This beautiful Cape Dutch style building, now Hamilton Parks, has long been a renowned hostelry in the Lowveld. Previously a dairy and banana farm, the non-indigenous species have now been removed and the farm has been returned to natural bush. Extending to 250 ha there is already an abundance of game and you are likely to see blue vervet monkeys, grey duiker, red duiker (a very rare species), bush pig, porcupines and bushbuck. There is a leopard on the farm but they remain shy and you are unlikely to see them, although you may well see the spoor. The name Hamilton Parks comes from any one of a choice of four origins. There were two British generals named Hamilton, active in South Africa during the second Anglo Boer War from 1899 to 1902. Sir Ian Hamilton was chief of staff to Sir George White who (somewhat idiotically) managed to find himself besieged in Ladysmith in 1899. Sir Ian also had the dubious distinction of having written to his wife suggesting that it would be an idea to take on Winston Churchill, then a journalist covering the war, as his ADC. The other Hamilton of this period was Bruce, who does not seem to have covered himself in distinctions. Following the end of the war in 1902, a third Hamilton, Sir John, sprang to fame as Governor of the Transvaal. However, it seems most likely that the reason that the name Hamilton Parks was chosen, was to honour James Stevenson-Hamilton who was the first senior ranger of the Kruger National Park. His nickname was Skukuza, which translates from the Shangaan/Tsonga as “he who sweeps clean”. He obviously gave his nickname to the largest camp in the Kruger National Park and, ironically, given the meaning of it, his Shangaan assistant was known as Doispane, which is a corruption of his true name, Dustbin. The road from Phabeni Gate to Skukuza is still known as the Doispane Road.