The movement toward greener purchases, lifestyles and holidays has encouraged the hospitality industry to step up their game and entice their customers with eco-friendly products and practices. It is necessary that this becomes standard across the field, and no matter where or what the sale is, it should be nothing less than neutrally impactful on our precious environment. In the world of safari, of wild Africa, and all the beauty that is beheld in it, it is our priority to promote our most favourite, ‘greenest’ destinations for your holiday pleasure. Africa’s Finest, the impressively sized and gloriously illustrated, photographic publication by David Bristow and Colin Bell, is a most beautiful manual guiding the reader through the greatest of the green properties scattered throughout sub-Saharan Africa and the Indian Ocean Islands.
In a series of articles, we will be tracing these Southern and East African countries and warm-water islands, bringing to your attention the best choices in truly eco-friendly style. Guided by Africa’s Finest’s well-worn expertise, the following properties are listed in our series of ‘Greenest Game Lodges’ because they wholeheartedly represent what it is to be environmentally sustainable. No compromise on comfort, just the best of the best.
Here’s the first, beginning in the oldest desert in the world, the Namib.
Damaraland Camp is a thriving success in the deepest, driest, desert river valley, the Huab. Located near Namibia’s second-ever established Community Wildlife Conservancy, Torra, Damaraland Camp was initially built to facilitate revenue production in the area. The aim was to encourage the local people (a diverse mix of Nama, Herero and Khoi clans) to collaborate in the development of a conservancy that would expedite both wildlife conservation and community upliftment.
Born out of the drive to create an environmentally sustainable business, Damaraland Camp has stuck to what it strived to accomplish. Today, it welcomes guests to bask in the solace of the Skeleton Coast’s eerie beauty. Early morning fog quenches the thirst of the specifically adapted insects, reptiles, plants and mammals. Black rhino, elephant, leopard, cheetah and the renowned desert lion are among the safari favourites, cutting a rarely seen silhouette against the stark desert landscape.
Future-forward technology that immensely reduces the environmental impact that this well-visited lodge has on its sensitive surroundings is combined with tradition and history, offering award-winning safari opportunities. It is owned and partly run by the local community whose members have dressed the lodge with a reminiscence of their heritage and distinctively cheerful nature. Thatched units perch atop individual wooden platforms, each of the 10 adobe-style tents producing views of the undeniably enriching landscape that splays itself before one’s eyes.
A swimming pool, restaurant, bar and convivial campfire welcome guests to absorb the nature of this remotely located lodge. Days spent curing curiosity on game drives and guided walks are concluded around an amber-embered pit where guests recount tales of desert elephants and shepherds tree sunsets. Tradition states its claim in the form of a boma, where, on cloudless nights, guests can sit amid the softly lit lanterns and gaze upward at the eternally starred skies. This is the magic of Damaraland.
Image credit: Wilderness Safaris
