Samara Private Game Reserve encompasses 29,000 hectares of malaria-free spectacular Karoo wilderness. The reserve offers a tremendous game experience for those hoping to see cheetah (there is an excellent wild cheetah breeding programme in operation here), mountain zebra, the once-endangered white rhino, big herds of plains game such as kudu, eland, black wildebeest and beautiful birds, such as the rare blue crane.

The reserve is only a 2.5 hour drive from Port Elizabeth, making it an ideal end to any family holiday that takes in some of the Garden Route too.

For any bookings made between now and the 1st November, Samara are offering these fantastic deals for families :

• Pay for 2 nights and receive the 3rd night completely free

• Children under 14 years of age will only pay 50% if sharing with an adult – and children under 8 stay for free

• During a 3 night stay, one adult will receive a complimentary shoulder / back / neck massage – I would imagine this will appeal to all mothers !!

• Baby sitting services are provided free of charge

• Children get a specialised kiddies menu

• Because children under the age of 8 may not accompany their parents on game drives, they can enjoy a whole host of kiddy-friendly activities, such as their own shortened game drives (with popcorn and snacks), face painting, baking with the chef, orienteering courses, sketch your own Bushman paintings, star-naming, making animals from natural products, puzzles, crafting with African beads, insect and bug appreciation – plus all children receive a free gift on arrival

• All families will get a treasure hunt walk in the bush with their ranger

• Family picnics can also be arranged

For a stay here if booked with Travel Butlers, we are offering the following rates :

August : Adults pay R2,845 per person sharing per night
September : Adults pay R3,535 per person sharing per night
October : Adults pay R3,730 per person sharing per night

Children rates as quoted above.

The rate includes all meals, tea and coffee, 2 game drives daily for the adults, local house wines and soft beverages. PLEASE NOTE: All other drinks are NOT included.

Stay for 4 nights, only pay for 3 at Mateya Safari Lodge, situated in the spectacular 76,000 hectare malaria-free Madikwe Game Reserve.

As well as elephant, lion, leopard, rhino and buffalo, the Reserve is also home to wild dog, cheetah, plains game including gemsbok, springbok, zebra and giraffe, and over 340 species of birds. Experienced game rangers and trackers will be on hand to take you on game drives and guided walking safaris.

Each of the 5 suites is adorned with original African artworks and hand-crafted mahogany furnishings that reflect the very essence of the reserve. Your en-sutie bathroom is complete with a secluded open-air shower. Whether your are looking out at the game by the waterhole, relaxing in front of your custom designed fireplace, lying under the shade of your window sala, or immersing in the cool water of your rim-flow pool, each and every feature of your suite provides total privacy and comfort.

Valid for travel between 1st October 2010 and 15th December 2010 … so don’t delay … BOOK TODAY !!!!!

For anyone planning their South African holiday in advance, it is so refreshing to have just heard that the Amakhala Game Reserve have announced that they are HOLDING their current 2010 rates throughout 2011.

They are also going to continue to offer the excellent Special Offer deal of Stay for 4 Nights, Pay for 3 during January, February, March and April 2011, and during the low season months of May, June, July, August and September 2011 they are offering a Stay for 3 nights, Only Pay for 2 deal.

All in all - a winner all round for anyone wanting to experience exciting game drives in search of the Big 5 in a malaria-free environment !

Call us now to make your booking …. why wait any longer !!

The Kichaka Luxury Game Lodge, in the malaria-free Eastern Cape, recently played host to one of South Africa’s newest stars, the actress Vanessa Haywood, who enjoyed a weekend here with her family and team from the SA TV show, Top Billing.

Vanessa stars in District 9, which has just been released worldwide, and has topped the US box office with over $160 m takings in just the first week. Movie buffs may also remember Vanessa from other movies such as Hey Boy and Blood Diamond.

Kichaka really made an impression on Vanessa. She was very impressed with the accommodation, cuisine and friendly service she received, and was blown away by the game viewing - she saw cheetah, elephants, lion, aardwolf to name a few !

Kichaka Lodge is ideally situated just over one hour from Port Elizabeth airport. Experienced rangers maximise every opportunity to ensure exceptional viewing during game drives on this established 7,500 hectare game reserve. Each of the 10 luxurious suites have been designed to provide every amenity and privacy. Each suite has a lounge area with large glass sliding doors on two sides which open wide, making these rooms part of the surrounding bush. There is also a large private viewing deck and private heated plunge pool.

Travel Butlers are pleased to now be working with Sibuya Tented Camp, in the malaria-free Eastern Cape.

The 3,000 hectare malaria-free reserve is home to a diverse range of wildlife, including the Big 5 of the African bush - elephant, rhino, lion, leopard and buffalo. Over 400 bird species have also been recorded.

A wide range of activities await guests, including guided game drives, fishing, canoeing, and horseback safaris. But the most unique part of a stay here is the 30 minute boat transfer to River or Forest Camp from the main reception area - during which, if you are lucky, you may see dolphins and turtles in the river mouth.

Accommodation is in safari tents, split between 2 camps - Forest and River. Children are welcome at River Camp.

Hidden in lush riverside forest, offering spectacular views of the Marico River and the surrounding bush and its wildlife, Makanyane Safari Lodge offers you the ultimate luxury safari experience within the malaria-free Madikwe Game Reserve, which boasts 76,000 hectares of Big 5 game viewing territory. As well as elephant, lion, leopard, rhino and buffalo, the Reserve is also home to wild dog, cheetah, plains game including gemsbok, springbok, zebra and giraffe, and over 340 species of birds.

If you book to stay here before the 31st December 2009 for travel between 1st May 2010 and 30th September 2010 (excluding the period between 1st June 2010 and 31st July 2010), you can enjoy 3 nights for the price of 2.

Click here to ask us to check availability for you and to make a booking !

Stay for 4 nights for the price of 3 at Makanyane Safari Lodge in the malaria-free Madikwe Game Reserve.

Hidden in lush riverside forest, offering spectacular views of the Marico River and the surrounding bush and its wildlife, Makanyane Safari Lodge offers you the ultimate luxury safari experience. As well as elephant, lion, leopard, rhino and buffalo, the Reserve is also home to wild dog, cheetah, plains game including gemsbok, springbok, zebra and giraffe, and over 340 species of birds.

House wines, local beers and spirits, soft drinks and mineral waters, breakfast, lunch and dinner daily, teas, coffee and cakes, lunch (on day of arrival and departure if required), 2 game drives each day in open 4-wheel drive vehicles, spotlight game drives at night, game walks accompanied by an experienced ranger, transfers from the air strip in Madikwe Game Reserve, visits to hides, emergency medical evacuation insurance and use of gym are included.

This offer is only valid for bookings made before 31st December 2009 for travel between 1 January 2010 and 10 December 2010, but is NOT available for travel between the 1st June 2010 and the 31st July 2010.

Please click here to read more and to ask us to check availability and make a booking for you !

If you are thinking of arranging a family holiday to South Africa, and including a couple of days at a safari lodge, you will be amazed at the number of lodges that do cater specifically for children - and by this, we mean not only just offering to put extra beds in the room for them to sleep on !

A growing number of safari lodges now offer children programmes for their younger guests. These obviously vary from lodge to lodge, but in general the majority of the programmes will include ‘bush bumbles’ - a shortened version of the adults game drive, plus the vehicle will not get as close to the larger animals of the African bush (such as elephants, lions, buffalo and rhino); short bush walks in search of insects and animal spoor (what child wouldn’t just LOVE the opportunity to be able to pick up some zebra dung !!), and story-telling about ‘Why the Elephant has a Trunk’ , ‘Why the Zebra has a Stripy Coat’ and ‘Why the Warthog is so Ugly’. Some lodges will offer kiddies bush picnics or special ‘themed’ meal times, some will even invite the children into the kitchen where the chef will help them bake cookies.

And all this goes on while the parents either enjoy their own game drives or just relax around the pool !

You can see a selection of lodges that Travel Butlers work with who offer such programmes by clicking HERE.

Even if you want to go to a lodge that doesn’t offer a bespoke children’s programme, there will always be babysitters on hand to look after the really young children during game drives. In general, all the lodges right across South Africa will not allow children younger than 5 to go on the long adult game drives (but the age restriction does vary from lodge to lodge so you do need to check with us before booking).

If you really do want to share the safari experience with your little ones, you can ask the lodge if you can hire a Land Rover for a day, and the ranger will only take you and your family out on your own game drives.

This will be an extra cost over and above the rate that you would normally pay, and whilst the lodge will do everything they can to accommodate this, they all do state that they cannot guarantee this service - purely for the reason that each lodge will normally have just one ’spare’ Land Rover - and if one of the vehicles that is due to take out the other guests breaks down, then the spare vehicle has to be used !

Finally, for most families, the family-friendly lodges in the malaria-free regions, such as the Eastern Cape, the Waterberg and Madikwe, will offer the most appeal, as this will mean that the kiddies will not have to take malaria tablets before, during and after the safari part of the trip !

For a lot of visitors to South Africa, a very popular safari destination is to spend a couple of nights in one of the lodges of the Eastern Cape, as this can easily be combined with a visit to Cape Town and a trip along the Garden Route - and the area is also malaria-free, which especially for families is an important consideration

But which lodge or reserve do you select? There are so many to choose from – Shamwari, Kwandwe, Pumba, Amakhala, Lalibela, Kariega … so what are the main differences ?

This may, I hope, shed some light for potential visitors to this area !

The reserves of the Eastern Cape range in size – anything from 5,000 hectares to 25,000 hectares. They are all privately owned, which means that the rangers have the freedom to drive off-road if there is a particular sighting that they want their guests to get close to – a pride of lions snoozing under a tree, for example !

The reserves all operate independently from each other, and each therefore have their own wildlife stock - the larger reserves such as Shamwari and Kwandwe can obviously sustain more wildlife in terms of actual physical numbers, and can also sustain species such as wild dog, who need an incredibly large home territory to hunt over - but the privilege of this is reflected in the rates.

The smaller reserves such as Amakhala, Lalibela, Pumba and Kariega, which tend to be around the 5,000 - 8,000 hectare size, do have to limit the number of predators - for example, a small reserve can only sustain a few lion, or else they would find their entire buffalo population is wiped out very quickly by hungry lions !

If Shamwari or Kwandwe fall within your budget, then in all honesty a 2 or 3 night safari in one of these lodges would give you a more rounded safari experience by dint purely of the size. 

Staying in either of these reserves means you will generally not see the road / reserve perimeter fence line at all during your stay, whereas in the smaller reserves you may well come across the fence line during a game drive - especially in Amakhala, as the lions are kept in a separate 1,000 hectares on one side of the road, so to get between this and the main part of the reserve you do cross under the main N2 road via an underpass - which can detract from the overall feeling of being totally immersed in your bush / safari experience.

However, to be forewarned is to be prepared - we had some wonderful sightings when we stayed at Amakhala, which included a cheetah mum and 3 cubs on an impala kill just a few meters from the N2 – which more than compensated for the highway encounter !

Kariega is also a ’split’ reserve, with the lions and elephants being kept separate in one part of the reserve, but you don’t go near the N2 at all - however you do cross over a minor road between the 2 parts of the reserve.

Whichever lodge you choose, you will still come away with memories of a wildlife encounter that will last a lifetime.

We are delighted to be able to offer 3 nights for the price of 2 for people booking a safari in the malaria-free Lalibela Reserve between 1 November and 31 January (excluding 15 December to 10 January inclusive.).

Lalibela is a 7,500 hectare Big 5 reserve near Port Elizabeth and the Garden Route, and this offer is valid for all new bookings at Lentaba, Tree Tops Lodge and Mark’s Camp.   All meals, drinks (excluding premium wines) and 2 daily game drives are included.