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When former President Nelson Mandela needed to get away from the hurly-burly of politics he used to head for the bush of Mpumalanga – and he always insisted that William Hlatshwayo went with him. In the early 1990s, at a bush lodge in the Crocodile River Valley, the world’s favourite statesman unwound with the woman he was wooing, Graca Machel, later to become his wife. The bush of Mpumalanga used to rejuvenate the already elderly Mandela and prepare him for the rigours of office the next Monday. At Bongani Mountain Lodge Mandela would dismiss his bodyguards and go for game drives and walks with his chosen guide, William Hlatshwayo. Now tourists from anywhere in the world can experience for themselves the magic of the bush that was so dear to Mandela in the company of his preferred ranger. William Hlatshwayo grew up near the exclusive Sabi Sand Game reserve, bordering on the Kruger National Park. After primary school his mother couldn’t afford to keep paying for his education and William went to work at a coal mine far away. After two years he returned home and got a job as a gardener at Sabi Sabi Game Lodge. He did that job well and soon became a waiter, a job that he did even better. Next he became a tracker. The problem was that William couldn’t speak English. Then he met Wayne Elliot, a white, university-trained guide who recognised the young William’s potential. “Wayne refused to speak anything to me except English,” says William. “If he bought himself a book or a newspaper he would buy two copies; one for him and one for me.” William spent almost a decade at Sabi Sabi, becoming head ranger, the first black South African to hold such a position. His career then took off; with the provincial parks authorities in Mpumalanga and KwaZulu-Natal, he was successively “poached” by prospective employers who recognised his potential. Among these were American investors who took William to Pennsylvania where he worked for three months at a bird conservancy. “Birds have always been my first love,” says William. “Now I take my clients on safari in the Kruger National Park, the greatest park in the world. We have 500 birds and 147 species of mammals). This place is more than 2 million hectares. It’s a wonderful place that I get to introduce to people from all over the world.” After a glittering career that was set to take him to the top of the game-ranging profession, William went into self-employment, opening Crowned Eagles Tour & Safaris in Hazyview, on the border of Kruger Park. The town is a hotbed of tour and travel agents. Its location is unique: on the doorstep of the great park and close to such scenic wonders as Sabie, the Bourke’s Luck Potholes, Blyde River Canyon and God’s Window. William, 50, chose the name of his business carefully. He was one day given an injured crown eagle which he nursed, over eight months, back to health. “I eventually released the bird but I loved it so much that, I reckoned, if I couldn’t name my son ‘Crowned Eagle’, at least I would call my business that.” William loves taking people on tour because, he explains, when I am on safari I enjoy every minute of it and my clients enjoy it even more”. Crowned Eagle Tours does tours to the park, and a lot more besides. It packages, two to seven days tours that take in the natural and social attractions of Mpumalanga, Swaziland and Mozambique. The business employs several hand-picked freelance tour guides and does transfer and tours, as many of which as possible William leads himself. “We do what everyone else does but we do it differently,” says William, “we give people an amazing experience. If people want a cultural tour we don’t take them to the set-up places, we just take them to the community and expose them to singing and dancing competitions, without the organisers knowing we’re coming.” TEP has been an invaluable partner in helping William’s business flourish. “As an entrepreneur I have enormous challenges but, I can honestly say, TEP have been almost as passionate as I am about my business. They’ve helped us get training and marketing. They’re doing everything in their power to improve our businesses. The [Mpumalanga] Cluster is quite new but it’s already working for us. I’m co-operating with several cluster members to grow my business – and theirs but at the same time improving our product to give tourists an experience that they will remember forever.”
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