History of Stanford Farm
The headlines of two 1941 Limpopo Province newspaper reports read “Big-Game Hunter Drowned in a dam” and TRAGIC ACCIDENT AT “STANFORD’S LAKE”. Seventy-year old Harley Daly Maurice Stanford died in his own lake on the 8th of January 1941. Harley was born in France on the 2nd of July 1871. He came to the Cape as a child but was educated at Dulwich College near London. He was
a tax collector in the Pilansberg area and then Haenertsburg from 1911-1924. His nickname, Intabalen, meant “the one to be looked up to” because he was usually on horseback. He was also one of the first people to own a Buick. Harley’s grandson Gavin, his wife Jady and their two children moved up to the farm from Cape Town in 2000. There were opportunities in Tourism and Gavin decided to do a course on ‘building log cabins’. He finished the course and set out to build the cabins. The first cabin, a double storey unit, was completed in 2002. It has three double bedrooms, two bathrooms and sleeps eight people. Gavin then started building the second cabin, which was completed a year after the first lodge. It is a single-storey log cabin that has three bedrooms, one bathroom and sleeps six people. Gavin has since converted the old farm house into 3 Cottages - A four bedroom and two x two bedroom cottages. In addition to this he has also built a honeymoon cabin and a Four Bedroom Cabin. All the units have their own unique views of the lake , forest and/or mountains.
