Safari Honeymoon?

irishlady29

Hey, Anybody know of good places to do a safari for our honeymoon, also who would be good to book it through, we think we'd prefer to book through an agency rather than the internet. Any advice/info would be greatly appreciated!

The_Chopper

A friend of mine went to africa and loved it.

I was thinking of doing something similar - but I don't know anything about it either and would welcome hearing on it also

axel rose

Did it. Twas great ( got married in the reserve ). We went to SA. My only advice is to avoid Slattereys, they screwed up our wedding and honeymoon sooooo bad, then negotiated a credit note, 6 months later we had to send a solicitors letter to get them to give us the credit note! :rolleyes:



They have the service skills of a hippo in a disco. :mad:

2-3 days is more than enough time there
What do you guys want to know?

Radiotower

I priced around alot of places about honeymoon to SA and Mauritius with a safari in SA. Trailfinders were the cheapest around - have heard that from a few people too. You can book everything through them including car hire and transfers, etc.

Hope it turns out as good as we're hoping.
Best of luck

irishlady29

axel rose wrote: »

Did it. Twas great ( got married in the reserve ). We went to SA. My only advice is to avoid Slattereys, they screwed up our wedding and honeymoon sooooo bad, then negotiated a credit note, 6 months later we had to send a solicitors letter to get them to give us the credit note! :rolleyes:



They have the service skills of a hippo in a disco. :mad:

2-3 days is more than enough time there
What do you guys want to know?

Thanks for that, good to know about Slattery's. So hard to know these days who is safe to go with, What kind of itenary had ye? What part of SA? Accommodation? is it cheap/dear to wine and dine there. Where did ye fly from? Sorry now for all the questions but we're clueless!

Tillerman08

I was on honeymoon last June in South Africa. We drove from capetown to Port Elizabeth and did a 4 day safari in Shamwari http://www.shamwari.com. I cannot recommend it highly enough and we were dissappointed we only stayed for 4 days as we enjoyed it so much. Be sure to shop around for prices as it can vary from 3k-6k as we found. We booked everything through trailfinders http://www.trailfinders.ie/ and they were fantastic and the cheapest of several quotes. SA is a fantastic country with so much to see and do- you won't be dissapointed.

axel rose

In all we were away for about 3 weeks.

• 1 week we were in Capetown, brilliant but we planned to head to the falls but we had to stay to sort out some FU by Slattereys.
• Next 4 days we flew to the reserve in northern SA, were we got married. ( more Slatterey FUs followed). When we first arrived we photographed any animal that moved-be it lion, hippo, dog or cat! Two days in we got really cool ('God! Another elephant?').
• We then flew to Mauritius for a week and guess who forgot to make our reservation?
• We spent the last few days in Stellenbosch (fab area, better wine!)

A game reserve is not like a regular holiday. There are bugs and critters. and its not like you can head out down the road for a packet of fags and a pint. Its early starts (5.30am) and a second tour in the afternoon. The social life is based solely in the reserve. Where we stayed the emphasis was on seclusion and relaxation, no phones or TV.....but we had a small bar, swimming pool and stunning views. I loved it and would recommend to anyone.

That whole experience cost about 12k which included our wedding, all food and drink for our five guests in the reserve and all inclusive in Mauritius.

axel rose

As for the food and drink......YUM YUM!(very fresh, tasty and cheap esp seafood) but its OK cos you'll be married and you can let yourself go!

irishlady29

wow, it really sounds fab, thanks so much for the heads up, appreciate the feedback. will defo be shopping around.

Tillerman08

Most people drive the garden route. The food and drink is beautiful and really cheap. Depending where you go but we ate 4 course meals with wine for less than 50 euro.We were going to spend two weeks South africa and 1 in mauritius but found that it to be a bit of a rip off- 1300 for week for groom. we decided to stay an extra week in SA and upgrade hotels. Would highly recommend the following if driving the garden route

http://www.stjames.co.za/

http://www.hunterhotels.com/tsalatreetoplodge/

http://www.thefranschhoek.com/

The_Chopper

Thanks also guys - some great tips in there.

One other location I was thinking about was Fiji - I heard for honeymoons it's like paradise. Any tips?

*irishlady29 if you wish I can open another thread - just haven't seen a honeymoon thread here before

paulse7en

Nice one, will look into trailfinders. I'm looking into any safari options in Africa for next summer but fear that SA will be crazy with world cup fever..maybe Malawi or further north. Any more info would be great.

Ulanzi

Tanzania has superb national parks and game reserves. Zanzibar is then amazing for the palm lined beach thing. The parks in Kenya and then on to Mombasa is another option although some might not be comfortable with the recent post-election unrest. For a cheaper option Zambia has some stunning parks and Victoria Falls. If you want an amazing budget safari have a look at Flatdogs - a gorgeous campsite with chalets in the South Luangwa valley. It's a stunning place. South Luangwa has other posher options and it's a fab place. Malawi is a lovely country, I've never gone on safari there though and Uganda is another option although I do know that five/ten years ago the game populations were still recovering after the Idi Amin years where they were almost wiped out. You can do gorilla safaris in Uganda, Rwanda (and Burundi I think) if you're interested in that.
Head into trailfinders and see what the options are. Make sure you're going at the right time of year if you don't want to be caught up in torrential rains...
Good luck with it.

paulse7en

Much appreciated, loads of info to get me started. My sisters and brother have had a great time in Malawi and Zambia tho i'm not sure how much safari they saw.
I guess it's trying to convince the better half now then, safari and maybe get a few days further north to catch a glimpse of the gorillas - that'd be amazing.

Planning to go the last week in May, first in June so i'll need to check the weather for that time of year too.
Thanks for the advice.