Our Flights:
Our main bases in South Africa
were Cape Town
and Kruger National Park.
We tried to buy a multi-city option for flights: Houston to Cape Town ; then Johannesburg to Houston
for the return flight. This was available for USD 1008 in Dec 2015 but before
we could lock it in, the option became costlier and hovered around 1400
(exchange is currently 1 USD~R16). The return ticket Houston-Johannesburg was
USD 1008. We bought it in December and that was that!
The flights are a full day each way and we move to a time
zone 7 hours ahead. So we lost out on 2 ½ days from the 17 days at our
disposal. With the 2 weeks available, we chose 3 bases in South Africa : Cape Town ,
Kruger and 2 days in the Mpumalanga area.
May 20, 2016, Friday:
We boarded KLM flight Houston
to Amsterdam on
May 20 Friday 3.05 PM. The flight was 9 hour duration ; we had a 3
hour layover at Amsterdam ;
Then took a flight from Amsterdam
to Johannesburg
(11 hour duration). This flight was not going full. We requested and got seats
assigned where 2 seats remained empty near us... I had the 3 seats near the window, son had 3 in the middle! We lay flat and had a pretty
comfortable flight.
The captain announced Swiss Alps andLake
Geneva on the path unobstructed from view by clouds.
The vegetarian food and their regular snacks were very good. It was altogether a great start!
The captain announced Swiss Alps and
The vegetarian food and their regular snacks were very good. It was altogether a great start!
21 May, 2016, Saturday:
We landed at
We had heard that there may be aggressive helpers at the
airport, who may try to help you with your luggage cart. It was advisable to be
ultra alert at the ATMs. There were some concerns expressed by people about
checked baggage tampering.
We passed through the
airport 5 times… no issues whatsoever. Big thumbs up to O.R. Tambo International Airport
What worked:
OR Tambo airport
was fine on our 1st arrival… no issues for us.
Had a smooth sail through passport control (nice immigration
officer who joked with us and said Namaste and bahut bahut shukriya!)
Collected our checked bag (no tampering of our unlocked bag),
Drew rands from the ATM (No negative elements around),
Guys who offered taxi or help with bags walked off after a
smiling no thanks from us.
We called up our hotel for their promised pickup. A guy
called Memory turned up and drove us 3 km to the hotel. We gave him the 100
rands for the pickup as it was after their regular hours when they offer free
pickup. We asked him to drop us at the airport for our 7.25am flight the next
morning. He said it’s OK if we leave the hotel at 6 and he won’t be late as he
sleeps there.
What didn’t work:
Overnight stay at
JNB:
Airport lodge (3 km from airport; offer free airport
transfers, paid if between 10 pm-9 am)
Our choice of Airport lodge was disappointing mainly due to
the attitude of the main guy there (don’t know who he is). We stayed here twice
during the course of our trip. The place has great potential but he gave us the
worst room—room no 18. We had 2 one night stays here, May 21st and June 2nd.
1st stay room no 18 was a horror.
We had room no 18 on May 21st: the bathroom walls don't rise
to the ceiling and the door is a plastic collapsible one which does not close
shut. We arrived at 10.30 pm after the day long flight from Houston and it was terrible to have to open
the main door in the biting cold to vent the room after using the bathroom.
Surprised there are no hygiene standards for bathroom specs
in room 18.
The room has open brickwork on the wall near the bed, no openable windows, not nice for persons with allergies.
The room has open brickwork on the wall near the bed, no openable windows, not nice for persons with allergies.
There were just 2 extra blankets, one of them pretty thin. I
used that and was cold through the night. Son had pulled a back muscle just a
week before the trip and I was worried he should be fully fit for driving
around! He did not even know about the blanket issue!
The manager was pretty rude to all queries…
We say… Hello, good evening
He: …(looks away with a surly expression)
We ask… we have a flight at 7.25 tomorrow. Memory says we
can leave at 6. Is that OK for checkin?
He: I don’t know (in
a surly tone)
We: Our Europe plug does
not fit in the points in that room. Can you please help with charging?
He: NO
We: Can we please have the wifi password … we need to
checkin for our flight
He:…. (Heavy grumbling…). This was after he had walked off from the reception and we are talking on the phone...We can’t make out on phone. So he
comes and gives the password.
We: We wrote an email reminding we’ll need some vegetarian
items for breakfast before we leave, we got no reply? Can we have something by
6?
He: No, not possible as it’s Sunday.
We: But it’s inclusive in the room rate and we informed
early?
He: Give me a wake up call, I’ll see if I can pack something.
We checkin using our data, find out bag drop closes at 6.20 am.
We want to be at the airport at 6. We want to inform Memory.
When we tell the manager to do so, he says
“You should have given him the correct time at the 1st
instance. He’ll come when you arranged!”
We: He sleeps here, so please inform him. We don’t want to
miss bag drop because of him.
Again heavy grumbling…
It’s touching midnight and we sleep!
We woke up at 5 am, gave a wakeup call for breakfast and
Memory at 5.15. He gave us some packed fruits and yogurt. We got dropped at
airport by 6 am paying 200 rands for both the trips direct to Memory, the driver!
Airport is near empty and we are looking forward to Cape Town
May 22 Sunday:
We took the 7.25 am Flight to Cape Town (Tickets bought much ahead at
discounted price of USD 50/800 rands). It’s a two hour flight with just a
handful on board. We even got a hot breakfast served. Unfortunately for us,
though we had indicated Hindu meal while booking, they brought us fish and we
could not eat it. We were worried our other upcoming flights on SA Airlink
(Cape Town-Nelspruit and Nelspruit-Johannesburg) will have the same issue, but
no we got good vegetarian meals on those legs.
The flight landed at Cape Town by 9.35 as scheduled. We were at the Avis car rental at airport by around 10 am after collecting our checked bag. We had
booked automatic hatch back, got upgraded to Honda accord. Got the GPS and full
insurance as well. Had a smooth ride to the city on N2.
Stay:
We stayed at an Apartment
at Cape Paradise Lodge in the posh Gardens area, Cape Town . Lovely apartment with awesome
views all round. Totally loved it!
We had a lunch of our home made paratas and tomato relish... the stuff we brought lasted for 5 days and came in very handy!
This is our parking space and entry door...
Maps, websites:
There are great maps available online with all attractions
marked out for Cape Town .
has great maps
These came in quite useful for our stay.
Also all official sites have a ton of info and just one look
prior to visit ensure if the weather was good! You can see the clear skies but
need to know if high wind has closed the cable car to Table mountain or the
Chapman’s drive.
Will tell you if the road is open besides giving you
interesting info about the drive!
we checked the cableway info here… it indicated cableway
open…the temperature is …with good visibility and moderate wind. It gives
estimated wait times also!
Our 1st Activity: Table Mountain
The weather was glorious. We knew it’s ideal for taking the
cable car up Table mountain. We drove straight up with the strategy: we’ll come
down and park and ride the shuttle if there is no parking up, luckily got a
parking spot.
We joined the few people at the counter and got our 20% discounted
tickets with our Wild Card, after showing ID and receipt.
Wild Card
With Wild Card Membership you are entitled to one year's
unlimited access to Wild
Conservation Partner
Parks, Reserves and Resorts (Parks). For international guests it’s
R3005 and it’s valid for the member and one partner
gives details
For us, the calculation was as follows:
For us, the calculation was as follows:
WILDCARD R 3,005 for 365 days for 2 international visitors.
Our expense if we had opted to pay cash:
R 280 /day conservation charges Kruger National Park: TOTAL for 2: 560x5: R2800
CAPE POINT: R125… so for 2: R250
BOULDERS: R 65…for 2: R130.
We got a 20% discount for the table mountain cable car too.
So, even for a short stay like ours, the Wild Card was economically
beneficial, not to mention the convenience of not having to pay for individual
entry tickets.
TABLE MOUNTAIN:
It’s a five-minute cable car trip to the top of Table Mountain ,
1089 meters above Cape Town .
Each of the two cable cars can carry 65 people. The floor of the circular cabin
rotates to allow 360° views.
Interesting tidbit: The cable car base is a water tank with
a 4000 liter capacity. This provides fresh water for visitors, and is used as
ballast in windy condition!
We enjoyed the views and explored the summit. There are
numerous hiking trails.
has the video of our flight, some city drives and Table Mountain
Two Oceans Aquarium:
We then drove to Victoria and Albert waterfront, parked
easily in one of the garages near the Two Oceans Aquarium. Spent 2 hours in the
aquarium till it closed.
Ragged tooth Shark...
http://www.aquarium.co.za/
Site gives details of the specimens.
Kelp Forest Exhibit is awesome… it is an underwater
forest where kelp plants grow like tall trees, and is one of the handful live
Kelp Forest displays in the world! It contains 800 000 liters of seawater,
filtered and circulated…a variety of creatures swim around here.
The tank is 12m x 12m x 6m deep. The windows are made of acrylic and are about 180 mm thick. The rocks are made from fiberglass. Sand and crushed shells were blasted on to make the rocks look real.
At 6 pm, we came outside, enjoyed the seals at the outdoor platform.
We needed to catch up on sleep, so got into our car, reached our apt. The 7/11 store just across was great for stocking up. That was the end of day 2 inSouth Africa.
covers our day at Kirstenbosch
Our videos are set to music as usual and some frames are captioned!
has the video of our flight, some city drives and Table Mountain
https://picasaweb.google.com/108910506663540711253/6294685377235791985#6295071801886469010
has the video of our visit to Two Oceans Aquarium and Boulders Beach
Africa hotels 2: Johannesburg : Airport Lodge, Graskop:
Zur Alten Mine, Victoria Falls ,
Zimbabwe
South Africa
hotels 1: Cape Paradise Lodge, Gardens, Cape Town
We needed to catch up on sleep, so got into our car, reached our apt. The 7/11 store just across was great for stocking up. That was the end of day 2 in
covers our day at Kirstenbosch
Our video links:
https://picasaweb.google.com/108910506663540711253/6294685377235791985#6295071801886469010
Very informative indeed! have you also written a blog on your Kruger visit?
ReplyDeleteHello Devendra
DeleteGood to know you find this post informative.
Yes, I have several posts on our trip to South Africa, Including our Kruger visit.
Some parts are in the previous post:
http://adventuretrav.blogspot.com/2016/06/how-to-plan-trip-to-africa.html
Then there is a whole separate post on Kruger:
http://adventuretrav.blogspot.com/2016/06/south-africa-trip-report-kruger.html
Happy travels!
Thanks Bhagvat!! it is very helpful. i am planning to visit with my wife end of this month. do you have any recommendation for car hiring? Also, what are the do's and dont's of travelling in SAF. heard a lot abt the security situation there.
DeleteHello again
ReplyDeleteI've included a detailed paragraph on self drive in the introduction:
http://adventuretrav.blogspot.com/2016/06/how-to-plan-trip-to-africa.htm
We hired from Avis, took full insurance of course.
We observed all rules, drove under speed limit, pulled up to let people in a hurry pass, stopped fully at STOP signs etc... so no run ins with traffic police
Regarding safety, we take adequate precautions from our side on our travels to all parts of the world.
We don't take township tours... really see it as disrespectful to walk around somebody's living quarters!
We are not into bars/night life, so don't visit iffy areas anywhere!
A smile and simple shake of head kept away 'helpers' at airport! My personal theory is that non white people don't face harassment with aggressive vendors/helpers! We tipped the guys who guarded the car parking with a smile and 5 rands. Found them sweet and helpful!
We did not face any concerns regarding safety in SA
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ReplyDeleteYou've put in your link in some 8 comments on different posts. I've deleted the spam
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