Mary Ann Ramsey, Owner and President of Betty Mclean Travel, and her husband just returned from a three-week southern Africa adventure. The trip included South Africa, Botswana and `Namibia. Abercrombie & Kent managed the trip details, camps, lodges and hotel destinations.
A&K also organized all of the internal flights required to visit the destinations.
The first stop after flying in to Johannesburg, and staying overnight at the fabulous Saxon Hotel (truly one of the world’s best hotels) was Sanctuary Chiliwero on the Chobe River in Botswana. The Chobe River is the border between Zambia and Botswana. In addition to the several traditional game drives, there were some fabulous private river excursions. Mary Ann has been to Africa many times but every visit there is something new and amazing. They saw the biggest hippo grazing out of the water, either had ever seen. There were hippos all over the place in the water along with what had to be the biggest crocodile either had ever seen. There were nice herds of a variety of antelope, warthog and elephants that were swimming and playing in the river!
They then flew to Sanctuary Stanley’s Camp located on a 260,000-acre private reserve in the Okavango Delta bordering the Moremi Game Reserve. Lots of lazy well-fed lions and elephants as well as a pack of wild African Dogs.
One of the highlights of Stanley’s was following a beautiful leopard as it began its evening hunt. To gain a better view of the surrounding area, it climbed up on a termite mound just as the sun was setting behind him.
Next stop was a short flight to Chief’s Camp on Chef’s Island. On the very first game drive they were able to track a mother leopard leading her cub to a recent kill that she had stashed in thick brush. The mother leopard allowed the cub to find the impala, and they were able to watch it feed. After the cub had completed its meal, mother and cub reunited as they licked each other’s chops and they cuddled in the sweetest way. They also had a private helicopter flight and visited Xigera a luxury safari lodge, and Jao, a very unique safari lodge. The view of the delta from the helicopter was spectacular and so was their stop for Sundowners.
The next day they flew to Windhoek Namibia where they over nighted at Habitas Namibia a very stylish tented camp on a 70,000-acre private reserve. From there they had a private bush pilot fly them to Sanctuary Elephant Lodge in northern Namibia. The topography and scenery was out of this world.
The next stop, also by way of private flight, was to Sanctuary River Lodge, located just across the river from Angola.
Another private flight brought them back to Windhoek where they spent a few days at the wonderful Omaanda, a collection of ten Owambo thatch and clay huts that were as luxurious as any 5-star hotel. They could sit on their balcony and watch African wildlife come to the watering pond.
Last but not least, off to the One & Only Hotel Capetown. It was time to enjoy a little civilization before heading home. They also visited the Silo hotel where they met up with a client for lunch at the Willaston Bar. Afterwards, with and A&K private driver, they did some sightseeing of Table Mountain, Clifton, the beaches and Constantia the oldest winery region in South Africa.
Mary Ann is an African expert and has been to Africa over 20 times. She always takes the time to explore and research on behalf of her clients that are interested in visiting the African continent.
