Will the municipal caravan park in Makhado (Louis Trichardt) ever again live up to its reputation of once being voted the best caravan park in South Africa?

Many frequent visitors to the caravan park seriously doubt this, with the number of loyal caravaners opting to stop over dwindling fast.

One such frequent caravaner who thinks it is not worth ever returning, despite supporting the caravan park for the past 20 years, is Mr Rod Clark from Witrivier.

Clark and his wife stayed at the caravan park for one evening in July. They arrived after hours and when they wanted to pay the R35 per person per night (R70 in total), there was no one on duty who could assist him. Clark says he was informed by a security guard that he should go and pay at the municipal offices in Krogh Street, but when he asked the guard to direct him to the offices, the guard could not assist him. The couple then decided to go and pay the next day.

Their bad experience was, however, only starting. According to Clark, the caravan park and facilities were extremely dirty and the stench of raw sewage was overwhelming. The stench was even worse to the north of the park where “a river of sewage” (as Clark put it) was flowing. There was also no hot water in the ablution and shower facilities and when his wife went to the ladies toilet, it was full of men. This, obviously, upset Clark immensely with regard to the safety of his wife. Apart from the poor and dangerous state of the ablution facilities, Mr Clark says that there were also almost no braai facilities left.

The dilapidated state of the caravan park prompted Clark to phone the municipality’s emergency numbers. Clark was outraged by the response he received. He says he was sent from pillar to post by a very arrogant official. One, he says, very arrogantly wanted to know why he wanted hot water, while another chewed him out “why he only complained after they stayed there!”

Following the Clarks' stay at the caravan park, he has indicated that he will not leave the matter there and says that he intends to write to one of South Africa’s most prominent outdoor caravan and camping magazines to discourage travellers from staying over at the municipal caravan park.

Municipal spokesperson Mr Louis Bobodi responded last week by admitting that the municipal caravan park is in need of refurbishment, with regard to the ageing of the water and sewerage system, among others.

“During the 2012/13 financial year, maintenance of all the facilities will be done through the general maintenance budget. We have full-time personnel deployed to service and clean the caravan park and, although we do have some challenges, our caravan park is in a usable state,” said Bobodi.

Regarding the issue of on-site payment, Bobodi said that the municipality used to have a cashier during the day and even after office hours. “But usually the cashier will sit in the office for the whole day without doing anything and the frequency of the visits made by customers is very low. The overtime created thereof was very high and we decided to have visitors come to the municipal offices for payment of their accommodation,” said Bobodi. He added that the cost-benefit analysis of transactions at the caravan park was not favourable to the municipality, “hence the action taken to have payments made at the civic centre.”

As for the treatment Clark said he received from municipal officials, Bobodi said they had already spoken and apologised to Clark about the alleged ill behaviour meted out to him by one of their officials. “We are investigating the matter further,” Bobodi said.