Small World

Mopani camp was full. How about Letaba? I asked. Sorry, its also full. So Jessie found Tingala Lodge on booking.com – What a happy diversion it turned out to be.

About 15km north of Phalaborwa gate into Kruger Park, Tingala Lodge is terrific. While we chilled on the big patio overlooking a waterhole, a lady arrived in a double-cab bakkie and I noticed a couple of cases of Painted Wolf wine being carried into her room. When she joined us on the patio I said, ‘Lovely Wine, that Painted Wolf. My sister sells it in Durban.’

Oh, she said, It’s my wine. My husband is the winemaker. Your sister must be Sheila! I’m visiting lodges promoting it, asking them to include it on their wine lists.

‘Yep, Sheila’s my sister. I love the labels,’ I said, ‘Who does your artwork?’

Originally an artist who worked on a game lodge in Botswana.

‘Which lodge?’

Lloyds Camp on the Savute channel.

‘I knew an artist at Lloyds Camp,’ I said, ‘Jenny Song, she was there when we visited way back when.’

It was Jenny! She did our original artwork!

‘What a lovely person, we got on so well with her. My wife Trish bought something she painted. We had such a special time there,’ I said. ‘When we flew in from the Delta, back in the day, we were picked up at the landing strip by Emma, a young pink-cheeked Pom who said she was the chef, and she was on guest-fetching duty that day. She loaded us into the open Landrover and drove us right up an elephant’s bum at the waterhole on the way to camp. When we got to camp she had prepared a delicious lunch for us overlooking the camp waterhole in the channel, and we ate and drank ice-cold beers looking down on eles heads as they drank freshly-pumped water.’

I’m that Emma! she said. I worked with Lionel and Jenny Song in Lloyds Camp in 1993! I loved driving new arrivals to Pump Pan to watch the eles!

In 2022 we had bumped into Emma the pink-cheeked Pom from our 1993 trip to Lloyds Camp! You sadly just have to behave wherever you go – someone, somewhere will know you – even 29 years later!

I carried on reminiscing about our time in Savute: ‘Our fellow guests were cabin crew from SouthWest Airlines in Texas, the world’s biggest airline at the time.’

That would be Doug and Linda, said Emma, and you won’t believe it, I was in contact with Linda just yesterday. We have kept in touch ever since! She’ll be amazed when I tell her who I met today.

~~oo0oo~~

The next day we were due at Mopani Camp in Kruger, so we only stayed one night at Tingala Lodge. I’d love to go back. The birding was terrific, and on the way out we saw an African civet in broad daylight.

~~oo0oo~~