The Discovery Wilderness Trust

Welcome to our Trust’s website, showing what we are about and what we do.

The Trust is a Public Benefit Organization (PBO No. 930068139), registered with the Master’s Office of the Western Cape High Court, South Africa. It was established in 2019, off the back of seven years of mainly trail activities in the Greater Kruger National Park, conducted under the banner of Discovery Trails. 

Our key objects are to –

• promote participation by select groups in trails in natural areas, especially wilderness zones, of Southern Africa,
• preserve and foster tracking skills, and
• support environmental education and conservation generally.

The Trust is a small one, with modest means funded mainly by donations from its trustees, friends, trail participants and the Jan Glazewski Foundation. Its activities are highly targeted, with a focus on –

• wilderness walks in the Makuleke (Pafuri) area of the Kruger Park for selected school youngsters (mainly of primary school age), parents and children, and other special interest groups;
• activities that enhance the skills and general welfare of the San (Bushman) tracker communities of the Kalahari;
• ichnology – the discovery and interpretation of fossilised trackways in Southern Africa, bringing in tracker skills to help;
• other niche wilderness ventures, ranging from field geology through to astronomy under African skies. 

The founder trustee is Clive Thompson, a FGASA trails guide whose trails experience began with the Wilderness Leadership School. The other board trustees are Simon Sephton, Pamela-Jane Schwikkard and Jan Glazewski.