South Africa &
Zimbabwe

We highly recommend the Intercontinental Santon Hotel. We felt safe and were one block away from the Nelson Mandela Center. The downtown mall started in the parking garage of our hotel. There is a great Thai restaurant in the Nelson Mandella Center with an outside terrace we thought was world class.

Kings Camp was everything we expected and more. We never saw a fly or mosquito. This was summer and this was the only place we wanted to nap in the hot mid day. We were advised by the Center for Disease Control to take prophylaxis for malaria and we took Larium as we often do in nonresistant areas. We never saw a mosquito in all of South Africa but I saw some in Zimbabwe. Don’t forget that your weekly Larium has to be started one week before the trip. We have to take this medication several times each year because of our travels. Insect repellant is a fact of life. We believe that DEET is the only choice these days. Don’t forget that that 100% DEET reacts with nylon as Fred found on our trip. We use a roll-on these days but also like sprays. On some trips we have been on we have found that only 100% DEET is effective so we always carry some but didn’t need it at all in 2007 or 2006.

South African Airways is now one of our favorite. The service couldn’t have been better!!!

Everyone on our trip was extremely well prepared and packed light. Laundry facilities were available everywhere and hair dryers and in-room safes were in every room everywhere. Be absolutely sure you know the maximum weight limits for your most limiting flight.

Ikapa tours and travels provided us with a great guide and van. Highly recommended.

The Victoria & Alfred Hotel was clearly the best choice on the waterfront in Cape Town.

Dining is world class in Cape Town. This was our 6th or 7th trip with Aims Travel. We have never had any problems and feel these are good values for the money. To get adequate CME’s though, we have learned to contact all of the participants before going and have everyone prepare interesting lectures to give. There are always waiting times in airports and travel days to get in the lectures. We got 25 hours credit for the trip but it required everyone to work and take this seriously.

We did not take malaria prophylaxis on this trip.
Be sure and take some bandaids. Carry medication for a common cold, for gastroenteritis, for cuts & scrapes. Carry several types of antibiotics. I like to have some Augmentin, Cipro, cephazolin, and some doxycycline. Take some handkerchiefs When visiting malaria prevalent areas we choose to take mefloquin but some people have bad dreams on it. We have learned to get medical evaluation of infectious diseases in the area the disease it was acquired as so very many local physicians and pharmacists know exactly what is prevalent in that area and it's treatment. I would rather have invasive or surgical care back in first world countries. Know what your health insurance will cover over seas. Oceania and Holland America have excellent physicians onboard. Take some laxative as you will be less active on a cruise than at home. Sea sickness medication would be a good idea as would cough drops, ear drops, eye drops.

I took only digital photos on this trip with my Nikon D70 and my Sony DCR-HC40 camcorder. I wished I had used a lens hood on the Nikkor 18-70 1:3.5-4.5G lens. I did use a hood to good advantage on my Sigma 70-300 1:4-5.6D lens. I never needed a longer lens than that & never used a teleconverter. I did enjoy having my macro lens at Kings Camp. Contrary to my experience on tropical adventures, I had little trouble with fogging and it was only on the outer lens surface, never internal. I carry a small piece of travel towel tied around my camera strap for this and learned from kayak trips that this works best. A Wolverine or similar portable hard drive (or a laptop) to download compact flash cards is worth it’s weight in gold. Circular polarizers make little difference this close to the equator & I stopped trying to find a use for it quickly. I appreciated a sky filter, especially in Cape Town in the summer.

We found 220 volts only, and there is a special adapter for South Africa that we have never seen anywhere else. We used British plugs/adapters in Zimbabwe. Since all of my battery chargers, etc can use 220 volts, I just use an adapter on the plug of a regular power strip and plug in the chargers as usual. Worked great! We do carry a travel iron that can be changed to 200Volts.

We take only appliances that will run on either voltage and since we are from the US we use small plastic adapters that turn the 220v plugs to 110v. I carry a couple splitter cubes. Be sure and bring battery chargers for any appliance that needs one. Most modern chargers will run on both 110v & 220v but check before you come.

We have special travel socks and underwear such as those by Exofficio or Magellan that we can wash out daily and need very few pairs. These usually dry within a half day if washed in the room, thoroughly rung out, rolled up inside of towels, and hung up to dry in the stateroom. We also have travel shirts and pants (long & short versions of each) that dry this quickly when hand washed in the room. We carry a small Nalgene bottle (from REI) of concentrated washing detergent for this and I pack this Nalgene Bottle inside a waterproof box or Nalgene water bottle to avoid the consequences of a leak in route. We have culled the clothes we take over the years to be those with the most wrinkle resistance and to dry the quickest. In many parts of the world, we really appreciate the secure zipping pockets of our travel clothes (safari type clothing). Don't forget your hat for sun protection.
The more years we travel the more we find we can take less and less clothes with us on our trips.

Exchange rates were very favorable to the dollar in South Africa. We ate in great restaurants for what we thought was a steal! In Zimbabwe we were told to deal only in dollars or South African Rand and never use our credit cards because there is no definite exchange rate and over 1000% inflation. Get prices in dollars or rand & pay cash including hotel bills etc. No one in our group used travelers checks and we feel that their usefulness is almost nonexistent for our travels the last few years. We found ATM’s everywhere in South Africa and credit cards accepted everywhere (more so than in the US).

We have found that having a couple hundred dollars each in one and 5 dollar bills (or euros in parts of the world) opens up so many possibilities to get us good service, pay porters, and buy trinkets. We find out immediately upon entering a country how to tip and who. The US dollar is still king. We split up our credit and debit cards so if we are robbed we can continue our trips. One of the most important thing not to forget is to take some photo copies of your passport picture page. Because you use the photocopy of your passport rather than the actual passport (which the ship holds for you) you may still need your driver's license or other government issued ID at some money exchanges etc or if you have marked your credit cards CID. I have records of credit card numbers and the international phone number for the card. We know which ones have foreign transaction fees. Before we leave on our trip we call the credit card company and let them know which days we will be in each country so they will allow the transactions. We still have cards frozen by the banks when we withdraw large amounts out of the country or make large purchases. This problem is easy to resolve by logging in to the card's web page and checking messages. Keep up with your plane tickets and any vouchers you carry with you. In Europe and Japan in particular be sure your credit cards have been upgraded to Smart Cards that carry the computer chip.

We love our travel agent Dianne Blackburn at Gateway Travel in Spartanburg, South Carolina. She usually follows our progress when we fly and has even called ahead and rebooked flights when she knows we won't make connections. We call her from all over the world. We have used her for over 20 years and feel she consistently gets us the best deals. Susan takes whatever deals she can find to her and Dianne tries to get a better deal. Even when we book a cruise etc we make sure Dianne gets credit with the Cruise Line.