South Africa
June 2025
Welcome to our adventure in South Africa!
Several years ago, my mother-in-law shared that she would like to take her grandchildren on a safari. Obviously we were thrilled to make this YOLO (You Only Live Once) dream come true. So here we are - off an adventure in South Africa! Please feel free to follow along as we share some of our favorite experiences as we travel far and wide in this amazing world.
Getting There
I’m not going to lie - this was not fun!
When deciding on what flights to purchase, we narrowed it down to two options 1) flying from Boston to Heathrow (6-ish hours) and then to Cape Town (11-ish hours) or 2) fly from Boston to Newark then to Cape Town (15-ish hours).
There were pros and cons to each and at the time, the disaster which is Newark Airport was yet to be dislcosed. So we went #2. When we started to see news reports of the “difficulties” Newark was having we opted to cancel our Boston to Newark flight and rented a one way rental car to drive to Newark. This eleviated stress in making our connection, but did mean we needed to drive 4 hours.
Fortunately we made good time and were able to find a great playground for Jack to explore before making it to the airport.
So onto the 15 hour flight.
The anxiety leading up to the flight was expotentially worse than the fligth itself. Someday I hope pre-flight anxiety starts to lessen but for now … the time leading up to the flights is always - the worst!
Once we got onto the plane, gave Jack his newly aquaired Nintendo Switch - things went great. After 3 hours of Mario Kart, Jack fell asleep for most of the flight. Sean slept more than usual and I switched between sleeping, listening to the Elephant Whisperer, and reading Nelson Mandela’s autobiography - Long March to Freedom.
So if I change my perspective, reading, listening to audiobooks, and napping (with a glass of wine - or two) is a pretty relaxing Saturday so - Flight wasn’t THAT bad.
We finally landed, found our driver, and made our way to our hotel where we were fortunately to get a pretty sweet room upgrade. After dinner at the lobby restaurant - we went to sleep much easier than expected seeing how it was really 4:00 pm “our time.” I’m not gonna lie - this is the best 15 hour flight experience we could have. Things could have been much worse.
Cape Town
It’s no surprise that we didn’t set alarm and woke up when we did - which was later than expected! Fortunately we had blue skies and mid-50’s degree weather to enjoy.
After getting advice from our hotel consierge to uber rather than walk 20 min., we made our way to Green Market Square which is a popular tourist destination and an easy place to direct an uber. We then made our way down a lovely pedestrian street full of shops, cafes and restaurants to St. George’s Cathedral, which is where I really wanted to start our trip to South Africa.
St. George’s Cathedral
I was in college during the late 90s and early-00’s. I was fortunate to learn, about Desmond Tutu during that time. Since then he has captured my attention and greatly influenced the way I view the world. During Nelson Mandela’s Presidency, he appointed Archbishop Desmond Tutu to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. His writings speak to my heart and inspire me. To start our trip at the church where he served was important to me.
As we walked in, a beautiful welcome greated us as well as many of his poignent quotes. It was a beautiful church to take a moment and reflect on the history of this space.
After spending time in St. George’s we made our way along a garden (Company’s Garden) that borders many of the Parliament buildings. The pigeons, squirrels, and (lone) rat were even more friendly than those at home in the Boston Commons - including an albino squirrel (which I had never seen).
Jack’s patience with this needed to be rewarded so we checked out Honest Chocolate, which we found because of the Netlix show - Somebody Feed Phil. This place was amazing! After a milkshake, hot chocolate, ice cream filled banana bread, some truffles, fudge and a brownie to go, we left happy!
District Six Museum
Our next stop was the District Six Museum. If you can’t tell, seeing sites siginficant to the South African time of apartaid are of importance to me. This time period has fascinated me, but most importantly - humbled me that I need to learn more.
This museum tells the important story of a predominantly black neighborhood which was determined by the government to become a “white” neighborhood. The District Six Museum weeks to remember and memoralize the lives, people, and culture of the previous neighborhood.
Mouille Point
After some time at the District Six Museum, Jack asked to go back to our hotel and since he was a trooper during this day, we obliged. At the hotel, we relaxed a bit, read some, and Jack played some more Mario Kart.
Traveling with a six year old and having the intention of learning about aparthaid is a tension, but when Jack says he wants a playground - we do everything possible to make that happen. So thanks to some great crowd sourcing recommendations, we made our way to a neighborhood that is along the water. There was a great playground, wonderful pedestrian walk, and a fantastic restaurant we found with a view for everyone (included construction vehicles).
Truth Coffee
So once again, Somebody Feed Phil came through with a great coffee shop recommendation. I love coffee and in my early 20s - you could say that I was one of those coffee obsessed Gen Xers. And if I had just moved to the Big City of Cape Town and made friends with people, I would totally make Truth Coffee the place I hang out to talk about all things in life. Good coffee shops are often like friends - they will always be there for you and this place was quite impressive.
The Book Lounge
As we continued our time in Cape Town, and specifically the Ward 6 neighborhood, we stumbled upon The Book Lounge which is a lovely bookstore that has such welcoming vibes. it was easy to get lost in perusing bookshelves and taking more than a minute to sample a book before purchasing. On the bottom floor is a chill cafe and charming kids section. I loved checking out the local South African authors as well as the non-fiction books about South Africa. Bookstores are such gems and it was just a joy to stumble upon this gift of a shop!
Afternoon Tea at Mount Nelson
Of course when I heard from a friend to check out the afternoon tea at the Mount Nelson, I had to look into it. And wow! This is was fantastic. I need to add it to my favorite afternoon tea places for sure. We learned a great deal about South African tea and how it is different than tea commonly from China. And the three traditional courses were perfection. I loved the china and the complimentary bubbles to start are the experience was such a lovely treat. The staff was great and so was Jack, despite an unfortunate spilling of his hot cocoa on a nicely upholstered chair, but did I mention the staff was great?
Bo-Kaap Neighborhood
One morning we decided to tour the Bo-Kaap neighborhood which is a community full of colorfully painted homes. We have found Cape Town to be fine with regards to safety - however, we realize that our “home” is in an urban neighborhood by a busy train station as well as a busy hospital so we are used to security concerns. Despite this we do try to take precautions when possible and in touring Bo-Kaap we decided to join a tour and for a number reasons we are so glad we did.
Touring this neighborhood was the first time I felt a bit more on “high alert’ and we learned so much more about the neighborhood because of the tour guide.
Bo-Kaap is a neighborhood that highlights the Cape Malay culture, which consists of Muslims who immigrated to South Africa - namely from Indonesia. The Muslim influence in the Bo-Kaap neighborhood is as noticeable as the brightly colored homes. It is where the first mosque was built in Cape Town and the culture remains unique to this day. We were able to visit a fantastic spice shop as well as a handful of artisans. When visiting Cape Town, I highly recommend taking a guided tour of this neighborhood as it is much different than the other areas we visited.
Camps Bay Neighborhood
One of our last touristy things to enjoy was a nice beach neighborhood so we made our way to the Camps Bay neighborhood which is a lovely, beach-ey town. We enjoyed the sunset on the beach, playing on the beach, a great dinner, and of course ice cream. This was definitely a much different vibe than the other neighborhoods we had spent time!
Penguins
After a few delays, the rest of our family made it to South Africa in time for us to spend a day driving down the coast. We saw some amazing views of the ocean and a highlight was checking out Boulder Penguin Colony. The weather was as close to perfect as it comes and made for a fantastic time of watching the penguins on the beach. I learned the universal truth that penguins waddling always cause smiles. So, I think the next time I’m having a bad day - I’ll head to the aquarium and watch waddling penguins. I wished I had learned this lesson sooner.
Table Mountain
The iconic Table Mountain provides a stunning backdrop of Cape Town. Pictures don’t do it justice. It’s one of those travel things that - you expect it to be cool, but then when you see it in person - it’s all the more stunning. We took the gondola up to the top of the mountain (we decided spending 3 hours and hiking up was not the best idea!). One cool thing about the gondola is that when you are scaling the mountain the inside rotates so you can see the entirety of the view. On top of the mountain are a few short hikes which we spent some time seeing the views of Cape Town and the views looking south. In addition, we stumbled upon the cutest of creatures, the dassie, which inhabits the top of the mountain.
And now onto the Safari portion of our trip!
Sabi Sabi Bush Lodge
Our first safari experience was at the Sabi Sabi Bush Lodge, which is adjacent to Kruger National Park. There are so many options when it comes to having a safari experience in South Africa and my lessoned learned is - just go! They are all amazing. There are a number of reasons why we chose the bush lodge, the primary was they had a great reputation for providing safari experiences for young children. We had three kids under the age of 10 so we wanted to make sure it was a positive experience for them and us - and wow! They really delivered.
Our guide Warren and our spotter Bunai (sp?) we extraordinary. So talented at what they do and clearly enjoy leading people on tours to see incredible animals. Each day we woke up early (6:00 am!) and departed by 6:30 am to discover the animals as the sun rose. We returned to our lodge around 9:30 am for a fantastic breakfast. We relaxed a bit while the kids went to a kids club that the lodge runs and then we went out for another drive at 3:30 pm. Dinner was at 7:00 pm and had a variety of game options… the craziest I got was Zebra.
Each drive included what the kids called a “party.” In the morning it was coffee, tea, hot cocoa and cookies, and as the sunset it was cocktails, soda and snacks.
Obviously though - the highlight was the animals! We saw the “Big Five” - Lions, Leopards, African Buffalo, Rhinoceros, and Elephant. In addition, we saw giraffe, zebra, wildebeest, warthogs, hippos, all the antelope you can imagine, and countless other amazing creatures! Going off road and tracking leopards made a lasting impression, one we will remember for a long time - and we did it twice! It was such fun to learn so much about wildlife, how to protect it, and show gratitude for all they do to make our world such a stunning place to live.
So a few thoughts:
Just Go! I feel as though so often in travel spaces, there are people who say things like: “You must do this!’ or “You gotta stay at this place.” or “This is the best place to do this.” or “Go this time of year.” I get it and I’m guilty of doing the same thing.
But so often a consequence of this is that I think “iI I go on a safari, I can’t until I have so many days to take off, enough money, can go this time of year, and get reservations at a certain provider.”
Definitely do your research and pick the best options for you. But just because someone did a safari one way - doesn’t mean it is your way. Research to find what is best for you and then - Go!
Don’t wait until your kid is “old enough to remember” because when that time comes - there will be many trips you want to take and much less time because of “older kid” type commitments. And - travel does not need to revolve around the kids for it to still be fun. During our sun down “parties” the kids had a fantastic time playing The Floor is Lava using the safari trucks. There are so many reasons to take a kid on a safari, there is no perfect age - just go when you are able to make it work! Also, One of my favorite travel bloggers (Local Passport Family) writes about traveling with kids for more reasons than memories. Click here for one of my favorites.
I love elephants.
Victoria Falls
Our next stop on our adventure was to visit Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe. We took a short flight from South Africa and made ourselves comfortable in lovely glamping accommodations at the Elephant Lodge West. The staff were fantastic especially Moses ,our host and Wonder, our guide.
Our first day started with making our way to Victoria Falls which locally is called: Mosi-oa-Tunya (The Smoke that Thunders). There are many ways to qualify the “largest water fall” - most water, longest, tallest, etc. but by all accounts - Victoria Falls is an impressively large water fall and it is WET! There are walk that visitors can take and enjoy several look out points, while getting soaked.
I was grateful to our guide Wonder who was able to explain the complexities of the waterfall to Jack and answer his many questions. In addition, I was curious about the current attitudes surrounding David Livingstone and the role he played in the area surrounding Victoria Falls. When I was in college, I visited Westminster Abbey for the first time and Livingstone’s grave is prominently located in the center of the nave. The legend is true that his body is buried in England, but his heart is buried in Africa. Of course he didn’t discover Victoria Falls, the people who lived in the area knew it existed and the local people were the ones who assisted in helping him navigate the waters to “discover” the falls for himself.
Our guide was much more positive towards Livingstone that I expected and I directly asked if he was because we were westerners. He implied that on the spectrum of colonizers, Livingstone is seen more positively than many others. People today seem to acknowledge he had a love for the continent of Africa and its people. He fought to end slavery and to bring medical care to people. However, much of his mapping and discoveries were later exploited by people such as Cecil Rhoades. Once again, I was grateful for our guide and the perspective he was able to take. It inspired me to learn more.
The following day we were able to take an early morning safari drive in the Zambezi National Park. Once again our guide Wonder did an exceptional job explaining the ecosystem of the area and the animals inhabiting the park. I will forever remember his explanation of elephants being the gardners of the park. It took us almost 45 minutes of driving to see wildlife - but WOW! It was worth the wait.
First we saw troop of baboons that provided endearing amusement - especially the moms taking care of the babies and young baboons. We saw a large heard of African buffalo (Jack’s favorite) and then WILD DOGS! Wow! What a treat. It was such an amazing experience to watch the wild dogs go on a hunt (fortunately we didn’t see “the kill”). Of course it made us miss our best friend Charley back at home.
Chobe River
The last stop in our adventure was in Botswana on the Chobe River. This was such a unique experience as we got to take wildlife excursions by boat on the water. Once during sunset and once during sunrise. It was wonderful to see how the animals interact with the river during different times of the day.
The Chobe River area is home to over 60,000 elephants so it was wonderful to see them in abundance and in groups. In addition we were able to experience a host of other animals along the river bed. Baboons, giraffe, birds, and of particular interest hippos as we were not able to see them in this quantity in other places. Our last drive of the trip was on land and the grand finale was experiencing a lion pride after a kill. We spent time watching the pride and the surrounding wildlife (like vultures) prepare to eat the kill of the lions.
We had one last sundowner/party (as the kids called them) and ended our 10th game drive having learned so much about wildlife, the beauty of the land and the people who work so hard to preserve the wonder for generations to come.
I’m so grateful to my mother-in-law for gifting Jack with this extraordinary experience and I’m once again reminded that my two favorite travel companions will forever be Jack and Sean. Traveling the world and learning with them is one of life’s greatests gifts.
