About | Nako Private Game Reserve

NAKO SAFARI LODGE

Purchased in 2020 to redevelop for private use. With roots in the hospitality industry, it was natural to create a sustainable model which allowed for personal use and an element of commercial trading.

The owners envisaged a lodge where family could gather, spend quality time together and raise their children surrounded by nature, when not in school, and therein to have the ability to continue the daily business requirements; whether it be a in a private office environment or a boardroom, for strategic executive meetings, coming in from Johannesburg, Pretoria or elsewhere in the world; virtually or in person.

Prior to being renamed ‘NAKO Safari Lodge’, the lodge was called ‘Pumba Game Camp’ and was owned by Pretoria businessman, Charl Van Deventer. Charl, being one of the founders of the Dinokeng Biosphere, owned the lodge for a period of 22 years. Pumba was the Northern-most camp in the Dinokeng area; an unfenced hunting camp with simple chalets looking into a central Boma. The redevelopment enabled all of these chalets to be opened into larger suites, turning the views from the Boma towards the bush, where the spectacular Big 5 game can be readily spotted.

The vision is to make a worthwhile difference in luxury eco-tourism, with an emphasis on conservation and preservation of our natural habitat and communities. Part of NAKO bookings are re-invested into local projects, inviting our guests to make a worthwhile difference, by simply having a superb holiday. Thus, an economic vehicle is created for the greater purpose of making a real difference. We are passionately committed to responsible tourism practices and strive to combine tourism, environmental management and local economic development. We encourage you to join our team on one of the conservation efforts like working with Rhino, Elephants or one of the Big Cats in the reserve.

NAKO is an intimate luxury safari lodge run by a close-knit, experienced team, with a dynamic workplace culture based on participation and democratic decision-making. Through an uncompromising dedication to service excellence, NAKO offers nothing short of luxuriously sophisticated accommodation, sincere hospitality and spectacular wildlife encounters!

History

Heralded as the boutique reserve in South Africa, Dinokeng Game Reserve is a landmark in modern conservation and community development, with a joint venture between the state, the community and the private sector. Now the setting for Africa’s biggest translocation of wild game, our guests witness an abundance of new life in a once economically-depressed region.

Dinokeng Game reserve is testimony to a truly enlightened conservation plan which has created this exceptional wildlife reserve for the preservation of a unique wilderness area in one of the more remote regions of South Africa. The reintroduction of game began early in 1991, known as ‘Operation Phoenix’; the largest game translocation exercise in the world! More than 8,000 animals of 28 species were released into the reserve, including elephant, rhino, buffalo, lion, cheetah, African wild dog, spotted hyena, giraffe, zebra and many species of antelope and herbivores. Leopard graciously inhabited the reserve naturally and approximately 250 species of birds have been recorded in Dinokeng.

This is a near-perfect ecological environment; where every plant, animal and insect forms an essential part of an intricate web of survival. Here, life and death are complementary for the continued existence of the natural ecosystem, and man is reminded that his very existence through the ages has been rooted in such a complex, yet simple design.

To enter Dinokeng is to stand at the very threshold of wild Africa!

About us

Located in the Pride of Africa Nature Reserve, Dinokeng, NAKO Safari Lodge offers guests a 5 Star, Big 5 Safari getaway just 1 hour from Johannesburg and OR Tambo International Airport and 30 minutes from Pretoria.

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