Page 36 - Fourways Gardens July 2021

Travel

KruGer ShAlAtI:

the trAIn On the brIdGe

B y Ja M es c la R ke and Ma R y B R o adley

It rates as South Africa’s most unusual hotel – not that a stranger point – Selati Bridge or, 10 minutes’ drive

would recognise it as a hotel. away, Lake Panic’s famous bird hide.

t’s a specially designed train and it The government soon realised that tourists In the hazy distance to the west, one
stands, permanently, on the century-old were more entranced by the stop-over on the can watch spectacular sunsets over the
Selati Railway Bridge downstream from bridge than by the journey. People hankered kilometre-high Drakensberg Escarpment
ISkukuza, Kruger National Park’s main for a chance to stay down below in a camp while, to the east, one can see the crest of the
rest camp. Despite the precipitous fall-off among the giant riverine trees with the night- Lebombo Mountains on the Mozambique
in overseas visitors caused by the COVID time roar of lions and the cackle of hyenas. border stretching southwards to eSwatini
pandemic, ‘The Train on the Bridge’ is open This spurred the 1926 declaration of Kruger (formerly Swaziland) and Zululand.
to guests. National Park and the development of its first
rest camp – Skukuza. At the end of the Boer War, there was
The stone-pillared bridge spanning the uncontrolled hunting along the Sabie and
Sabie River provides an evocative link Having known the landmark bridge for the government called in a Scot, Lieutenant-
between the Kruger Park and its 19th most of my life, I was anxious to see the train colonel James Stevenson-Hamilton, to stop
century beginnings. The bridge was built and with photographer, Mary Broadley, we the killing which, incredibly, he did. A quarter-
in 1893 to accommodate a railway loop went to Skukuza’s revamped Selati railway century later, he became the first warden
from the main Delagoa Bay - Pretoria line station and were cheerfully greeted, though, when the region was proclaimed as a national
and was hastily planned to carry goods and because guests were occupying the train, we park. I met him on his 90th birthday and
labour up to the mountain ridge beyond could not enter the ‘carriages’ but were taken heard first-hand how he took control.
Gravelotte where a gold rush was causing up to the bridge. Each carriage is an en-suite
great excitement. But the rush quickly apartment with a glass wall allowing guests to He was called ‘Skukuza’ by the local people.
fizzled out and investors, including the either sit in armchairs or lie in bed observing One interpretation of his name is: ‘the man
British government, lost millions. the elephants bathing and watching the ever- who turned everything upside down’. Fair
present fish eagles patrolling the river. enough. But some historians believe the
The Selati railway became a line to nowhere. name given to him by the tribe living there
On the south side of the carriages, guests and who, for centuries, had freely hunted
In the 1920s, it was re-opened to offer can stroll along the bridge’s walkway or lean using bows and arrows, spears and, later, rifles,
tourists a nine-day railway tour of the against the railing watching for whatever was less complimentary. Their translation was
Lowveld which included a night on the might be moving about down below. ‘the man who wrecks everything’.
bridge looking down at the wildlife of the
Sabie and experiencing the night sounds For a birder, this alone was a thrill and I now Their descendants are, nowadays,
and spotting game as the sun rose. wonder which is the better birding vantage conservationists and form most of the

Fourways Gardens • 34 • July 2021