The people behind Travelleia

I learned to love Southern Africa from the back seat of a car, nose pressed against the window somewhere between Durban and the Transkei coast. But the trip that really did it was a three week self drive through Zimbabwe as a child: Great Zimbabwe's ruins, the spray of Victoria Falls, elephants in Hwange, and evenings on a houseboat drifting across Kariba as the sun went down. I was hooked before I even knew it was a career.

Fresh out of my Travel and Tourism diploma, I cut my teeth at a small B2C operator in Cape Town, thrown in the deep end with Southern Africa itineraries from day one. I found my feet there, but a few Cape Town winters were enough to send me running back to my home town, Durban.

I walked into a small office in Morningside, met Craig Smith, and knew within minutes it was where I wanted to be. I joined as a junior Audley consultant in 2006, and spent the next eighteen years growing alongside the company and an exceptional boss: from senior consulting in the USA department, to leading the UK team, to landing in the role I loved most, Regional Product Manager.

Taking over from Sally Moon felt like a lot to live up to, but it turned into the best challenge of my career, and it shaped who I am as a travel professional today.

Somewhere among all of that, a fire started to build something of my own. A company run by people who love this part of the world as much as I do, who sweat the details, who know the difference between a good trip and one that stays with you for years. That's Travelleia.

And that's still what drives me every single day: not just planning holidays, but building the kind of journeys that stay with someone long after they've unpacked.

I have always had a deep love for animals and people, and from a young age I dreamed of becoming a game ranger. After my Travel and Tourism diploma at Varsity College, I began my career at Phinda Private Game Reserve, where that love for wildlife and hospitality truly came to life.

I started in Guest Relations, welcoming visitors from around the world, before becoming Camp Manager of one of Phinda's smaller, more intimate lodges. It taught me the value of real attention to detail and what it takes to make an experience meaningful rather than just well run. There is still nothing quite like watching a guest's face at their first safari sighting.

From there I moved into incentive travel, designing group programmes for international partners across destinations as varied as Russia, Croatia, Mauritius and Spain, work that stretched me and taught me how much power there is in getting every detail right.

The last eighteen years have been spent in tour operating and inbound DMCs, working across markets and giving me a rare view of both sides of this industry: what it takes to deliver on the ground, and what international travellers are actually looking for.

With over 27 years in hospitality and tourism, Southern Africa still gets me the way it did when I first started out in the bush. For me, travel has never simply been about the destination. It's the people, the stories, the wildlife, and the small moments a guest carries home and smiles about years later.

My love for travel began long before it became a career. I grew up exploring Southern Africa with my family: regular trips to Hluhluwe-iMfolozi, a self drive camping trip through Namibia, drifting across Lake Kariba on a houseboat, gliding through the Okavango Delta by mokoro, and discovering the beaches and culture of Mozambique.

It gave me what South Africans affectionately call the “bush bug”, and Africa's wild places have held a piece of my heart ever since.

In 2012 I completed a postgraduate qualification in Tourism Management at the University of Cape Town, interning with a local destination management company along the way, and realised this passion could actually be a career.

I returned home to Durban the following year and joined a local DMC, starting out as an Audley consultant before moving across to the USA team as a senior consultant. Thirteen years there taught me the ropes properly: how to build itineraries that hold together, and relationships that last.

Joining Travelleia felt like a natural next step, a boutique, owner-run, all-female team was exactly the kind of place I wanted to be. Today I work alongside two colleagues who are as much friends as they are teammates, and together we draw on years of industry knowledge and first hand travel across Southern Africa to shape journeys that actually fit the people taking them, whether that's a family safari, a milestone celebration, or a once-in-a-lifetime honeymoon.

For me, it was never about ticking off destinations. It's about the connections along the way, and helping someone find the parts of this continent I love most.