A Walk Down Safari Lodge Memory Lane...

Today marks Zululand Safari Lodge’s 43th birthday! It opened its doors for business on 15 October 1970 for the first time, changing the future of Ubizane Reserve forever. In co-operation with Cape Hotels Group, Safari Lodge was established and realized Norman Deane’s dream for the beautiful reserve to become a tourist destination.

Back in those days, Safari Lodge had a very different look and feel to it.  As the only lodge on the reserve, it had a dining room, cocktail bar and 42 double rooms.  Safari Lodge also had two boma’s – one for dining and one for Zulu dancing.  Today we still have the one boma which we use as a dining venue. The dining room and bar has been moved to Tree Lodge as the main restaurant. 

Ownership has shifted tremendously throughout the years moving from private ownership to leisure companies such as Sun International and the Three Cities Group, and then back to private ownership again.  With each owner bringing their unique atmosphere to Ubizane, Safari Lodge soon became a popular tourist destination. 

 The Three Cities Group owned Ubizane until 2009 with the group consisting of the main investors from three different cities; Mark Taylor, Mike Harrison, Robert Maingard and Alan Burke.

In 2009, one of the Three Cities investors, Mr. Alan Burke, saw the potential of Ubizane Wildlife Reserve. Ubizane was in desperate need at that stage for renovation and a make-over.  Mr. Burke bought out all the shares for Ubizane Wildlife Reserve in December 2009 and renovations began in 2010. 

Now, three years later, Safari Lodge (and the whole of Ubizane) is still under Mr. Burke’s ownership and has been showing remarkable progress as rooms have been beautifully refurbished and a team works hard every day to keep the original dream of Norman Deane alive. 

If you have any photographs of Safari Lodge throughout the years, send them to social@ubizane.co.za and we’ll post it into our “memory lane” album on Facebook.