I was living in South Africa for 28 years and in that time along with my wife we created two successful lodges. The first being the Hippo Hide lodge and backpackers which slept 27 people, this was our first venture in 1997. We successfully gained superb write ups in various travel guides including ‘The Lonely Planet guide’. Due to this exposure we became the ‘go to’ lodge in Durban, eventually becoming too busy and we were forced to expand and find bigger premises.In 2005 we sourced and found a building close to Durban’s beachfront, this was the start of a very sharp learning curve, where I became the project manager for the renovations. On completion of the building work, then came the preparation of a business that slept 67 people and had a compliment of 17 staff. The Happy Hippo Accommodation was created and opened in March 2007.This proved to be a very successful and prominent business on Durban’s landscape and within the tourism industry. We won 5 provincial and 1 South African national tourism awards for our category and was highly rated on the various online portals that we employed to host our business.Due to covid-19 the tourism industry was decimated in South Africa and we were to close down.I have a wealth of experience in management and business creation, solving problems and implementing the solutions is something I enjoy and relish. Hospitality and customer satisfaction was key to the growth of my company and the return business that we enjoyed with our companies was the inspiration to keep on improving our customer experience.