South Africa Travel Guide

SOUTH AFRICA

Recently went to South Africa for a week.

Apart from the bad roads, worn down farms/buildings next to the road, rubbish everywhere, just like in Namibia, in some towns, and the fact that we were almost hijacked in Kimberly, I was pleasantly surprised!

We got great and friendly service from everyone right from the start, good food and drinks, exept from one place, best/affordable accommodation, clean malls, clean bathrooms, the weather was perfect and from the animals that we could see was a nice experience!

We visited a total of plus minus 6 towns. Every town is different. Every landscape is different.

We were surprized over the courteous, friendly and prfessional help for and after the safary game dr

We were saisfied over the courteous, friendly and prfessional help for and after the safary game drive. Accomodations, food, transportations,
guides, weather, and scenery were very good. Wildlife was not to our full satisfactory, but then this was not a national park! But for beginners
it was it was allright. We enjoid our beginners wildlife safary and can recommend further. Thank you for the good time.

Cheers, Wilfried and friends

Great tour guides that made this an unforgettable experience!

We had a great experience with the guides and were very lucky during our visit. We saw all of the Big 5 and everything on our list. The scenery was beautiful and the evening drives were always our favorites with the gorgeous sunset. Overall would recommend Viva Safaris but recommend looking at Trip Advisor for details on the lodging.

Well organized

Highly recommended. Perfect organization, many private games and visit to the Kruger park. Plus we met many nice people along the way :)

South Africa has it all and for all tastes.

Above expectations. Guide Keegan very nice and knowledgeable

The whole experience was very regarding.
Hotel in Johannesburg excellent
and Safari lodge outstanding.
Luxurious, comfortable and food
very good and unexpectedly cheap
Would higly recommend it

It was interesting

Weather was very propitious and there were no mosquitoes. The scenery was good accommodation, transport was good and we had a good and informative guide who explained the habits of the various animals we spotted . This was good.

Fantastic safari experience. Skip the cities.

The lodges were fantastic. Especially leopard mountain. Rhino sands and phinda Zuka. Wish we hadn’t wasted our time at the st Lucia lodge. If going back I would just do two lodges. Minimum 3 nights each. I’d choose leopard mountain and rhino sands over phinda.

Our travel agent did an amazing job. Justin at bookings@paperjet.org picked us up and transported between Durban and lodges. Provided binoculars. Snacks on the trips. It was all last minute booking for us and his advice and recommendations were fantastic.

We then flew to cape town and drove the wine regions. Which are beautiful. Should not have wasted a night in cape town. Stay in stallenbosch instead. Helicopter tour a must over table mountain. Drive/Walk to cape point a must. Will go back but stay away from the cities.

Great game preserve with a variety of animals

There was a variety of wildlife. The game drive operators seemed knowledgeable at what they were talking about and we had a great time

A pleasant trip, with a wonderful itinerary, but with too cheap a way of travelling.

I booked my tour with Kruger Park Tours: they were absolutely perfect from all points of view.

The tour itself was organised by Nomad Tours. It was an overland tour, South African Explorer 2018-South, 20 days, accommodated. I have not enough words to praise the excellent staff, the guide, the driver and the cook, all of them great professionals. The itinerary was perfect, although the tour should have been a couple of days longer to enable a more relaxed pace. The truck was comfortable, even for somebody with joint pains like me, but it should be heated: we spent several hours in a snow storm in a freezing vehicle, and many other days in a very cold one; on the other hand, warm weather is not a problem as it is possible to open all the windows. Moreover, the truck is good for ordinary transportation, not for game viewing, as it is too large to get into the narrow paths where game usually hides: therefore, only the safaris done with special vehicles were really rewarding, not the ones done with the large truck. Most accommodations were good or excellent - only the Kudu Ridge Lodge near Addo N. P. did not meet the required level, as the heating in the quite dilapidated tents was not working despite the very cold temperatures -, but due to the type of tour we could not enjoy the common areas: we used to eat outside in the cold, or in areas near the kitchen or even in the room of the guide. The food was generally OK, enough for me - a petite 66 year old woman -, but again the type of tour made us spend a lot of time buying food, preparing meals, washing the dishes, etc., a time that would have been better spent visiting the wonders of the country; furthermore, this type of tour forces the staff to reach the accommodations quite early in order to have time to cook dinner, late afternoon hours being the best to view game, together with early morning ones. But I guess the very cheap price of the tour is possible only with this type of tour called overland.

My advice: South Africa, Swaziland and Lesotho are marvelous countries where you will enjoy extraordinary wildlife, beautiful scenery, interesting culture, good food and bear, and excellent wines, so do visit them. However, take an overland tour only if you really cannot afford something better; if you can spend some more money, do yourself a favor and choose a tour using lodge restaurants for meals - at least for breakfast and dinner - and special vehicles to watch game.