Touring Africa

Innervision

Hi,

My boyfriend and I are starting to plan where we go travelling next year, and something we'd both love to do is travel in Africa. We really want to see South Africa and spend some time there, and then travel to as many other countries there as we can.
We were looking at a tour such as this one in Trailfinders: http://tours.trailfinders.ie/Tours/Africa_Kenya_Kenya-To-Cape-Town
Time isn't really an issue as we'll both be leaving our jobs to either do our travelling and come back home or else go work somewhere for a year or two, so we'll hopefully be able to spend about 2 months doing Africa.

Has anyone done something similar? Are there any other tours we should look at like the Trailfinders one? I know something like that probably ends up being quite expensive but would it be the best way for people who've never been to Africa before to travel around it?

All opinions welcome! Thanks

LiamMc

There are numerous first world operators that cater for first world tourists, sometimes flights included in the price but maybe after spending a short time in South Africa you may wish to use local travel agencies. These maybe for short tours 4-day,5-day or a little more. And then you may move on to another centre independently and after a few days chose another short tour for the region/country you are in.

Some well known first world travel agents similar to the Trailfinders product
Explore
http://www.explore.co.uk/

Exodus
http://www.exodus.co.uk/

Kuoni
http://www.kuoni.co.uk/en/safaris/pages/trekking-kilimanjaro.aspx#/

Travel is also about piece of mind and the travel agencies linked provide a secure service, where you can share your experiences with fellow travellers/tourists.

Zebra3

OP,

The tour you've linked to there looks like Dragoman's tour that Trailfinders are an agent for.

The trip runs from Cairo to Cape town, but is also sold in parts as well.
http://www.dragoman.com/holidays/details/nairobi-to-cape-town-overland-via-namibia

I've travelled with Dragoman before in Asia and their overlanding trips are a very convenient way of travelling especially through trickier parts of the world.

Any questions about them, fire away.

Innervision

Thanks LiamMc, definitely going to have a look at those sites and see if they've anything similar. Because it's such an expensive trip I really want to make sure there's not cheaper out there.

Zebra3 I know yours was Asia but just wondering was there many extra costs for activities on the tour you did with them? Just wondering would I need much more than the price they're quoting for the trip!

Zebra3

http://www.dragoman.com/holidays/itinerary/nairobi-to-cape-town-overland-via-namibia

Everything is there about what's included and what optional extras there are. I only done a two week trip in Asia, so there was just a couple of things not included.

The overlanding is a great way to travel. It's like a coachtour but a backpackers' version in a costumised truck with plenty of camping to keep costs down. I'd highly recommend it instead of doing it yourself, waiting for buses and constantly looking for accomodation in places you don't know.

Mrsbrady

Hi OP, We travelled to South Africa for our honeymoon 5 years ago in Jan. We spent a week in Cape Town and then flew to Durban (scary place IMO) and then joined a tour provided by Gap Adventures and spent 10 days touring back down the coast to Cape Town to fly home. The tour was an amazing way to see parts of the country that we would have never travelled to, and in a way that we would have never travelled before. The campsites were brilliant, really well done and all needs were catered for. There is a driver / tour guide and a chef on the bus to cook breakfasts, lunchs & dinners. It was my 30th birthday on one of the days and they baked me a cake Showers etc were spotless and one of the campsites was at the ocean so you fell asleep and woke to the sound of waves... gorgeous! You had a choice in some places to pay a little extra to upgrade accomodation for a night - we did this one night so that we could have a bit extra space to sort out our bags and relax on our own and take time in the shower, etc. All in all we had a brilliant time, met some good people, and would love to do it again!!! South Africa has some amazing sun rises, sun sets and stary skies that we would have missed if we had stayed in the cities. Even if you dont go with it, take a look at their website anyway for some ideas of what you could do. This is the one we did: http://www.gadventures.com/trips/south-africa-discoverer/DCD/2013/
MrsB

Innervision

Cheers Zebra3, yeah I know we could probably do it all ourselves cheaper but I really like the idea of everything being taken care of for us as you said!

Thanks for that Mrsbrady, that site seems to have a tour very similar to the one we were looking at (this one) and has a really detailed itinerary so it's handy to see what activities are optional extras etc!
For the camping, were they private tents i.e. a private part for the two of you? Or how did they work? Camping doesn't bother me at all but would hope for our own little space at least!

Mrsbrady

Hi Innervision,
It was seperate tents per couple so you had your own privacy every night, i dont think i could have handled sharing with others 24/7, def need your own space.
MrsB