atravelynn

So now you are expanding your possibilities beyond just South Africa. If Great White Sharks are a focus, then South I'd suggest remaining in South Africa. I think you can do private for lowest budget in South Africa with some self driving.

If you are thinking East Africa as an option, I'd focus on Tanzania in May or June. The culutural options you are seeking would be easy to include in Tanzania.

For some pricing estimates and example itineraries, check out Good Earth.

Good thing you are planning early.

isabel25

Hi --

Just a note on the timing -- I've just finished planning a trip for end of June/ early July 2008, and I didn't have any problems getting rooms at our first choices. We even managed to use frequent flyer miles to get upgrades on Delta for the crazy flight from Atlanta to Johannesburg!

I don't have any first-knowledge about places to stay -- yet!-- but I've scoured the pricing structure of all of the lodges. Some of the best deals seem to be on CC Africa's off-season prices. Their properties are substantially discounted in June and July, and at least now, they have a stay-three-nights-get-a-fourth-free special.

Based on the prices for this season, for about $5000 (total for 2 persons) you could get 8 nights at a combination of Phinda and Ngala, which seems like a super-luxurious combo and an extraordinarily good deal. Both are game lodges with twice daily game drives, food and drink included. As far as things on your list, Ngala is a tented camp, and Phinda offers a cultural excursion to a Zulu village, among other things. The airtravel from J'Burg to Phinda, Phinda to Ngala, and Ngala back to J'Burg would add about another $1500 for the two of you. For $6500, this seems like a phenomenal vacation. (I haven't figured out tipping and the costs of incidentals yet, and I don't know the cost of the Phinda Zulu excursion).

If you could go up another $1800 or so, you could then spend three nights in Cape Town, and rent a car to explore the area. Air travel to Cape Town would probably be another $500; you could easily get a same day connection from J'Burg. There seem to be plenty of nice-looking places in Capetown for under $200 a night for the two of you, including breakfast. If you figure another $200/night for rental car, meals and activities, that would be $1200 for the three nights there, plus the air-travel costs.

You could do a shark dive from Simons Town during your time in Cape Town, but I don't know how much that is.

A lot of airlines seem to allow "open-jaw" travel, so you could leave for your international flight directly from Cape Town.

Anyway, my advice is second hand based primarily on what I learned on this board, but since I just spent so much time figuring out prices, I thought I'd pass along what I've learned.

Doogle

Having said you are well travelled, you could easily a trip on a self drive basis and this will reduce your costs.

You could do something like this:
1) Arrive and connect to HOedspruit. Spend 3 nights in a camp up there, tented camps include Hamiltons, Tanda Tula and Buffalo Camp. If you stay at Kapama Buffalo Camp they transfer you for free which will save you 3 days car hire. My favourite out of them is Tanda Tula.
2) From here you can go back to Hoedspruit and collect a car and drive the Panorama route. Stop and visit the interesting sights like Bourkes Luck Pot Holes and Pilgrims Rest it is very interesting and really makes for a nice few days. If you have the budget Tanamera is lovely, so is Casa Do sol and a little more budget conscious Hippo Hollow is good value for money. Take 2 days for this.
3) From here stop in at Nottens Bush Camp for two or three nights.
4) From here you can go through Swaziland and spend the night at Forresters Arms or if you want more game there are nice game lodges here as well, Hlawane Game reserve has Stone Lodge which is nice, You could even do 2 days depending on your time available.
5) Leave Swaziland and travel to Northern Natal a great tented camp up here is Thanda Tented Camp and well worth 3 nights.
6) After Tanda I would try and visit Fugitives Drift for 2 nights.

From here you can go to Durban drop off your car and fly to Cape Town or Port Elizabeth, if you have the time go to Port elizabeth pick up a car and drive the garden route, or just to Cape Town and spend some time there, to me this will be more than enough game viewing for your first trip, the cuture and history are great and really worth seeing.

heymo

Thanks for all the info and the acknowledgment of how tough this is! I got a call the other night from a travel agent from a web site, and she very indignantly told me that if we weren't willing to spend AT LEAST $500 a night we should just not go to Africa until we can.

And something else she said makes me pose this question: If you booked with a safari company were they ALL based in the U.S.? Basically, what she said was do not book a safari with ANY company based in Africa. Is this a universally held belief, or just hers? A couple of the ones we've liked so far (the last one I posted was from a company called Strider Expeditions)...

The sharks are not necessarily a "must see"...it was more of a "hey, we're down there, we COULD see" We both scuba dive, so I guess there's always that somewhat perverted desire to see a shark.

isabel- your trip sounds interesting. Did you book everything on your own, or go with a travel agent?

atravelynn

That $500 plus or stay home advice applies to the fly-in places in Southern Africa and even some in East Africa, not the drive-to places in South Africa. It also pads the commission of the agents.

I've used US agents, but people book with African ones all the time with excellent results. Go2Africa and Rhino are in Africa and arrange Southern Africa trips. I'd definitely use Go2Africa if it offered me the best deal and I'd probably use Rhino. Rhino is newer and I haven't gotten as much feedback on them, but I saw where Cheeseman's used Rhino. Cheeseman's is established, reputable, and provides high-end trips to clients who wouldn't tolerate poor service or gaffes.

Now if it's East Africa you are considering, you can very easily get a private safari for two for $500 per person per day or less using US or African agents.

isabel25

Hi -- We booked everything ourselves through email. It was very quick and easy. I heard back from every property I contacted by the very next day. The airlines all have on-line booking available, so that was easy, too.

We ended booking Phinda and Mala Mala as our two game viewing properties. Phinda in July is an incredible deal; Mala Mala is a splurge. The rates were exactly those that were posted on the websites.

The travel companies based in Africa may have better deals available than you can get booking on your own. I contacted one company but by the time they got back to me with specific suggestions I had already made my own reservations, so we didn't use them. But the rate they offered us at the lodge they suggested was much, much lower than the website rate, so we may have been better off booking through them. (It was a lodge that I hadn't contacted myself, so maybe the lodge would have offered us the same rate directly.)

One thing that makes me nervous about using an agency based in Africa is that you pay the 50% deposit to the agency, not the property directly, so there may be a risk involved. I have no basis for saying there is a risk, and insurance is probably available to protect against the risk, but I feel more comfortable paying the property directly.

The hardest part about booking things yourself is trying to figure out how to get from place to place. If you don't have the patience to pore over airline schedules and maps, it may drive you crazy.

Honestly, I've found the advice on this board more useful than any other source I could imagine. I bought a bunch of guidebooks as well; the old stalwarts -- Fodors and Frommers -- were much more useful than the fancy ones with pictures.

Reading multiple guidebooks shows how subjective the whole trip-planning process is -- Fodors gives Mala Mala their top rating, for example, while Frommer's specifically recommends AGAINST staying at Mala Mala Main Camp or Sable Lodge. I ended up going with Mala Mala because of the consistency of the advice on the board, which I tend to trust more than a single reviewer in a guidebook who may have idiosyncratic tastes.

Anyway, remember to take my advice with a grain of salt, since I haven't gone on South Africa adventure yet!!

heymo

Thanks isabel, I appreciate the info. We're sitting down today and going over all the info I've gathered so far, and then decide how we want to proceed.

I'm sure I'll have more questions!

sandi

Admittedly, $500/person/nt seems high. While there are many properties (lodges/camps) in both South and East Africa that do cost that and some as much as $1500/person/nt these vary depending on where, time of year.

Though the agent who replied indicated you had to figure on spending $500/person/day, in East Africa you can get darn nice accommodations which this total includes room/board, transport, daily park fees. For peak season, that amount is a good average.

Can you get space for less? Of course. Quality/type of lodging will be different. Park fees are set and can range from $40-$100/person/day. Having a private vehicle w/guide can run $200/day (divided by # of paxs). Days on safari most always cost more than days spent on the beach (unless you select a resort as Mnemba Island) or city hotels.

Though the $500/person/nt can throw one off, when you average out your entire itinerary - some days will be more, some less. Of course, camping in pub-tents in the bush, will be much lower.

Kenya was welcoming guests during the recent political upheaval and still is. At no time were tourists targetted or hurt, weather was lovely, game plentiful. So, East Africa is still a good option, especially as you're planning so far in advance.

kareng

I didn't see this option suggested, but we're doing a 4-day, 3-night Mana Pools canoe trip as part of our safari this summer. You can usually do it as an add-on through your TA (we're using AAC) or book yourself (http://www.bushlifesafaris.com/). The cost is not bad relative to safari costs (it's listed as a $1250 pp add-on on the AAC Web site), but you have to fly in and out, so not sure what that will add. But this trip gets you up close and personal with the wildlife, and you'd stay in tents set up by staff each night.

ldtc2

Heymo
I am planning a trip to SA as well, and enjoyed reading the posts ... so what happened? What did you decide?
Ldtc2