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“The Maletsunyane
was stocked with trout in the late 1950’s
mainly through the efforts of the then manager
of the Frasers’ store, Jan du Preez, a pilot,
Dick Southworth, and a police officer, Ken Short
Smith. The site on which the lodge now stands
was a favourite camping site from then on for
people either trekking on horseback or flying
in on Basotho Air which was a fledging airline
doing a fantastic job in opening up the then Basutoland.
The campsite was ideal for trout-fishing visitors
to the falls due to its close proximity to the
landing strip (and that’s literally what
it was), store and a good supply of drinking water.
The spring on the hill behind the camp always
had lovely clear, sweet water winter and summer.
It was also ideal in that it was flat and well
grassed and situated midway on the fishable part
of the river. The fishing in the early days was
fantastic, as Yellow Fish could not get up the
falls so the water was completely virgin.
I first visited the falls with a
party of school friends in 1955 and we camped
there. Although we were complete novices we managed
to bag at least 8 fish of between 2 and 4 lbs.
It was also on this trip that the idea of Maluti
treks was born.
A friend and I were sitting on the
bank of the river one evening at sunset and Tim
said to me. “You know, Chappie, people would
pay to do this”. In 1962, fed up with university,
I decided to start a pony trekking and trout fishing
safari business; we called it Maluti treks. We
established a base camp on the bank of the Senqunyane
and built 3 rondavels with the help of the Maseru
District Council. This is now the site of the
Senqunyane Lodge at Marakebei. From this base
camp we rode to the falls, taking two days and
all our equipment on mules, at least two pack
mules per guest and then some. The night camp
was set on the banks of the headwaters of the
Maletsunyane, a beautiful spot leaving an easy
and pleasant ride downriver to Semonkong. We camped
at the old campsite on the river, which is now
the site of Semonkong Lodge. After about a year
of operating we decided to build some sort of
permanent structure at Maletsunyane to make life
easier for all concerned. Again with the help
of the MDC we were given permission to erect a
wooden hut on the site. This was the real beginning
of Semonkong Lodge. The hut was about 10m long
and divided into one small room and a larger ‘mess
hall’. The hut was prefabricated in Maseru
and driven to Ramabanta. From there we hired Basuto
women, two to a section, who carried it to Semonkong
on their heads.
Charges for a Maluti Trek
were R10 per day all-inclusive - which even included
booze. My idea at the time was to establish camps
a days ride apart, all over the Maluti’s.
My ideas changed, however, when I visited Oxbow
and decided to concentrate all my resources in
that area. We kept the two southern camps for
a few years, as, with great difficulty, we had
managed to get the liquor licensing laws changed
to allow our lodges to sell booze, but eventually
I sold our interests to Frasers who had stores
at both places”.
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