Our 26,500 Hectare concession attracts an ever-changing tableau of wildlife. Our rivers are home to pods of hippo, giant crocs, and abundant birdlife. The valleys host the highest density of nyala and eland in Kruger and, when the conditions are right, huge herds of elephant and buffalo. Morning safaris usually produce good general game in the form of nyala, impala, kudu, baboon, monkey, waterbuck, zebra, wildebeest, warthog and, perhaps, giraffe, grey duiker, steenbok, klipspringer or bushbuck. Other species, such as Sharpe’s grysbok and yellow-spotted rock hyrax, which are difficult to find further south, are regularly seen on the concession. Night drives may yield leopard, hyena, bushpig, jackal, civet, genet, honey badger, African wild cat, porcupine, bushbaby and white-tailed mongoose. Whilst not always resident, lion, cheetah and packs of African wild dogs can all be seen whenever they traverse or hunt in Pafuri.

© Chad Cocking

Pafuri is not only a treasure trove of landscape and biodiversity. Its human past is as rich as its natural bounty. You may discover evidence of stone age ancestors who lived here since the dawn of humanity, and you will learn about a trading past linking Africa to the world, a major archaeological site called Thulamela, a more recent history of rogues, traders and crooks, and – perhaps most poignantly – a contemporary tale of loss, struggle and restitution as the Makuleke people turned their ancestral home into a 21st century icon of responsible conservation and tourism. Speak to our managers, guides and staff – most of them have parents or grandparents who were born on the land.

The royal citadel of Thulamela arose in the 13th century, around the time of Marco Polo, and stood for about five centuries on a rugged hilltop overlooking the Luvuvhu river. It was part of the highly sophisticated Great Zimbabwe culture, that mined, crafted and traded with the world via the Swahili Coast for more than a millennium. Today, it’s hard to imagine that this wild place once had trading ties across the globe. Yet excavation of its stone-walled fortress yielded gongs from West Africa, Ming dynasty porcelain from China, beads from India, and glass from Venice. Thulamela prospered until the end of the 17th century. This spectacular site, which was excavated and partially reconstructed in the 1990s, is one of the most haunting reminders that Pafuri’s story also includes a rich and varied human history.

© Simon Espley | Africa Geographic

Pafuri is big predator country. Leopards are resident along the rivers and in the hills. You might encounter them on your excursions or hear their rasping calls at night. Great crocodiles bask on the banks of the Luvuvhu or move between the river and the seasonal pans. Sometimes they emerge at night to scavenge on land, occasionally driving others off their feast. But hyenas – the Makuleke totem animal – remain the true apex predators on land. At dusk, you might visit one of their dens. At night, you’ll almost certainly hear their eerie calls as they hunt and scavenge across the floodplains. Remind us to tell you about these magnificent creatures who deserve so much more than the bad rap we humans have given them. Lions, cheetah and African wild dogs do roam in and out but the hyenas are ferocious guardians of their land. Here, the rivalry between the great African predators is as fierce today as it was a thousand years ago.

© Chad Cocking

Pafuri is the premium bush walking destination in South Africa. For travellers who wish to truly discover the astonishing biodiversity, exquisite landscapes and intriguing history that Pafuri has to offer, there is no better way to do it than on foot. Getting your feet on the ground offers you a chance to experience untamed Africa in close-up. You’ll focus on the little things but you might also explore ancient human settlements or experience the rush of adrenaline when you happen upon a great beast of the bush.

The wedge of land overlooking the confluence of the Limpopo and Luvuvhu rivers is known as Crooks Corner. This spot is also where three countries – South Africa, Mozambique and Zimbabwe – meet. In the early 20th century, Crooks’ Corner became a refuge for outlaws and fugitives who, at a moment's notice, were able to flee across an international border to escape the law. The crooks included ivory poachers, gun runners and various other shady characters, who chose the free life of buccaneers. Today, Crooks Corner is fugitive-free, but in other ways, it remains as wild as it was one hundred years ago. Hippos still shelter in the pool at the confluence. There are no crooks, but there are still plenty of crocs.

The spectacular variety of habitats and food sources found in our concession support a mesmerising array of four hundred and fifty species of birds, making our concession the destination of choice for avid birders and guests who are regularly treated to sightings of rare species including the elusive Pels Fishing Owl, Racket-tailed Roller, Böhm’s and Mottled Spinetails, Lemon-breasted Canary and Arnot’s Chat. Other specials are Black-throated Wattle-Eye, Three-banded Courser, Southern Yellow White-eye, Meves’ Starling and Tropical Boubou.

© Albert McClean

Our concession is home to the most impressive stand of fever trees in South Africa. Its mass of pale yellow-green trunks and glowing colour palette are hauntingly beautiful, especially in the light of the late afternoon or early morning. Seeing a herd of eland or a giant elephant bull move through is an unforgettable sight. The forest’s cathedral-like ambience makes it the perfect backdrop for wedding ceremonies and sundowners. We’ve learnt from our Makuleke partners that rubbing the trunk’s powder onto your face brings good luck. Try it. Who knows? By contrast, early European settlers thought that the powdery yellow bark of these wetland trees caused malaria, and thus dubbed them “fever trees”. How wrong they were!

© Simon Stobbs

Lanner Gorge, where the Luvuvhu cuts a deep canyon through the sandstones, is one of our most spectacular sites. From the viewpoint you may be lucky enough to spot Verreaux’s eagles, falcons, cape clawless otters, hippos, dassies and crocodiles. What may be less obvious than the grandeur of the view and the abundance of life is that the deeper you look down into the gorge, the further you are looking back in time. The cliffs tell the story of the past two hundred and fifty million years. At the base, rocks record the mass extinction of the Permian Age – the event that ushered in the age of dinosaurs. Here, the remains of primaeval mammal-like reptiles are deposited. The upper layers record a dramatic climate shift as the land warmed and dried. The imprint of a desert rose in the light-coloured sandstone, like the one at the lookout you’ll visit, reminds us of a time when dunes dominated this terrain.

© Morgan Trimble

Pafuri lies in a vast triangle flanked to the north and east by the wide and ancient Limpopo, which is today mostly a sandy swathe but has brought life to the area for millions of years, and the young and powerful Luvuvhu to the south, which is actively carving its way through the sandstones of the region, in the process creating the magnificent Lanner Gorge, and depositing rich alluvial soils on the floodplains around our camps. Between them, the two rivers embrace a spectacular and varied landscape with mountains and gorges giving way to floodplains, pans, baobabs, forests and savannahs before they merge in the low-lying forests at Crooks Corner on the eastern fringe of our concession. They are the lifeblood of Pafuri, changing with the seasons but always sustaining its inhabitants.

Pafuri is a place of baobabs. These great icons of the African continent stud its hills and ridges. Most are ancient but some have been dated at over a thousand years. Your guides will tell you about the great array of wildlife they sustain but also about their indigenous use as remedies and as the font of ancient traditions and folklore. Visit the Big Baobab and decide whether you dare clamber up its flank to a resting place between its vast branches. Or listen to stories about the baobab where a sangoma lived to dispense wisdom and care to the people. And then there is the one called Deku at the site of the old royal village. Learn about the legend of its naming and how it subsequently became a seat of governance where the chief and his headmen gathered next to its bulk to discuss the affairs of the day, declare the laws of the land and prosecute those who contravened them.

There are two major river valleys and more than 30 scattered pans in the Pafuri Triangle. These were listed as wetlands of international importance under the Ramsar convention on 22 May 2007. It was the first Ramsar site owned and co-managed by a community - not only in South Africa but worldwide. Prominent features include riparian forests, floodplain grasslands, river channels and flood pans. Pans are depressions in the floodplains which are intermittently filled from floods and rains - they are of great importance as they hold water into the dry season, supporting a high diversity of species and providing an important habitat for water-dependent frogs, fish and birds. They also act as a vital refuge for wildlife during the dry months and water birds during the summer rains.

© Clearly Africa