Dear Londolozi Family,

The 2025 yearly roundup is HERE! It’s once again a time for reflection and to look back on many high points of the Londolozi calendar year. My reflections are vast and varied, but as is tradition, let us begin with the now-famous, Londolozi year in review movie…

One of these was the creation of the “Original Rondavels- A Living Museum” – inspired by our humble beginnings at Londolozi. The four original mud huts and an old reed kitchen have been beautifully reimagined into a living museum, which captures Londolozi’s evolution from a bankrupt cattle farm to a thriving Futuristic African Village. For Shan and I, this project has been extremely reflective and meaningful. We would like to give a special thank you to Gina Waldman and her incredible team, who helped us bring these rondavels to life.

Each Rondavel tells a different chapter in the Londolozi 100-year history, weaving together stories of people, place, and purpose.

The first Rondavel, entitled “The Essence of Safari,” pays tribute to the arrival of our forefathers a century ago, who set the foundation for what was to come.

The second historic rondavel showcases “The Londolozi Conservation Development model”, which evolved over time and ultimately became a blueprint for launching an industry.

Rondavel number three invites guests to reflect on the contribution they make each time they visit. The Londolozi’s Ripple Effect display highlights the impact of Londolozi and the work we do in the neighbouring economies by creating careers and business opportunities for sustainable employment, functional family life, access to world-class education, river restoration and biodiversity corridors – all built on a thriving economy of wildlife.

The fourth historic rondavel has been converted into a mini cinema where guests can access the Londolozi’s Living Library, a comprehensive digital timeline of 100 years of history and storytelling.

Finally, inspired by the old reed kitchen, a new artisanal wine-dining cellar has been created. This is a perfect location for wine aficionados to enjoy some of South Africa’s wide range of choices. This venue has already borne witness to many long festive evenings.

Guests are now able, in their own time, to wander through the four historic “Original Rondavels” and witness firsthand the many stories and defining moments that have brought us to this place. Creating this living museum was for Shan and I cathartic, emotional and celebratory and caused us to take time to reflect our own personal journey together.

Another highlight for the year has been a request from SANParks leadership to assist in the development of a countrywide movement entitled the Rhino Renaissance. This is intended to be a movement supported by South Africans, and globally, to restore the white rhino population in Kruger over the next decade.

This generational responsibility will usher in a new blueprint for conservation in South Africa: one that is community-driven, skills-based, and inclusive, turning neighbouring communities into co-guardians of protected areas. It’s not charity – it’s national strategy. A bold vision, led by SANParks, where conservation becomes a catalyst for dignity, education, and rural economic growth.

Two of Londolozi’s NGO affiliates are playing a central and strategic role as part of this initiative. The Tracker Academy is under mandate from SANParks to provide skilled local trackers, from its Rhino Guardian programme, to monitor 24/7 Kruger’s rhino. The relationship also provides for Tracker Academy to offer training annually to 90 existing security personnel in Kruger to enhance their ability to protect these animals.

In parallel with this development, and as part of the Rhino Renaissance movement, a new relationship has been established between SANParks and the Good Work Foundation (GWF) through its Conservation Academy to capacitate young learners with digital learning, conservation coaching, and field guiding programmes. This plan builds on GWF’s existing programmes, which are already reaching 12000 learners per week and produce 400 Academy graduates annually. SANParks have requested that this tried and tested rural learning model be scaled to have a presence in the villages around Kruger and later to the Addo and Kalahari National Parks. This initiative is in support of SANParks’ 2040 vision towards building the next generation of rangers, guides, leaders in conservation, technologists, and storytellers to protect our national wildlife assets.

This project is a chance to define a legacy of leadership, not only for South Africa but for Africa.

The GWF and Tracker Academy are becoming scalable, proven models for empowering rural youth with relevant skills in support of the digital, tourism and wildlife economies.  Together, these strategies represent a synergistic pathway to achieving a sustainable and prosperous future where people and nature thrive in harmony.

Anyone wishing to support this initiative, please visit here.

Our Londolozi Ripple Fund has also gone from strength to strength during this year as a result of the continued and growing support from our visiting Londolozi guests.

Jess Maclarty and Cry Sithole, who are the moving spirits of the Ripple Fund, have created strong partnership relationships with many families in the region, demonstrating the strength of the kinship model as a productive and effective way to create opportunity and upliftment. I wish to extend our sincere thanks to our many guests who have been Ripple Fund supporters and have so generously contributed financially to these programmes during the past year. If you’d like to follow along on the journey of the Ripple Fund – follow us here.

Cry Sithole and Jess MacLarty

Village Life at Londolozi continued to enjoy several celebrations this year.  These included the annual Mandela Day and Heritage Day celebrations, and of course, the highly contested Londolozi Leopards vs the Hyenas, a coupling together a motley crew of rangers, trackers and camp managers for the annual soccer derby.

All of these wonderful developments should be seen against a year when the support from our guests and past visitors has been unprecedented.  To put it mildly, “we have been busy”. We have had so much fun, and we have loved welcoming you all to our living African Village.

You will of course all be aware that at midnight on December 31st, we begin the centenary year celebrations – a year of gratitude, joy, love and hope.

Shan, Bronwyn, Duncan, and their creative/operational teams have, over the past few years, been meticulously preparing a number of special micro moments of celebration for our visiting 2026 guests. Indeed, it promises to be a unique year of celebration and reflection. Shhh!!! More about this later… Come celebrate with us!

If the past century has taught us anything, it is that we cannot continue as we have, and if the next century is to teach us something greater, it will be that humanity belongs to the earth, not the other way around. And only by remembering this truth will Londolozi endure and thrive for yet another 100 years.

As we usher in the next century we are witnessing within the new generation, a greater sense of urgency, clarity and understanding of what needs to be done to conserve places like Londolozi, a place where people and animals co-exist in harmony and the rivers still flow from the mountains to the sea giving life to the vast, indigenous landscape as a continued safe haven for our wild kin in nature’s abundant flow.

 As I wrote this year’s “Yearly Round Up”, I was struck by the number of life lessons which have emerged over the last 100-year journey;

And so, as one era passes, another begins. The torch is being handed to those who see that conservation is not merely a project, but a conscious way of being. It is not just about saving species but about restoring the right relationship between humans and the living world and advocating for more space for the natural processes to thrive.  One hopes that the wisdom of those who have walked before us – Attenborough, Redford, Goodall, Tinley, Mandela, and countless others, including unnamed indigenous custodians of wild places, will find their true meaning in the century that follows.