Nkomazi, Mpumalanga. Late afternoon. There are six of us sipping pre-prandial drinks - a double G&T for my husband and me, red wine for the others - and admiring two rhino backlit by pale yellow grasses, now burnished into a rich gold by the sinking sun.
It strikes me that nobody could blame the rhino for bearing a grudge. Even though poachers face stiff competition from Viagra peddlers, there has been a recent upsurge in the wanton slaughter of these pachyderms throughout southern Africa. Since their eyesight is notoriously poor, they scrutinise us from less than 20 metres away. This leads to a debate.
If a rhino charges, you should: a) Pay it in cash. b) Pray and then dash. c) Stand still. d) Run up a hill. e). Show it your rucksack?
The latter option worked best for Ulrich Schutte, the last time he was charged by two and a half tons of fighting fury. He lightly tossed his rucksack to one side and distracted the prehistoric creature. As you do.
Of course warding off a charging rhino is all in a day's work for Schutte, Nkomazi's head ranger and South Africa's answer to Crocodile Dundee.
Earlier that morning, armed with nothing more than a thin stick, the thinking woman's Safari Ken had challenged a two-metre Mozambican spitting cobra sunning itself on a wooden step.
The hissing reptile reared up, Schutte bent closer and the serpent slithered swiftly into a hole.
I observed the entire drama through my binoculars, a good 50m away.
Not that I'm afraid of snakes, you understand. I just believe that if you must pick one up, then at least use somebody else's hand.
Tall, tanned and tough, Schutte's knowledge of the local fauna and flora is extensive. He can whistle like a Black-Crowned Tchagra in descending scales of "whee, cheree, cheroot, cheree, cheroot" and knows the Latin name for Blue Bush (Diospyros Lycioides). Apparently traditional Swazi women use the fruit as a lipstick and use the roots as a toothbrush.
He shows us wild mint or Bushman's Fever Tea, explaining how the Bushmen, who once inhabited this area, cleared their sinuses by boiling the herb-saturated water in a tortoise shell over a fire and drinking it. Now, only their rock paintings remain.
The Bushmen are not the only ones to have left their mark on this area, also known as "the Genesis of Life" because of its Archaen geology representing 3 500 billion years of earthly evolution.
Add to that Neolithic or Iron Age activities dating back to 40 000 BC, evidence of the oldest known mines on earth and a plant diversity higher than the entire Kruger Park's and you can see why scientists from all over the world have flocked to this "Centre of Biological Endemism" since the 1960s.
Schutte points out some truly ancient granite outcrops as well as remnants of old Swazi kraals and various grinding stones used to crush maize or sharpen instruments.
A major water catchment area, the 30 000 hectare Nkomazi Game Reserve lies on the edge of the Drakensberg escarpment, partly in the Barberton Mountain lands (the oldest mountain range on earth) and partly in the Komati grasslands (the world's most threatened biome). Its broad river valleys, vast savanna grasslands and flat-topped acacia are beautiful to behold.
This is the Africa that resides in my soul, no matter where I am.
Staff welcome us to the Komati Tented Lodge perched amid a tangle of bush on the banks of the Komati River with a rambunctious tribal song and dance. Eat your heart out, Mr Zuma, thought I, for we had arrived on the day of his inauguration - what better place to avoid the madding crowds?
General manager Louis Strauss and his gracious wife, Belinda, showed us to our tent. Did I say tent? A sultan's seraglio would be a more accurate description.
Built on a raised teak deck with expansive views over the Hlumuhlumu foothills and Komati River, it had a king-sized bed, en suite shower, outdoor bath, sun deck and plunge pool. In the adjoining tent was our lounge with leather wing-backed chairs, plump sofas and an outdoor sunken boma.
Turned out we had indeed been accommodated in the sultan's quarters. Nkomazi Game Reserve is owned by Dubai World Africa, the investment arm of Dubai World, ultimately wielded by a Dubai sultan.
The Mantis Group manages the reserve locally.
Lying on my deckchair, I close my eyes and listen to the Komati River whispering the secrets of its 3.7 billion-year-old habitat as it glides through a pristine landscape, pierced by the "trrrp-trrrrrrr" call of a woodland kingfisher.
Later, as a thunderstorm stutters on the horizon, my husband and I decide to forgo the game drive to quaff champagne in our ball and claw bath instead.
Since we figured we were already in heaven, we weren't at all worried about being struck by a bolt of lightning. What a way to go!
Using modern techniques, Nkomazi is returning wild animals to a region they once roamed in abundance. The wildlife haven forms part of a planned 170 000-hectare park and world heritage site.
Explains Schutte: "We have a couple of leopards and we stocked the reserve with 20 white rhino.
"Two male cheetahs are nearly at the end of their quarantine and we will bring in a female soon.
"Later this year, we'll add elephant, lion and buffalo to make up the big five."
Nkomazi Reserve's high-lying grassland and the low-lying bushveld areas have long been home to an assortment of antelope, giraffe, warthog, jackal, spotted and brown hyena, civets, gennets, monkeys and even aardvark.
I was thrilled to see a civet and a black-backed jackal bickering over something in the long grass as well as plenty of zebra, wildebeest, giraffe, and warthog.
Besides, it wasn't just the game that kept us enthralled at Nkomazi; it was also the spectacular views from the rocky granite sentinels in the highlands of the reserve with its waterfalls and rock pools.
It was the taste of freedom; the sense of wildness and solitude that always heals the heart.
On our second evening, as the moon rose yellow as a hyena's eye against the bruised night sky, frogs began their baritone chorus.
Not to be outdone, nightjars and crickets chimed in and suddenly a full-on orchestral recital surrounded us. A small distance away, a giraffe pruned the upper reaches of an acacia tree.
Schutte cut the engine and we sat silently absorbing nature's score. It was a rare, almost transcendental moment.
In the end, it is not the rhino chewing contentedly on the sweet savannah grass that gets to you, or even the magnificent Kudu bull eyeballing you from behind an Acacia tree.
It is the smell of the winter veld, the immense horizons and echoing cries of the hadeda ibises in the big open skies.
It is the clock-stopping frisson of picking up something that was last touched by a Swazi warrior or possibly even a Bushman.
Such a paradise helps you forget, for a minute, the other Africa - Johannesburg with its house alarms, street patrols and taxi wars.
The Komati Tented Lodge is still new, so go soon before everybody wakes up to this pristine corner of Mpumalanga.
- Caroline Hurry was a guest of the Mantis Group.
If you go
- Getting there: The Nkomazi Game Reserve is a pleasant three-hour drive from Johannesburg along the N4 towards Nelspruit.
- Accommodation: The Komati Tented Lodge, which blends with the surrounding riverine forest, features 11 Noble and one Royal Suite tents, all with plunge pools and other five-star amenities. The lodge also features a River Retreat spa, where my husband said his massage by Arlin Schutte was just the right level of firm; plus a boutique, outdoor boma dining area and the Majilis Lounge Tent with a viewing deck.
- Activities include game drives, walks, birdwatching, stargazing and rock art viewing.
- More information from central reservations at 041 407 1000; email [email protected] or visit Nkomazi Game Reserve
More info about Dubai World Africa from Dubai World Africa
Special Offer
- Komati Tented Lodge is running a special for South African guests at R1 500 each, which includes all meals, game drives and selected beverages. The offer is valid until September 30.
- Nkomazi Game Reserve is a Dubai World Africa property managed by the Mantis Group in South Africa.
- For more information, call central reservations at 041 407 1000 or email [email protected]