The Lalapanzi Hotel, right off the N1, is not your typical roadside accommodation. Built in 1947, this charming Tudor-style lodge transports its visitors straight from the highway and then back in time.
The thatched, whitewashed hotel feels like an old country manor house. The walls in the cavernous lobby are decorated with old black-and-white photographs and trophies of South African buck — one of a few giveaways, along with all of the Afrikaans being spoken, that Lalapanzi is indeed in Africa. The bar, with its polished, dark wood beams and neat rows of liquor bottles, could easily be an 18th-century English pub. There couldn’t be a better spot in Limpopo than this bar to sit and enjoy a cold pint on a hot afternoon.
Lalapanzi has a huge dining room that hosts a lazy brunch buffet on Sundays, and a smaller lounge with a cozy fireplace. The hotel also has more than 30 well-appointed rooms (most with self-catering facilities) of various shapes and sizes — arranged roughly in a circle around an English-style garden, populated by snow-white doves — that are perfect for a weekend getaway in the bush.
The hotel offers a long list of leisure options for guests: swimming in the onsite pool; cycling/mountain-biking on the road or in the surrounding bush; walking and hiking (up to four hours) on well-marked paths around the hotel; birdwatching; game drives; and a huge array of historical and cultural tours to various sites and monuments around the Louis Trichardt/Elim/Tzaneen areas.
Anglo-Boer War Museum
Lalapanzi’s biggest surprise, in a room just off the lobby, is its Anglo-Boer War Museum. The museum is dedicated primarily to the history of the Zoutpansberg Skirmishes Route and the Bushveldt Carbineers, and was curated by local author and historian Charles Leach.
The museum contains a treasure trove of artefacts from notable Anglo-Boer war events in northern Limpopo and beyond, including Anglo-Boer-War-era rifles and swords, documents, books and newspapers, and paintings and photos depicting prominent battles and skirmishes. A bust of Commandant Christiaan Frederik Beyers, a Boer general in the war, stands in the centre of the museum.
Those with a keen interest in the Anglo-Boer War and the Zoutpansberg Skirmishes Route can book a historical tour of the area with Charles Leach, beginning and ending at Lalapanzi. Contact the hotel for more information.
Don’t leave Lalapanzi without a jar of homemade preserves, topped with quaint lace doilies and hand-written labels, for sale at the hotel check-in counter. The preserves are made by “Ouma Flippie”, mother of Lalapanzi owner Inga Gilfillan, and are undoubtedly delicious.
The Lalapanzi Hotel is 28 kilometres south of Louis Trichardt and 80 kilometres north of Polokwane, near the village of Bandelierkop, on the N1 Highway. GPS coordinates: -23.276904, 29.828585. For more information call 015-516-5455 or 072-509-3939 or email xanthe@lalapanzihotel.co.za. Room rates range from R700 to R1360 per night.
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