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A day in the life on an overland safari

At the crack of dawn you are woken by a knock on your tent and a cheerful “good morning happy campers” from your overland guide as she goes about preparing breakfast on the open wood fire in the middle of your camp.

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Experiencing the Townships in South Africa

At the turn of the 20th century racial segregation became prominent in South Africa and the history of community removals and marginalisation had begun.

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A journey into South Africa’s apartheid era

Sikhululekile, the new luxurious Robben Island ferry, cruised across Table Bay at a strong 25knot pace with a full load of 285 passengers.

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South Africa Day 8 – Visiting a couple of Himeville B&Bs

Our second day in the Himeville area was spent visiting a couple of small B&Bs, Albizia House, almost next door to Sani Manor where we’re staying and Under-the-Berg, about 10 mins back along the road in Underberg.

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South Africa Day 6 – A long drive, Johannesburg to Himeville

After a much needed rest I headed the 10 minutes up the road to O R Tambo Airport to print some documents, check emails and meet Jan, who was arriving on a flight from Paris.

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Swaziland, Day 1 – Planning your road trip with a GPS

We’re on the road again, out in the field with the Project: Exposure program and this month it’s my turn.

This trip is set to involve a good deal of driving over long distances, and my geographic knowledge of South Africa is limited.  I enjoy looking at maps and plotting a route but for this trip using a GPS sounded like a great idea.

On the road from Johannesburg to Swaziland

Why use a GPS?

It’s not just the navigational assistance that comes with a GPS but a greater predictability of time and distance, which leads to a far more relaxed and enjoyable drive.  You know exactly how long you have left until you reach your destination, how far it is until you have to make a turn and where there’s a petrol station along your route.

Pre-trip planning

My method was to download the South Africa map onto my TomTom device before leaving home and spend an hour using Google Earth to find the coordinates of all my planned destinations.  I input these into the Favourites section of my GPS so that it would be easy to set the device to navigate me to them once I’m on the road in South Africa.

It is possible to hire a TomTom from car rental or phone companies for about ZAR 50-100/day, but if you have your own it makes it much easier to get organized before leaving home.

Driving Johannesburg to Swaziland

It wasn’t long after arriving that I was sat at the exit of the airport carpark in a rental car waiting for the GPS to get a signal and show us the way to Swaziland.

It’s about a 4 hour drive from Johannesburg, and it’s only when you start to get close to Swaziland that the scenery becomes slightly more interesting than the flat farming land around Johannesburg.  Rolling hills with rocky escarpments and boulder strewn slopes guide you into the kingdom.

At the border a modest set of immigration buildings on the South Africa side and officials behind glass are followed by a vastly more colourful and relaxed face-to-face affair on the Swaziland side.

The GPS got a bit confused by a new bypass at one point after leaving the border at but generally it was a huge help to the journey.

Evening in Swaziland

We spent that evening eating and drinking at Quartermains in the Ezulwini valley with Swazi Trails as they carried out the timekeeping for their weekly 20km mountain bike race.

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South Africa tourism development with a long term view

The world’s biggest sporting event will kick off in Johannesburg, South Africa on 11 June 2010. The FIFA World Cup will attract international travellers from all around the globe to the Rainbow Nation.

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Voyeurism Or Tourism?

This article follows a recent discussion in the Make Travel Fair Facebook group that attempted to gauge popular opinion on this “voyeuristic-type tourism that you can read happening in places like Rio and Delhi.”