ORLANDO Haraseb, who works as a guide for Ultimate Safaris in Namibia, won a silver award at the Wanderlust Travel World Guide Awards on Tuesday at an event held at the Royal Geographic Society last night in London.
“This is quite a feather in the cap for us and for Namibia; showing the quality world-class service to our tourist guests,” an ecstatic Birgit Bekker of Ultimate Safaris told The Namibian. According to her, there were thousands of entries and just for Haraseb to be nominated as a finalist was something to be proud of.
“He was competing against world class guides from all over the world, and when we hear that he got second place, we were just over the moon,” she said.
Haraseb, a former Brave Warriors captain, could not be reached at his London hotel yesterday but he is expected back in Windhoek tomorrow.
Guests nominated their favourite guides for the awards, which were in the end shortlisted to just eight, and then down to three finalists.
The judges included Bill Bryson (travel writer), Mark Carwardine (author, photographer and TV wildlife expert), Peter Antoniou (SwarovskiOptik, supplier of quality binoculars to all of Ultimate Safaris guides), Paul Goodyer (co-founder, Nomad Travel Stores), Derek Moore (travel industry supremo) and Lyn Hughes(editor-in-chief, Wanderlust).
“We are tremendously proud (and not at all surprised) that this former captain of the national football team, avid birder, and all round nice guy has been recognised by industry professionals and guests as one of the best guides in the world. An honourable accolade to the calibre of Namibian guides, their passion, knowledge and experience and Orlando continues to be an inspirational mentor, role model and exceptional Namibian citizen,” a statement from Ultimate Safaris read.
“His knowledge is boundless,” says traveller Peter Harris. “Wildlife, geography,geology, botany, history, cosmology, politics: there was simply no question to which he could not provide an answer.”
“He sounds like an absolutely incredible guy. It is clear he is passionate about sharing his vast wealth of knowledge with people, and does so in an inspiring way,” said Bill Bryson.
