Mbabane – Swazi Trails, Swaziland’s leading tour operator, this month celebrated 21 years of operation. This past week saw the whole company take a break from their ‘seven days a week’ tourism business to treat themselves to a night away as tourists.
Due to its involvement in tourism community development, the 15 staff members treated themselves to the community-owned Ngwempisi Trails lodge.
According to the Managing Director, Darron Raw, Swazi Trails has been a vocal proponent of community tourism development; therefore it was no surprise that they celebrated their 21st anniversary at a community based tourism site.
Milestone
“We thought long and hard about how we would celebrate this important milestone and in line with our company philosophy we decided to find the best way of having some celebratory fun, whilst being cognizant of the circumstances that have crippled many local rural communities. Shopping at Mahlanya Market and filling beds at Ngwempisi left us feeling happy that our celebration’s budget had been well spent,” he said.
During the celebrations, Raw, who unfortunately had a flu, informed the staff that the best medicine he’d received was three emails from satisfied customers in Russia, Italy and South Africa, all of which arrived on the same day and complimented the company’s staff on ‘absolutely exceptional service’.
Giving a bit of an insight about Swazi Trails, a statement from the company states that they offer various guided tours to local cultural, wildlife and scenic attractions, manages regional itineraries that involve cross-border transport, operates adventure activities like rafting, caving, abseiling, quad, bicycle and hiking trails and wholesales accommodation availability to third party operators across the globe.
“The company also organises major regional events such as the Swazi Xtreme Adventure Race that has successfully focused international attention on the country’s natural environment and friendly local people,” partly reads the statement.
Fun
Operations Manager Banele Dlamini has promised more fun now that the company has reached such a milestone.
“There is nothing old in our thinking, we are in the business of making things happen, professionally, reliably, but always with that element of having fun,” he said.
Other key personalities that play a pivotal role in the daily operations of the business include Thandeka Mndvoti, Reservations Manageress and custodian of the company’s e-marketing platform www.swazi.travel and Administration Manager Maqhawe Fakudze.
Thanks Cassandra, we really did have a great time at the Ngwempisi Trails hiking lodge…its a fantastic venue that was sponsored by the European Union about 3 years back. It and the local community who benefit from it, just need a lot more visitors…so that they can maintain business momentum.
Good luck Darron! and happy anniversary…