolate with as a special surprise!

To round it all off, our by now, legendary guest, Hillary Wylie, donated money again and helped us to buy nice soft mattresses for the little ones to sleep on in the middle of the day. Some more donations by Monita Laurent and Ron Delmont, helped us to get them all new hand gloves and warm socks! How WONDERFUL it feels to be able to spread the love!!!

Back at the Lodge…..

The game viewing has been magnificent as usual. One evening we were joined by the whole Mica pride for sundowners! What a beeeeg surprise! We all had to grab a drink and jump back into the vehicles, just to sit quietly and watch the inquisitive youngsters nosing around our tables full of juicy snacks!

 

 

On another day, to our huge excitement, Gavin found the only cheetah still alive in the reserve. What a rare sighting! We are so relieved to see that he is still in super condition and going strong.

The African wild cat was also spotted on more than one occasion, but let’s hear what our new ranger, Christo had to say about his first month at Tuningi :

“As a new addition to the T- team I still have to pinch myself everyday to make sure I am not dreaming. Working at the most amazing lodge with people that welcomed us with open arms into the T – team family still feels a bit unreal.

Talking about unreal, the game viewing this month was out of this world. We had various breath taking sightings of the Kgala males mating with some of the females in the park, (so pretty soon we should have a few more little yellow fluffy things running around).

Thlou dam also offered us the best of Madikwe, with large herds of elephant and buffalo congregating around the dam everyday. This is due to the fact that this late in the winter most of the smaller dams and pans have already dried up. This assembly of elephant and buffalo offers us remarkable animal interaction and sometimes tears of laughter as the baby elephants mimic their older siblings in chasing the buffalo around with a bewilderment of shrill trumpeting and little ears flapping.

Some of our more rare animals also made unexpected but very much appreciated appearances. We were very lucky to spot brown hyena on a few occasions, not usually viewed during the day, as they are nocturnal animals, and also had the most astounding African wild cat sightings, rarely seen as they are highly endangered and quite elusive.

The wild dogs also contributed to the wonderful sightings we’ve had recently. Definitely the most mentionable was when a pack of 12 dogs chased a kudu in to Thlou dam (yes, Thlou dam is cooking) where they killed and then proceeded to devour the young kudu bull and then played around the dam, sometimes right next to the game drive vehicle.

We went back to the dam early one morning to see if we could locate the dogs again, but to our surprise we found two young male lions with some of the remains of the kudu that they had dragged out of the dam and were desperately defending their steal from a clan of hyenas. We watched in amazement as the lions time and again charged at the hyenas to keep them away from the spoils. We realized again, that if you are desperate, you have much more guts than what is good for you! Even if you are operating in a crowd…..

Just can’t wait to get out there every day!
Remember to join us on Face-Book for our daily updates and best photos of the day!
See you soon
Christo

Well, just to round it all off…

A huge piece of our lovely bush was destroyed last week by veld fires which we all had to fight for three consecutive days, sometimes till after mid night as it was also threatening to burn down our lovely Lodge!

The most amazing thing is, though, that all the horrible blackness and devastation that the fires left behind, has already started turning in to a new green wonderland. How wonderful NATURE is. By next month Spring will be here, all will be green again, hundreds of little flowers will start pushing their colourful little faces to the surface and lots of chirpy migratory birds will be appearing on the horizon as they come back to our warm and sunny weather.

If you still have not been here, Do not hesitate! Make that booking today. As our quote of the month says: Why not???
We can’t wait to meet you!
Until we chat again
The friendly T-team!

For enquiries please contact :

reservations@madikwecollection.com

Warmest greetings once again from the African Bush!

We hope that you are well and that you have all had a great mid- year break! In South Africa June was all about the soccer World Cup! Hundreds of thousands of soccer fans arrived in our country in droves and the vibe has just been unbelievable! Most visitors not only found the soccer exciting, but also took some time to discover our beautiful country. Needless to say, we entertained many of them here at Tuningi and as always gave them a chance to experience up close and personal encounters with our fantastic wildlife!

We also introduced them to warm and flawless service, fabulous traditional cuisine, the best of South African wine and as always, ensured an all over unforgettable holiday! In a matter of days, some freezing cold weather changed the lush green vegetation into a dry looking grey and brown landscape. This has noticeably thinned out the bush and made for even better game viewing than we were used to before! It is espessially easier to spot leopard when the bush is less dense and our guests were spoilt with quite a few of these very special treats!

 

Once again, the Tuningi rangers showed their amazing talents in tracking even the most elusive of animals. This time it was Gavin who found the fluffiest little new born lion cubs hiding in the bush. As with tradition in Madikwe, the ranger who finds new cubs first gets to name them and with all the soccer fever in the air this month they were named after the World Cup soccer ball and are called ‘THE JABULANI CUBS’. They are four weeks old now and we expect to see more of them as their mother gradually starts to allow them to walk around with her as they get a bit older. It is just awesome to see such cute little gems in the wild and something everyone hopes for on every drive.

It seemed as if this great find was a sign of more lion sightings right through the month, so I asked Grant to give you an update on some of the incredible stuff our soccer fans experienced! Over to him, then….

 

On Tuesday morning we drove for hours before we actually saw something. These days, the winter chill is quite cutting when we leave on safari at 6:30 in the morning. We went out in search of lions . Normally we stand a better chance of finding them in the morning because they are still active and walking around. After our 3 hour drive we decided to go back to the lodge for breakfast. The whole morning we had been following signs of the south western pride but couldn’t locate on them.

Then as we were heading back I spotted some zebra not far from the camp and could see something was unfolding. I switched off the cruiser and could hear the alarm calls of the zebra and the birds. As we drove on slowly I saw the blood-stained face of a male lion in the yellow grass. I then knew we had just missed the kill. We drove in and found the three males busy feeding on the zebra.

 

We could see the brothers were extremely hungry so they didn’t even flinched when we drove in. We didn’t stay long and went for breakfast. After breakfast I told my guests that we should go back there. What a sighting we had. As we drove up I counted not 3 but 7 lions hanging around waiting for their own piece of the zebra. The interaction was amazing between the 3 different groups of lions. The Lenyalo males made the kill and then Mutuzi brother and sister with the Muratie males joined in. The Muratie males got a piece of the action because they are a coalition of 2. It was the Mutuzi’s that did not succeed. The young female was not confident enough to take on the males.

After a while one of the Lenyalo males decided to drag the carcass off into cover. That was when the action started. The reason he dragged it away was because the other lions had made a move on his food.

 

This was really the month of the lion. Our lion sightings were spectacular. It was late afternoon at Tau dam in the south west of Madikwe and we were bathed in golden light. The adults were still sleeping at the back of the dam so the youngsters decided to come and amuse themselves at the edge of the water. These are the Maropeng youngsters and they have grown quite a bit. They are 9 months old now. From a lion’s point we did not do too badly.

The picture below is Thlou dam in the north. For the winter it doesn’t look too bad. We had very late rainfall this year and this is the result. Well this is me for now. Come and join us on Facebook and Twitter for regular updates on our safaris in Madikwe.

Till next time!
Grant

Well, as you can see, there is never a dull moment here at Tuningi!
Come and visit us soon! We guarantee that you will have an unforgettable holiday!
Until next month!
Warmest regards
The T-team

For enquiries please contact :