A land restoration project that became a safari company — not the other way around.
What SafariSeven® knows about &Beyond begins with the Phinda story — because the Phinda story is the key to everything &Beyond has done since. Most travellers who have stayed in &Beyond lodges across Africa, Asia, and South America have never heard it. In 1991, &Beyond's founding act was not a hospitality investment. It was a land restoration project: roughly 42,000 acres of depleted KwaZulu-Natal farmland returned to wilderness, at significant cost, on the conviction that exceptional conservation and exceptional hospitality are the same investment. Understanding that founding act changes what a guest understands about the concessions they visit, the game viewing quality they experience, and what their stay funds.
In 1991, &Beyond purchased roughly 42,000 acres of degraded agricultural land in KwaZulu-Natal, removed 30 kilometres of fencing, relocated black and white rhino from other South African provinces, and created Phinda Private Game Reserve — naming it for the Zulu word meaning 'the return', because that is what was happening to the wildlife and to the land. That act established the conservation-through-hospitality model &Beyond has since scaled to more than 1 million acres.
This was not a conservation subsidy. It was a conservation argument: that luxury hospitality on restored land could generate the revenue to make land restoration economically viable. Phinda proved the argument. It is now one of KwaZulu-Natal's finest game destinations, with exceptional Big Five, nyala, and cheetah in a landscape that was an agricultural failure thirty years ago. The name 'Phinda' — 'the return' in Zulu — described precisely what was happening, and the name has aged well. The wildlife returned. The model worked. &Beyond built the rest of its portfolio on what Phinda proved.
The Care of the Land, Care of the Wildlife, Care of the People framework is sometimes presented as a values statement. It is better understood as a description of three active programmes with measurable outcomes.
Care of the Land means managing private concessions where game viewing quality is a direct consequence of sustained land investment — not a lottery of public park adjacency. &Beyond manages private concessions where the absence of vehicle congestion, the confidence of wildlife in its environment, and the density of game are the returns on decades of habitat management. Care of the Wildlife includes significant rhino conservation and translocation work across multiple geographies, contributing to populations whose long-term viability depends on precisely this kind of sustained intervention. Care of the People describes community programmes around each &Beyond property that go beyond employment to include skills development, land stewardship, and community ownership of conservation outcomes.
"Each commitment is auditable against specific outcomes. That is the standard SafariSeven® holds the framework to."
&Beyond now manages more than 1 million acres of wildlife land across Africa, Asia, and South America — operating private concessions where game viewing quality is a direct function of sustained land investment over three decades, not of proximity to a public park boundary.
On a Serengeti concession or in the Okavango Delta, what a guest encounters is the return on decades of stewardship. The game densities, the absence of vehicle congestion, the confidence of wildlife in its environment — these are conservation outcomes that a guest experiences as a quality of experience. The causal chain between investment and encounter is not abstract at &Beyond. It is visible in the landscape.
&Beyond's Africa portfolio spans South Africa (Phinda Private Game Reserve, Sabi Sand), Tanzania (Serengeti concession, Ngorongoro, Manyara), Botswana (Okavango Delta, Linyanti), Kenya (Masai Mara ecosystem), Zambia, Namibia, and the Indian Ocean islands. The Serengeti and Okavango properties represent the portfolio at its most ecologically significant, while Phinda remains the spiritual home of the &Beyond model.
Phinda Private Game Reserve and Sabi Sand — the spiritual home of the &Beyond model.
Explore →Serengeti concession, Ngorongoro, and Manyara — the portfolio at its most ecologically significant.
Explore →The Masai Mara ecosystem — private concessions on the Mara's northern edge.
Explore →Okavango Delta and Linyanti — water-based and game-drive safari at scale.
Explore →&Beyond's founding story is a conservation story, not a hospitality one. In 1991, a consortium purchased roughly 42,000 acres of degraded farmland in KwaZulu-Natal, removed 30 kilometres of fencing, and relocated black and white rhino to create Phinda Private Game Reserve. The name — from the Zulu word meaning 'the return' — described precisely what was happening to the land. That restoration act proved the model &Beyond has since scaled to over 1 million acres across three continents: exceptional conservation and exceptional hospitality are the same investment, funded by each other.
The three commitments are not a tagline — they describe active programmes with measurable outcomes. Care of the Land means managing private concessions where game viewing quality results from decades of land investment. Care of the Wildlife includes rhino conservation and translocation work across multiple geographies. Care of the People describes community programmes — skills development, land stewardship, community ownership of conservation outcomes — around each property. On any &Beyond concession, all three frameworks operate simultaneously, and their combined effect is visible in the landscape and the wildlife a guest moves through.
Phinda Private Game Reserve is &Beyond's founding property in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa — roughly 42,000 acres of restored farmland that, since 1991, has become one of the most productive wildlife areas in the province. Black and white rhino, big cats, elephant, nyala, and cheetah are all present in a landscape whose recovery was deliberate and documented. The reserve offers six &Beyond lodges across different habitats within the property, from forest and wetland to open grassland. It is the origin point of the conservation-through-hospitality model that now spans three continents.
&Beyond operates across East and Southern Africa: Tanzania (Serengeti, Ngorongoro, Lake Manyara), Kenya (Masai Mara ecosystem), South Africa (Phinda, Sabi Sand), Botswana (Okavango Delta, Linyanti), Zambia, Zimbabwe, and Namibia. For a first safari, the right destination depends on timing and priorities. Tanzania's Serengeti offers year-round Big Five with migration access in season. Phinda combines Big Five with outstanding endemic species. The Okavango Delta is ecologically unlike anywhere else. A SafariSeven® Travel Designer will match destination to traveller based on the season, the experience sought, and the available time.
Speak with a SafariSeven® Travel Designer to shape a private safari around &Beyond, matched to your season, your pace, and the experience you are seeking.
