South Africa — A World Different

Water Bottles for the Desert

July 2, 2012 By admin Leave a Comment

It’s such a simple thing to do that most travelers probably don’t even notice it. The Atacama property of explora has just joined Tswalu Kalahari and Nimmo Bay Resort in Canada in cutting down on plastic. Tswalu bottles its water in glass bottles that it reuses, avoiding the transport of bottled water the hundreds of miles every day, and Nimmo Bay provides its guests with stainless steel bottles to refill. Now explora is also giving guests a reusable stainless steel water container to use during their trip to the company’s lodges at the Atacama, Patagonia, and Easter Island.

Some of these properties, however, do still provide guests with the option of bottled water too.

“Efficient use of precious water has long been a priority for explora, which employs a purification plant at each lodge to treat water with ultraviolet light,” explora said in a statement.

In Patagonia, Hotel Salto Chico draws from the Pehoé River. On volcanic Easter Island, Hotel Posada de Mike Rapu taps an underground well. Water is a bit trickier in the bone-dry Atacama: Water drawn from 200-meter well by Hotel de Larache goes through a triple purification process including demineralization and ultraviolet light.

Filed Under: Carbon Footprint, Good Stuff, News, Nimmo Bay Resort, Tswalu Kalahari, explora Atacama Tagged With: bottled water

Tswalu Kalahari, South Africa

July 1, 2012 By admin Leave a Comment

Tswalu Kalahari, owned by the Oppenheimer family of Anglo American fame, is South Africa’s largest private game reserve. Located in the Northern Cape at the foot of the Korannaberg mountains, it covers over 100,000 hectares of Kalahari wilderness. There are only two lodges on the reserve – the Motse and Tarkuni.

The Motse

On a Tswalu Safari

Each provides the ultimate in barefoot luxury. The Motse - Tswana for ‘village’ – consists of 8 individual stone-walled, thatched legae (small houses or suites), while Tarkuni is a private villa set amid rolling hills, offering the ultimate in luxury and personalized service for families and small groups of up to ten guests. The quaint bush suite, the Malori deck, is a raised platform with a thatched overhang for protection should it rain.

RICH AMBITIONS

Tswalu is driven by two ambitions: to create 1) an inspirational experience for its guests and 2) a conservation vision to restore the Kalahari. This vast area is a haven for many endangered and rare species. Conservation, socioeconomic development, tourism, and responsible environmental management are the four legs upon which Tswalu has been developed. To fund this vision, the Tswalu Foundation was started in 2008.

Suite-side, The Motse

Home to some 70 species of mammals and over 230 species of birds, Tswalu has embarked on a program to breed certain rare species for distribution to other game ranches and reserves and to establish viable wild populations as a contribution to ensuring their survival.

Eight adult desert black rhino were translocated from Etosha National Park in Namibia to Tswalu in 1995. They adapted to their new home and were monitored regularly by the Tswalu team. Tswalu today has approximately one third of the country’s population. There is an agreement with South African National Parks to exchange animals in order to ensure adequate gene flow through this fragmented population. Tswalu recently purchased four more rhino from Namibia, to supplement the genetic diversity of the population. Other animal breeding programs on the property include the sable and endangered roan antelopes.

Sable Magnificent

At any given time there are some two dozen research projects being carried out at Tswalu, be it in the study of cheetah, raptors, mountain zebra, insects, or plantlife.

Of the resident local community of about 400, at least one member of every family works for Tswalu.

Living at Tswalu

A clinic on the property provides free primary health care for residents of Tswalu and neighboring farms. It also runs an extensive HIV/AIDS awareness program, as well as the WARMTH program (WAR against Malnutrition, Tuberculosis and Hunger). A free preschool for children has been established in conjunction with a literacy program, aiming to address the high illiteracy levels in the area. As literacy rates increase, staff also benefit from new opportunities.

Lazing at Tswalu Tarkuni

In 2008, Tswalu embarked on the development of a new centralized staff housing complex allowing staff easier access to the clinic, creche, and sports facilities. The houses were designed on environmentally friendly principles, with particular attention paid to insulation, the planting of indigenous trees, reduction in energy consumption through solar power and water preservation. The second phase of 40 houses is due for completion in November 2009.

Tswalu's Bottled Water

Since May this year Tswalu has been bottling its own mineral water on site, rather than driving its supply 1500 kilometers from Johannesburg. The Classic Crystal water system is a seven-stage filtration process that ensures the lightest, freshest-tasting water without stripping it of the necessary calcium and magnesium minerals. As a result, Tswalu always has ice-cold still and sparkling water on tap and has reduced its carbon emissions. The classy Tswalu glass bottles cut down on recycling and garner a lot of positive attention.

Solar power is already used extensively throughout Tswalu, whether it is for electric fencing, pumps, geysers, or lighting. In June Tswalu started using lightweight, portable solar stoves for cooking meals and even breads and desserts. The plan is to use them as much as possible for meals in the bush, boma dinners, and sleep-outs. Tswalu also hopes to soon have its staff using solar cookers throughout the reserve.

Filed Under: Africa, Conservation, Education, Features, Good Stuff, Health, People, South Africa, Tswalu Kalahari Tagged With: Desert Black Rhino, Kalahari, Literacy, Oppenheimer, Roan, Sable, solar, Tarkuni, The Motse, Tswalu, Tswalu Foundation

Grootbos Private Nature Reserve, South Africa

June 7, 2012 By admin 1 Comment

Your View, Grootbos

Only two hours from Cape Town, the highly lauded Grootbos is owned and managed by the Lutzeyer family and lies within the fynbos (indigenous heath) and milkwood forests on a mountain slope overlooking the whale-watching hotspots of Walker Bay and Hermanus. It is a crossroads of flora, fauna, and marine life, where some of the world’s most unique plant, bird, and animal species come together.

Pool, Fynbos, Bay

There are 27 artfully crafted suites in the Forest and Garden lodges and an exclusive villa, with pleasure both inside and out that will sate both sybarite and nature lover. Specialist guides lead 4×4 drives and walks through the fynbos and forests of the reserve, trips to the nearby coast to view the Southern Right Whales from land or sea, walks along deserted beaches, visits to archaeological and cultural sites, as well as boat tours to a nearby island to view penguins, seals, dolphins, and Great White sharks.

FIRST OF ITS KIND

In 2003 Grootbos began the dynamic Green Futures College initiative on the reserve to train unskilled and unemployed people from the local community in fynbos landscaping, horticulture, and ecotourism. It is the first venture of its kind in South Africa, if not the whole of the continent.

Dining at the Lodge

The goal is to create out of people who were once disadvantaged a group of qualified gardeners – not just individuals who sweep and rake but highly trained people who can go on to make businesses of their own. Michael Lutzeyer’s brainchild became reality through a public/private partnership between Grootbos and the DEG (German Investment and Development Company).

The college generates funds through its plant sales, and there is an indigenous-plant nursery and fynbos-landscaping business. Over the years those sales have helped finance the college, and in the first two years all 23 students who started the course graduated, and most have gone on to find employment or to start their own enterprises within horticulture.

Fynbos Forever

Following the success of Green Futures, the Grootbos Foundation embarked on another training project in 2009 to further their commitment to the local community. Growing the Future is all about food production, and eight women will be trained each year in the cultivation of vegetables and fruit, beekeeping, and the principles of successful animal husbandry.

Horticulturalist of the Future?

Another project is Spaces for Sport. When the 2010 World Cup was to be held in South Africa, it was Lutzeyer’s dream to build a multipurpose facility that would fill a gap in the local community of Gansbaai, which had scant sporting facilities. He saw sport as a way to break down social barriers and bring people together on equal terms. The multipurpose sporting facility was opened in April, 2008, and here youngsters have access to professional coaching and can also learn about the environment.

IN THEIR OWN WORDS

“Grootbos is not only about five-star accommodation but also about conservation. We always have shown innovation and we are inspired by contributing to South Africa’s future in terms of developing knowledge and skills amongst all South Africans. In particular, we believe in developing youngsters from local communities, who in the past have not had as many opportunities as others.” (Michael Lutzeyer)

Filed Under: Africa, Carbon Footprint, Conservation, Education, Features, Good Stuff, Grootbos Private Nature Reserve, N-S, People, South Africa Tagged With: birds, fynbos, horticulture, penguins, seals, shark, sport, whale

Saving Piglet

April 18, 2012 By admin Leave a Comment

Piglet

Out of Tswalu in the Kalahari comes the unusual and heartwarming story of a baby aardvark that was saved by a vet and her husband in Vryburg, South Africa, and which has now found a home on the grounds of the lodge. Tswalu has posted the story on its blog of how the aardvark was found, reared on a particular kind of milk formula (which was eventually sponsored by the company), and how (because of the animal’s oddly shaped mouth) they had to use a bottle from the United States designed for babies with cleft palates. They called him Piglet. Every day they took him for walks, which aardvarks do a lot of, and Piglet eventually dug his first burrow so deep (9 meters!) that he couldn’t get out and it collapsed on him, and the vet and her students camped out for 36 hours in order to get him out. Now at Tswalu, and up to 18 kilograms from 3.5 when he was found, Piglet needs to learn now to fend for himself, eat termites instead of milk, and it is hoped that he will start moving off into the wild. Read more about Piglet’s story.

Filed Under: Africa, Conservation, Good Stuff, News, South Africa Tagged With: aardvark, Kalahari, vet, vryburg

The Travel of Art

February 29, 2012 By admin Leave a Comment

'Minga vonani kuxouga ka xigaza,' Philemon Hlungwani

The task we try to set ourselves at A World Different is to find hotels and lodges around the world that do good things. Sometimes it is easy to see who those good things or deeds benefit, such as the luxurious Casa Gangotena’s work with communities in its hometown of Quito, Ecuador. Or the silversmith project supported by Ibo Island Lodge in Mozambique. Or the efforts of Cortijada Los Gázquez to resuscitate a dying Spanish village’s way of life.

'Alter Ego 1,' Andrew Verster

In the case of Ellerman House, in Cape Town, the good works are less obvious. They are actually the art works hanging on the hotel walls. The luxury boutique hotel now has 500 pieces by South African masters and 80 by contemporary artists. The specially built Ellerman Contemporary gallery opened in December 2009. The gallery, hidden away below the front of the hotel, is fronted by the striking Hier sculpture, a 3-meter head made of slate by Angus Taylor. AWD met with Ellerman House GM Nick Dreyer and talked about how the luxury boutique hotel came to become a prominent supporter of local artists and built its Ellerman Contemporary gallery as a showcase.

A World Different: Ellerman House is famous for its paintings by South African masters, such as Pierneef and Irma Stern. That collection was put together by the hotel’s owner, financier Paul Harris. But these new art works are taking Ellerman House in a new direction.

Dreyer: With the masters we gained traction as art collectors. But we had no contemporary works, and we wanted to collect them. We had this hollow space at the bottom of the property, and it suddenly became obvious that’s where the gallery should go.

Inside Elllerman Contemporary

AWD: What did you want to achieve with the gallery?

Dreyer: We wanted to give artists access to the market and we wanted to give our customers a chance to see some great South African art.

AWD: Do you sell the paintings?

Dreyer: No. We make the introduction between the guest and the art, and we might suggest galleries where they can buy the artists, such as the Goodman Gallery or Michael Stevenson. But that’s all. We collect art we love, and there is an integrity to collecting the art but not selling it.

Mary Sibande's 'They Don't Make Them Like They Used To'

AWD: Who buys the art for Ellerman Contemporary?

Dreyer: It is a collaborative affair. Myself, my colleague Mitch Terry, Paul Harris. We get advice from Mark Read, the owner of Everard Read Gallery in Johannesburg. We go to the Johannesburg Art Fair. We find out about an artist and investigate.

AWD: Are there any success stories?

Dreyer: I don’t think Ellerman can claim the success of any of these artists. As I said, we merely introduce clients to them.

AWD: Are there set tours of the gallery or do clients simply wander down?

Dreyer: It’s a small intimate hotel, so one of the managers goes with guests. Often they go down by themselves.

AWD: The Independent of London carried a story on the ‘big six’ hotels in the world that have art collections. Besides one in Melbourne, which is named after the artist whose works it carries, Ellerman was the only one of the six with the idea of promoting living artists.

Inside the Gallery

Dreyer: We have had very important art collectors stay at the hotel and they have purchased hundreds of thousands of rands worth of local art as a result.

AWD: How do you arrange the art in the gallery?

Dreyer: As soon as work comes in I put it up and take other things down. It’s not a huge gallery, and because some of the works are very large, we can only put up maybe two dozen artworks at a time. It is a bit like a store, and sometimes there are even things on the floor propped up against a wall.

AWD: The artist Angus Taylor, who did the striking head outside the gallery entrance, is now a consultant to the hotel on a building project. So your relationships with the artists go even further?

Dreyer: Angus spent three months on the property putting up the head. He made a grid of steel and then layered the rocks inside. We liked the way he worked, always with organic materials, so we asked him to be a consultant on the new villa we are adding to the property.

Filed Under: Africa, Art, Ellerman House, Features, N-S, People, South Africa Tagged With: contemporary art, everard read, kannemeyer, mary sibande, philemon hlongwani

Ellerman House, Cape Town

October 14, 2011 By admin Leave a Comment

Possibly the most astonishing thing about Ellerman House – and there is plenty here to be amazed by – is that so few people know about it. Now almost 20 years old, it has succeeded by being as under-the-radar as it has been reverentially consistent in luxury. The people who need to know about it, do.

Room No. 7

This former residence (or, to be exact, mansion) high above exclusive Bantry Bay, is a study in refinement and peacefulness. Even though the gracious building is in the heart of Cape Town, its 9 rooms, two suites, and 5-bedroom villa, each with unsurpassed views across the Atlantic, offer the perfect amount of isolation.

Room No. 10

Below the spacious yet cozy reception rooms and large porches spreads a manicured garden and pool. The rooms throughout the property are decorated with magnificent works by South African masters, including Irma Stern and Pierneef.

At the Villa

The rooms have recently been buffed up – new fabrics, bedding, and wallpapers – although subtly enough that repeat clients (of which there are many, despite the prices) probably won’t notice. While the main residence has a more traditional ambiance, the more modern villa’s rooms – with names like Aqua and Lilac – are lushly simple. The kitchen has a glass wall that opens electronically for you to ask the chefs any questions, and across from it is a ‘pantry’ full of goodies for guests to raid at all hours and which has become infamously addictive.

WHERE WOMEN MEET ART

Ellerman House owner Paul Harris, a well-known Johannesburg financier, was the main mover behind the creation of Penreach, which works with schools in rural communities in the north of the country. Established in 1994, Penreach now touches the lives of more than 2,000 teachers a year, working in over 900 schools, and directly benefiting more than 350,000 learners . At least ninety percent of the teachers are women.

A Painting by Irma Stern at Ellerman

Penreach has also gone beyond schools, to help fund beneficial projects such as the provision of psycho-social support to teachers, orphans and vulnerable children; the improvement of state-run feeding schemes; the establishment of vegetable gardens; the development of sport and sports facilities; environmental education, with a view to turning schools into profit centers through waste management; the provision of IT training; youth leadership development camps; and administration training. So successful has it been that Penreach is aiming to reach other parts of the country in the future.

The Contemporary Gallery

Harris, who is also a patron of the arts, has one of the finest ‘galleries’ in the country decorating the walls and rooms of Ellerman House – you can find not only every South African master here but possibly also their finest work. In 2009 he opened a magnificent specially built gallery on the property to foster contemporary artists (see News). The gallery now has enough artworks to rotate the exhibition four times annually, and the exhibition there of artists has led clients to buy their works.

Filed Under: Art, Education, Ellerman House, Features, Health, People, South Africa, Uncategorized, Women Tagged With: bantry bay, contemporary south african art, penreach

Le Quartier Francais, Franschhoek, South Africa

July 24, 2010 By admin Leave a Comment

Le Quartier Courtyard

Le Quartier Français is an exclusive boutique hotel situated in the stunning yet quaint town of Franschhoek, just 50 minutes from Cape Town, in a spectacular valley that is a must for any food or wine lover. Always on hand and keeping an eye on keeping the hotel’s sterling name is the larger-than-life owner, Susan Huxter.

A Feast of Colors

A Grande Room

Tucked away in secluded gardens, you wouldn’t think that LQF’s gorgeously decorated rooms and suites, with their mountain views, are still so central. It is so quiet that you could be in the countryside, yet you are close enough to stroll to the myriad shops and eateries springing up in this increasingly popular hideout. Huxter has also created a fantastic shop selling local things that will leave you with your arms loaded, as well as a private 30-seater moviehouse.

The Four Quarters by Night

Lesotho Highlands Trout, Squid Ink, and Avocado

Known for its gastronomic experience – at restaurants ICI and the Tasting Room – LQF starts your day with a breakfast that is incomparable … and from there on it only gets better. Whether it is bistro lunches or homemade truffles or sensational sold-out dinners, they all come from the kitchen of award-winning chef Margot Janse and her team. Make sure to ask LQF about their range of cooking and eating adventures.

MEETING MR. MONDAY

Three years ago 68-year-old Mrs. Ndaba (LQF prefers to not give out her first name) began a nursery school in her little pink shack in the informal local settlement Langrug, and she soon had 67 toddlers – aged two to six – to support and teach, but with no funding. Hearing about this in 2009, LQF, with the aid of a dietitian, began a program to make muffins crammed full of all the daily nutritional requirements growing children need. These are delivered every Friday, and any interested guests and visitors can not only join in the delivery but help bake the muffins. (Watch a video of Mrs. Ndaba’s Fridays, below, with a funky soundtrack.)

But that’s only where the story starts. On the very first day of the Friday program, one guest was so inspired that he offered to fund meals at the school for every Monday for a year. He became known as Mister Monday. Before long, every day of the week had been sponsored, even by people who had not stayed at LQF.

The Cottage Entrance

A significant portion of the produce used in the restaurants is sourced locally and come from very small producers who knock on the back door with their produce of the day, and LQF’s restaurants support Streetsmart, which adds money on to each diner’s bill to finance programs that help street children. The hotel also contributes to the Kusasa Project, which is aimed at improving the lives of underprivileged children. LQF also supplies food to the local soup kitchen, and it donates its old linens to the local hospice.

iCi, the Restaurant

LQF has a three-year in-house training program focused on local kids who have completed high school. Of the 15 who have completed the course, a number have worked at Wheatleigh and Blantyre, both luxury hotels in Lenox, Massachusetts, as well as at Singita.

Filed Under: A Kitchen Different, Education, Features, Health, Le Quartier Francais, People, South Africa, Taste the Tasting Room Tagged With: gastronomy, huxter, ndaba

Good Food with Heart

July 6, 2010 By admin Leave a Comment

ICI at Le Quartier Francais

Across the globe, eating a fabulous meal can make a difference. From the Bonham in Edinburgh to Le Quartier Francais in the South African winelands, from The Drake in Brighton and One Aldwych in London to the Steenberg and the Table Bay Hotel in Cape Town. Hundreds of restaurants, some linked to hotels but most of them not, are supporting organizations that contribute a small portion of the revenue from every meal to a charity.

In all the countries except South Africa, where Streetsmart runs throughout the year, the program is limited to the season before Christmas and is aimed at gathering funds for charities in the cities where the money has been collected or specifically earmarked charities. In the UK’s Streetsmart program, diners have a note on their menus saying that a pound is being added to their bill, although it can be removed upon request. In South Africa, the money is spent specifically on street children. In America, Streetsmart exists in San Francisco, where, at restaurants like Medjool and Slanted Door, diners are asked to donate $3 in an envelope provided with their check. There is also a Streetsmart in Australia, where 250 restaurants are now members of the program.

Says Gordon Ramsay, whose Maze restaurants are members in the UK , “Streetsmart has become part of Christmas for us. It’s everyone’s chance to do the right thing at the right time with only the slightest nudge.”

Since 1998 Britons have given 4.2 million pounds which has been sent to ‘reputable charities’ in the respective cities where Streetsmart restaurants are found. In Australia, $1.18 million has been made and distributed to dozens of projects since 2003.

Filed Under: Africa, Australia, Europe, News, Oceania, People, South Africa, United Kingdom Tagged With: food, le quartier francais, maze, one aldwych, steenberg, streetsmart, table bay hotel

Pushing Art

March 14, 2010 By admin 1 Comment

The Gallery Different

Long known for its collection of art, much of it by local masters, the exemplary small hotel Ellerman House in Cape Town has recently opened a gallery to showcase young and upcoming South African artists.

“Our guests (the majority of whom are international) go down to the gallery and take in the art, see something that they like, and take the name home with them and spread the word,” the gallery says.

The Taylor Sculpture Above Bantry Bay

And spread the word they will, if the striking giant sculpture of a man’s head by Angus Taylor at the entrance is anything to go by.

The art pieces that have been carefully selected and collected for Ellerman Contemporary come from various art galleries throughout the country and cover various styles and disciplines, which gives any person visiting the gallery a fairly good understanding of the contemporary art scene in South Africa. The gallery, which was put together over a year, was in a location impossible to get heavy machinery to. All excavations had to be done by hand. Not only did this allow them to construct an entire gallery while guests were sipping cocktails only a few yards away, completely unawares, but it also gave them a green gallery.

Some of the artists that are featured include William Kentridge, Angus Taylor, Collin Richards, Anthony Scullion, John Walters, Kevin Brand and Phillimon Hlungwane.

Filed Under: Africa, Art, Ellerman House, People, South Africa Tagged With: contemporary, gallery

A Merrier Christmas

December 20, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

As part of its Instead of Christmas Cards and Gifts Program, the award-winning Le Quartier Francais hotel in Franschhoek, South Africa, paid for the children at a nearby nursery school – run by a woman who does it for little or no charge – to have their first Christmas party and a visit from one of LQF’s chefs dressed as Santa. The kids got healthy food, clothes, and a toy to take home. The children already are supplied with food for several days a week, and LQF is working on doing it for all five days for the entire year. Good idea!

Filed Under: Africa, Education, People, South Africa, Women