In July 2023 we stayed at Pafuri Tented Camp. This has become one of our special places in South Africa. The camp is located on the banks of the Luvuvhu river in the Makuleki Concession. The 24 000-ha private concession is located between the Luvuvhu River to the south and the Limpopo to the north.

“You have to leave the city of your comfort and go into the wilderness of your intuition. What you’ll discover will be wonderful. What you’ll discover is yourself.” ~ Alan Alda

The next image (taken with a iphone) shows the scenery looking south down onto the Luvuvhu river as it flows through Lanner gorge on its way to the Limpopo river. The vista is spectacular and for me represents quintessential Africa. It is one of the most diverse and scenically attractive areas in the Kruger National Park. The walls of Lanner Gorge in the Makuleke are made of ancient sandstones and the Luvuvhu River has over the millenia carved a deep canyon into these rocks.

The concession area is primarily a sandveld environment, distinguished by its Baobabs, Fever tree forests, large alluvial flood plains and probably more animal and plant species diversity than anywhere else in Kruger. This is one of the few places where Fever tree forests grow side by side with forests of giant Baobabs. In the flood plain and lower lying parts, the vegetation is verdant, but the higher lying areas are quite arid similar to that found in Mashatu further up the Limpopo river.

The Pafuri area is a favourite winter grazing ground for elephant from Mozambique, Zimbabwe and the more southerly sections of Kruger. There is plenty to eat with abundant acacia and mopani vegetation and perennial water flowing in the Luvuvhu river. This river, and some of its tributaries (including the Mutshindudi and Mutale rivers), rises in the Soutpansberg Mountains. It then flows for about 200 km through a diverse range of landscapes before it joins the Limpopo River at the bottom end of Pafuri in the Kruger National Park.

“Like music and art, love of nature is a common language that can transcend political or social boundaries.”
~ Jimmy Carter

Two young bulls were sparring with each other in front of our tented room. The one on the right had a shortened trunk possibly cut off by a snare or perhaps even a crocodile when he was young. Thankfully, the young bull’s trunk was not shortened too much and the end had healed with the openings intact. He looked to be perfectly healthy despite his feeding handicap.

Most mammals cannot sweat. Each species has developed effective and unique mechanisms to cool themselves. Elephants have wrinkled skin. The wrinkles act as a cooling mechanism by increasing the skin’s surface area. The additional skin and wrinkles trap moisture, which then takes longer to evaporate.

The quickest way for elephants to cool down is to bathe in the river. Elephants need water every day and they love playing in it. The Luvuvhu river is full of large Nile crocodiles but the adult elephants do not seem too concerned about them. There are rare occasions when a large crocodile has locked onto the trunk of an adult elephant but if that happens the crocodile is in for the thrashing of its life. The adults are very protective of their calves which on their own would be vulnerable to crocodile attacks.

Elephants’ large bodies need a lot of water and can’t afford to lose any via sweating. They use vasodilation to dissipate heat through their skin. Elephant ears provide wide platforms of relatively thin skin filled with blood vessels. When elephants get too hot, they flood their ears with blood to dissipate body heat. They also can fan their ears to increase airflow over their skin to lose heat faster.

Once the Luvuvhu river emerges from Lanner gorge the terrain starts to flatten out but is still rugged. The river twists and turns through the sandstone hills creating wonderful African bush scenes. You can’t but wonder what is just around that bend in the river.

In the winter months, elephant herds and larger bulls progressively push up into the Pafuri region to utilise the Mopani thickets as a source of nutrients as the palatability of other grazing opportunities decreases with less rain.

In winter, when the Limpopo is dry, wildlife, and elephants in particular, can easily move from one country to another. This migratory movement adds to the size of elephant herds in winter in the concession. Winter is also a good time to visit this area as it can get extremely hot in mid-summer before the rains.

“We cannot navigate and place ourselves only with maps that make the landscape dream-proof, impervious to the imagination. Such maps – and the road-map is first among them – encourage the elimination of wonder from our relationship with the world. And once wonder has been chased from our thinking about the land, then we are lost.”
~ Robert Macfarlane

Plenty of the elephant activity can be seen from the comfort of the Pafuri Tented Camp which is positioned on the northern bank of the Luvuvhu river. The river bank is sheltered on both sides by enormous Jackalberry, Nyalaberry and African Mahoganies which provide a wonderful backdrop for the elephants feeding playing and bathing in the river.

Explore, seek to understand, marvel at its interconnectedness and let it be.

Have fun, Mike