If you don’t keep your eyes peeled while driving along South Africa’s most iconic mountain pass, Chapman’s Peak, you might miss the unassuming entrance announcing your arrival at Tintswalo Atlantic. A small car park with almost theatrical ocean and mountain views is where Tintswalo’s shuttle service will transport you down a narrow road towards the rocky shoreline. On arrival, you step into another world, as elegant and charming as it is warm and welcoming. The location of the lodge is hard to take in. Built into the steep mountainside, the ocean is so close that the roar and salt spray of the waves becomes part of the lodge’s very fabric.
Once settled, there is little reason to leave. Ten ocean-facing suites offer all the exclusivity and comfort expected from luxury travel. Chef’s Warehouse offers a superb and extensive menu, there’s an exclusive-use private beach, a heated pool with ocean views, in-room spa service and even a boutique shop in case that sandal strap snaps.
The leased state-owned land where Tintswalo Atlantic was built in 2008 is one of five lodges owned and managed by the Goosen family. It is difficult to believe, given the extraordinary attention to detail and premium offerings, that running a collection of boutique lodges was never part of their plan. Far from it, the family business originally focused on shopping-centre development in rural areas in Africa.
CEO Lisa Goosen says, ‘My dad and mom built their business from scratch. My father was particularly good at leasehold developments (something people didn’t really understand back then), where you build on somebody else’s land. Over the years, they built up a portfolio of 13 shopping centres across the country.’
Goosen joined the family business straight after school but says there was no silver spoon involved. ‘My first job was reception and my second job was my mother’s PA. It was a baptism by fire! She is hardcore,’ Lisa laughs. ‘She was the backbone of everything. We worked in a small office where I sat across from her and she watched my every move. I had to go to every meeting with her. But that’s where I learnt about business, from job-shadowing my mother.’
After that, whenever a staff member left, Lisa was made to take over that position so that ‘nobody could ever hoodwink me’. The only job she says she never physically did was maintenance. ‘But I did rental collections, accounts, centre management, PR and marketing.’
She says it was tough being the owner’s daughter and being the youngest member of staff. ‘But the truth was that I loved it and I was good at it. I realised that my passion is business. I’ve always been excited by it and, slowly but surely, I took over the management of all our tenants.’
Fortuitously, it was their shopping mall in Bushbuck Ridge and an invitation to tender to develop a luxury safari lodge in the Manyeleti Game Reserve nearby that led them to where they are today. The business is owned by Lisa, her husband and her parents. She says, ‘None of us had a cooking clue about luxury lodges. Growing up, there were times when my family was broke and we’d often camp on a shoestring. We had no understanding about the tourism industry, nevermind the luxury tourism industry. We only understood shopping malls and property development. But we all thought it sounded like a fun idea.’
It was the complementary combination of skills among the four business owners that’s been crucial to their success. ‘My dad is a rainmaker. He can pull in deals, make them work. I laugh because they say you marry your father and that’s exactly what I did. My husband and father are both big personalities, very gregarious, great at bringing in new projects and sealing deals. My mom and I hold the reigns of the business, we know exactly what’s going on, moneywise, businesswise and operationally.’
They ultimately won the Manyeleti tender and were awarded the concession. Lisa recalls the early days of developing what was to become Tintswalo Safari, their first venture into luxury lodges.
‘We set about designing and building the lodge under the leadership of architect and designer Neil Hayes-Hill. It took nine months to build and we had to live in tents on site.’ At the time Lisa and her husband, Warwick, had two young children and she remembers being in the wild with the Big Five as their neighbours.
‘My one-year-old son had just learnt to walk and one day he fell while running and bit his tongue. At the time, he used to fall asleep with a bottle and that night inside our dome tent, he started crying because he couldn’t suck his bottle.’ This seemed to interest a nearby pride of lions. Lisa recalls sitting up in their flimsy tent for hours trying to soothe her inconsolable son while hearing the lions getting closer and closer. While her son eventually settled down and the lions lost interest, it shows the dedication involved in getting the lodge built in such a wild location.
And like Tintswalo Atlantic, Tintswalo Safari, which borders the unfenced Kruger National Park, doesn’t disappoint. Without leaving the lodge itself, you’re guaranteed to see elephant who regularly come into camp to drink, a herd of buffalo and, as Lisa’s family discovered, lions that are never very far away.
The family cut their teeth on Tintswalo Safari, and had to learn the ins and outs of the luxury tourism industry, which, given their shared skill set, they succeeded in doing. They also discovered the tourism industry was a lot more enjoyable and more aesthetically pleasing that shopping malls, and so they were hooked.
After Tintswalo Safari, they built Tintswalo Atlantic and have since added Tintswalo Waterberg in the private Welgevonden Game Reserve in Limpopo as well as Tintswalo Boulders in Simon’s Town.
Welgevonden on the highveld is particularly pretty with its rolling hills. Tintswalo Waterberg is an intimate private lodge nestled on a hilltop with spectacular vistas across treetops and bushveld, great for animal viewing. This is also Tintswalo’s most family-friendly safari lodge with its electric fences keeping animals from getting too close as well as an entertainment room for younger children.
Back in Cape Town, Tintswalo Boulders in Simon’s Town looks right over Boulders Beach and its famous penguin colony. A private gate from this boutique villa leads straight onto the boardwalk so guests need not wrestle the crowds visiting one of Cape Town’s most popular attractions.
And the family’s most recent acquisition? Something a little different, which Lisa refers to as ‘definitely more rustic than our other boutique lodges’. Situated on the banks of the Zambezi River near Livingstone in Zambia, Tintswalo Siankaba offers an enchanting experience in the form of a tented treehouse island camp. Here you can experience Mokoro (dugout canoe) trips around the islands as well as sunset river cruises by motorboat. There are also village walks, or guests can enjoy a sandy beach island picnic in the middle of the Zambezi.
Ultimately, whatever you’re after, Tintswalo has excelled in providing it for you. Lisa says, ‘We want our guests to leave feeling like they’ve rekindled something they’ve lost. That’s what we try and create for all our guest experiences at each of our lodges, and I think we nail it.’
We do too.
