Deep in a Big Five reserve, an extraordinary temporary safari retreat welcomed more than 800 guests for the All Blacks’ South African tour. The remarkable part? When the experience ended, the wilderness was left as it was found
There is something undeniably magical about waking up in the African bushveld. The distant call of wildlife, the early morning light filtering through the trees and the feeling of being completely removed from the everyday. Now imagine that experience transformed into an exclusive luxury safari village, created for hundreds of guests in the heart of a Big Five reserve.
That is precisely what Chiefs Tented Camps achieved at Mongena Private Game Reserve in South Africa.
What began as an untouched stretch of wilderness became one of the most ambitious temporary luxury camps ever constructed in a Big Five reserve. Designed to accommodate more than 800 guests during the All Blacks’ recent South African tour, the extraordinary development combined the romance of safari living with the logistical sophistication of a luxury hospitality operation.
And when the final guests departed, the entire camp disappeared.
A Luxury Safari Experience Unlike Any Other
Unlike traditional safari lodges, where permanent suites and established infrastructure define the experience, this remarkable retreat was created entirely from scratch.
There were no existing roads, electricity connections or water supplies on the site. Yet, within this remote setting, Chiefs Tented Camps created a fully functioning luxury destination featuring 485 tents, including 320 en-suite Cottage Suites.
The project was conceptualised and executed alongside Old School Group, with support from the professional team at Mongena Private Game Reserve.
For guests, the appeal lay in the opportunity to experience the African wilderness without sacrificing comfort. The temporary camp offered an entirely different approach to luxury travel, where the destination itself became the inspiration for the accommodation.
Behind the scenes, however, the undertaking was anything but simple.
Almost 900,000 litres of water were transported to the reserve, while 2.7 kilometres of electrical cable and 1.5 kilometres of water piping were installed. The camp required 160kVA of power, 2.2 kilometres of electric fencing and more than 3,200 square metres of communal canvas.
Over the course of the project, teams contributed approximately 27,000 person-hours of labour and served an astonishing 11,230 meals.
It was, quite literally, a small temporary village in the middle of the bush.
When the Destination Becomes the Luxury
For travellers seeking something beyond conventional five-star accommodation, the idea of a luxury camp appearing in an extraordinary location opens up an entirely new world of possibilities.
Rather than selecting an existing hotel or lodge, the experience can be designed around a destination that might otherwise be inaccessible to large groups.
According to Lysta Stander, Executive Director and Co-Founder of Chiefs Tented Camps, this flexibility is central to the company’s approach.
“It means the conversation can start with the experience rather than the venue,” she explains. “Instead of asking ‘where can we find enough rooms?’, the starting point can be ‘where would we love to take these people?’ From there, the camp is shaped around the location, the group and what they want to achieve.”
It is an interesting shift in the world of luxury travel and experiential hospitality. The location no longer needs to have an established resort to become a destination. Instead, the accommodation is brought to the landscape.
For exclusive celebrations, corporate retreats and large-scale incentive travel, the possibilities are considerable.
From the Bushveld to the Atlantic Coast
While the Mongena safari camp was being constructed, Chiefs Tented Camps was simultaneously operating a very different escape almost 1,500 kilometres away.
On South Africa’s West Coast, its Namaqua Flower Beach Camp was celebrating its 15th anniversary.
Open for just one month each year, this intimate seasonal retreat accommodates no more than 30 guests. Set against the dramatic Atlantic coastline, it offers a contrasting experience to the scale of Mongena.
Where one project welcomed hundreds of guests into Big Five territory, the other focused on the slower pleasures of coastal living and the seasonal beauty of Namaqualand.
Yet both were guided by the same hospitality philosophy.
“The scale may have been worlds apart, but the approach wasn’t,” says Allan Johnston, Executive Director and Co-Founder. “Every guest deserves the same attention to detail, warm hospitality and a team that cares about their experience.”
It is this versatility that makes temporary luxury camps particularly appealing. Whether the setting is a secluded beach, a remote wilderness or a spectacular natural landscape, the experience can be tailored to its surroundings.
Luxury Travel With a Lighter Footprint
Perhaps the most compelling aspect of the Mongena project is not what was built, but what remained afterwards.
Nothing.
In an era when responsible tourism and environmental preservation are increasingly important to luxury travellers, Chiefs Tented Camps operates according to a leave-no-trace philosophy.
Everything transported onto the site is designed to be removed again.
Once the All Blacks’ tour concluded, the tents were dismantled, the temporary infrastructure was taken away and the landscape was returned to its original condition, according to the company.
“The breakdown is part of the thinking from the very beginning,” explains Stander. “You arrive at an open piece of land, and gradually an entire little world takes shape. Then it all comes down, and the site returns to what it was before.”
This approach presents an alternative to permanent hospitality development in sensitive natural environments. While a project of this scale still requires substantial resources, including transported water, electricity and logistics, its temporary nature avoids the need for permanent accommodation structures on the site.
For Stander, the most meaningful part of the project is the landscape itself.
“What was here before you arrived?” she asks. “Because that’s really the story. The finished photographs show this enormous luxury camp. What they don’t show is the open landscape before the first truck arrived, or that same landscape again after the last truck left.”
Thirty Years of Creating Extraordinary Escapes
The achievement arrives during a milestone year for Chiefs Tented Camps, which celebrates three decades of operations in South Africa in 2026.
Founded in the same year that the All Blacks competed against the Springboks in the inaugural Tri-Nations series, the company has spent 30 years refining the art of temporary hospitality.
For Stander, experience has been the most valuable ingredient.
“Nearly 30 years of doing this creates a kind of muscle memory,” she says. “There is no substitute for having had boots on the ground, learning to read a site, adapting when plans change and solving problems as they happen, because they will happen.”
That experience has allowed Chiefs to operate across vastly different landscapes and scales, from intimate coastal escapes to extraordinary safari developments.
The Future of Luxury Safari Travel
There is a growing appeal in travel experiences that feel personal, immersive and impossible to replicate.
The Mongena project offers an intriguing glimpse into what that future could look like.
Imagine a private celebration beneath the African stars, a luxury tented retreat overlooking an isolated coastline or a bespoke safari experience created in a location where no permanent lodge exists.
For Chiefs Tented Camps, the ambition is not simply to build bigger camps, but to rethink where exceptional hospitality can happen.
“Our capacity is directly linked to our mobility,” says Stander. “We’re not tied to a fixed number of rooms, a permanent venue or even a particular style of camp. The camp can be designed around the destination and the brief.”
And perhaps that is the greatest luxury of all: the freedom to experience extraordinary places without requiring them to change forever.
At Mongena, hundreds of guests enjoyed a once-off safari experience in the African wilderness. Today, the tents are gone, the temporary village has vanished and the bushveld has been returned to nature.
The memories, however, remain.
For more information, visit Chiefs Tented Camps or contact info@experiences.co.za.
