TAASA Lodge

This was my 6th trip to South Africa and Botswana and, as always, Matthys van Aswegen made it a happy, safe, and exciting experience! My roommate, Glenna, and I thoroughly enjoyed the trip to South Africa’s Boulders Beach to visit the African Penguin Reserve and all the beautiful scenery in that area. Another Discover Africa staff member, Kayla Robson, joined Glenna and me for dinner one evening and it was such a delight getting acquainted with another Discover Africa person whose talents enrich the travel experience.

When we arrived in Botswana we were so pleased to have the two guides I have always requested and, even though I’ve been at Camps Moremi and Savute before, they provided us with safaris that added to my previous experiences, learning new things about animal behavior and, the bonus, twice seeing a cheetah – a cat I hadn’t yet seen in Botswana!

And I’m already planning my next trip to these two fabulous countries!

All bookings were at luxurious and convenient places. The camp tents are beautifully decorated with a rustic look and feel. Food service were amazing for most part. The bush drives are as best as it could be given the rainy season etc. Punctuality has been an added attribute.

We had a truly magical safari experience perfectly planned & organised for us by Susan Veldman at Discover Africa.

We flew from Cape Town to Hoedspruit and then seamlessly transferred to the most beautiful lodge in the Karongwe private game reserve. We stayed at Kuname Lodge and it was perfect, the setting, the staff and the lodges were all wonderful and the food was amazing. The game drives from the lodge were so well organised and we saw so much big game.

The transfer back to airport and flight back to Cape Town were also seamless so the whole experience is everything we could have asked for.

If anyone asks me where to look when booking a South Africa adventure then I would say that they do not have to look any further than Susan!

We had a great trip in Namibia. In 11 days we did a roundtrip, which was organised through online meetings. Every thing went on as agreed on and ver smoothly. We had a very good guide/driver, who explained us a lot about the country, politics, history and most importantly about the scenery we were enjoying as well as the wildlife we were seeing. The lodges we stayed in were very comfortable, the food was excellent. The trip itself was run by Namibia tours and Safari.

From start to finish, every phase of our trip was seamless. From the man who greeted us at Nairobi airport when we arrived to the woman who assisted us at our departure, we were taken care of perfectly. Our lodges at Saruni Samburu and Saruni Mara were beautiful. The staff was welcoming and we had genuine conversations that gave us an appreciation of their culture. Matthys at Discover Africa listened to our priorities. He communicated well and made our remarkable safari to Kenya a dream come true.

We had been thinking about a Southern Africa safari trip for a few years and had some valuable input from Zimbabwean friends who had been on tour many times. So we had a general idea of when and where but needed guidance on the finer details and options, as well as someone to put it all together once we’d agreed on an itinerary (South Africa, Zimbabwe and Botswana). This was possibly going to be our one and only trip of this type so we wanted to get it right!

I saw an ad for a tour similar to what I had in mind so contacted Discover Africa (DA). Devryn was able to clearly outline his preferences that would meet the brief. He suggested the order of travel, how long at each place, what type of accommodation (generally getting better as we progressed), how to get from A to B, etc., via several email conversations.

We had a Zoom meeting with him before finalising the plan, where we were able to ask further questions, which he was able to answer confidently and competently, given he had been to these places himself.

We felt confident enough with his recommendations to lock it in 12 months ahead of the trip.
Naturally, you anticipate some things will go wrong on tour, e.g., a missed connection, a guide not turning up, or accommodation not being as described, and we were mentally prepared for that.

Garry's Safari Experience

However, every connection was made on time and the accommodation exceeded our high expectations!

The Safari experience itself (which Devryn obviously couldn’t guarantee) was superb. The guides from the lodges we used were experienced, informative, respectful of the animals, and considerate of what we had and hadn’t seen previously and so every day (twice a day!) was another trip into the unknown. Everyone hopes to see the Big 5, which we did early on. After that it was a matter of literally sitting back in the jeep and seeing what would turn up. The birdlife was better than I expected (the lilac-breasted roller was a favourite), and seeing small animals like mongooses (4 different species), a chameleon and a steenbok were unexpected highlights.

The food was varied at the various lodges, with usually a buffet of 3 main courses of western-style cuisine (although I ate wildebeest, crocodile, kudu and springbok when it was offered). We finished off with 3 nights in Cape Town to let the Safari experience sink in, which was a very good move.

So in summary, we did some initial research, worked out a plan with Devryn, and he nailed the brief. We’ll never know if it could have been even better, but I seriously doubt it.