News

How about joining an egg hunt this Easter? The Gondwana Collection and Cymot as project partners invite you to find the golden Easter eggs hidden on their corporate websites. The grand prize is a family voucher (4 people) for three nights with full board at a Gondwana lodge of the winner’s choice plus a Cymot voucher worth N$ 5000.

Kori Bustards are common in Namibia and often seen walking across grasslands looking for food. They eat anything from grasshoppers, caterpillars, locusts, dung beetles and termites to scorpions, solifuges, lizards, bird eggs and nestlings – as well as snakes.

Imagine a scrumptious dinner at a picturesque lodge, enveloped in African warmth and surrounded by nature - plus powerful voices singing a cappella. That is sure to get right under your skin. African Vocals, a band from Swakopmund, performed at Etosha Safari Camp, Hakusembe River Lodge and Damara Mopane Lodge during the week from 4 to 11 March and delighted our guests with well-known African songs like The lion sleeps tonight and local compositions.

It is the third year in a row that a property of the Gondwana Collection has reached the final of the Responsible Tourism Awards. In 2018, the Namib Desert Lodge is competing for the prestigious award. The other two finalists in the Accommodation Establishment category are Grootberg Lodge and Damaraland Camp. In the Tour Operators category, which includes shuttles, car rentals and the like, the three finalists are Abenteuer Afrika Reisen, Wild Dog Safaris and Ultimate Safaris. 

According to African folklore, Leopard stopped sharing his meals and started to hide his kill in trees because Jackal and Hyena weren’t reciprocating his generosity. One of the best remembered fables of the ages is, however, “How the Leopard Got His Spots” in the “Just So Stories” where Rudyard Kipling spelled out the benefits of camouflage. Leopard looked “like a sunflower against a tarred fence” when he entered the forest from the veld until the Ethiopian kindly painted the five-dotted rosettes which cover the leopard’s coat to this day.

A camera trap at a waterhole on Uli Trümper’s farm Safari captured a lappet-faced vulture together with a black-backed jackal on 29 January this year. The clearly visible plastic tag on the vulture revealed that the bird was ringed about nine years ago. Pictures taken by other camera traps also prove that the vulture was successfully rehabilitated and that it is in good condition. 

“Congratulations!! You scored 5 Eco flowers (92%)!!” Gondwana’s environmental officer, Quintin Hartung, who accompanied the Eco Awards Namibia inspectors to Kalahari Anib Lodge in late November 2017, rejoiced with the lodge management and staff at the fantastic score.