Fodor's Travel Talk Forums - Trip Report OUTSTANDING trip to South Africa/Zimbabwe

Circling back after our trip in case anyone dredges this up and is curious about the outcome. The title sums it up, but here's more detail for anyone interested.

We began our trip with 2 nights in Cape Town; had a private guide for the four of us, who took us on a tour of the Cape one day, that included (not in this order): Boulders Beach and seeing the penguins, Kalk Bay, Cape of Good Hope, Cape Point, Chapman's Peak drive, we encountered wildlife such as baboons and ostrich, and we had a fun dinner at Spyced on the waterfront.

Our City tour included a long visit to Kirstenbosch Garden, a trip up Table Mountain -- we took the express cable car, which basically means cutting in line at the front of the line for the cable car, bypassing on the day we were there about a 2-hour wait -- and walked all over the top of Table Mountain, enjoying our time there, and drove around the city. Dinner that night was at Belly of the Beast, a "foodie" type restaurant that specializes in local cuisine and wines.

The next day we moved to the Cape Winelands area, spending two nights in a cottage at Boschendal (a large farm) and visiting areas such as Franschhoek and Stellenbosch, enjoying touring vineyards and doing wine tastings. We especially enjoyed the tastings and views at Oldenburg, and had some of the wine we sampled shipped home to enjoy after the trip as well.

We moved to Zimbabwe for the longer portion of the trip, flying to Victoria Falls airport and then being driven to our safari camp there for the next three nights. We saw wildlife on our way in to camp, enjoyed a magnificent sunset, and then over the next several days we had incredible days of rising at 5:30 a.m., coffee by the campfire, morning game drives, delicious lunches and siestas, afternoon game drives, delicious dinners, one night a night game drive, and repeat and repeat. Including the game drive on the way out we had a total of 9 game drives in Hwange National Park. We saw every animal we had dreamed of seeing (except for rhino and cheetah), and many many many animals we didn't know about in advance -- IS there a more noble-looking animal than the sable antelope? -- and incredible birds. We saw the spectacular skies -- sunrise, sunset and starry nighttime -- we could ever imagine. Breathtaking.

From Hwange we were driven (on some truly horrid roads) to the Victoria Falls area, and spent the next three nights at Victoria Falls River Lodge, where we chose each day from options such as the Falls tour, land safaris and river safaris. We took a helicopter ride over the Falls, then toured the land part of the Falls, had lunch at Lookout Cafe overlooking the Falls, and then spent all of the rest of our time at the lodge, which is located right on the Zambezi River. We had a private -- cabin? tent? -- with a very large deck overlooking the river and with our own plunge pool, lounge chairs, and even an outdoor bathtub and shower, in addition to a very luxurious inside bathtub and shower. The lodge was teeming with wildlife, so as we sat on our deck or enjoyed our delicious meals in the open-air restaurant we could watch and enjoy the animals right in front of us. We saw more wildlife on our land game drive but concentrated on the river game drives to take advantage of the Zambezi location, and those private pontoon boat river drives with our guide were fun and filled with up-close sightings of crocs and hippos and sights of many birds and animals visiting the water's edge.

Since we were in Victoria Falls in August, winter, we did not have problems with excessive heat or mosquitoes. Highs were in the low 80s (instead of the 100s as it would have been in summer). Our guide told us that in summer the game drives would begin at 3:30 a.m. to escape the heat of the middle of the day. I am very glad we were not doing game drives at 3:30 a.m.

I had very high hopes and expectations for this and the trip exceeded my hopes. Every single one of us was awed by our experiences in the bush. One side benefit I had not anticipated was the days in the bush in Hwange when we did not have access to WiFi. The four of us, including our young-adult children, spent the time watching, talking, sharing, being amazed.....and not scrolling, checking email, posting, etc. And we all acknowledged and appreciated that. What a gift.

Thank you, Africa!