The trip to South Africa was truly amazing. I was a bit anxious about doing a Christmas - New Years trip where flight from Seattle to Johannesburg was going through New York when just the year before there had been a huge snowstorm that delayed flights for days around the same time. However, luck was with me this trip and the weather was good.

Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe -

They only get two flights a day, so the international airport had a vintage feel exiting the plane from a set of boarding stairs outside and walking across the tarmac to the terminal. An experience only offset by the fact that they have quite possibly the surliest immigrations staff you are ever likely to encounter.

Travel Tip: If you are visiting Zimbabwe be sure to bring US dollars in small denominations. The Zimbabwean dollar apparently totally collapsed in 2009 and foreign currencies (primarily US dollars) are now used for all transactions.

But other than the exotic wildlife, Victoria Falls could be a small rural town almost anywhere.

After coming halfway around the globe, obviously the highlight of the planned visit here was to see Victoria Falls itself since it is one of the Seven Natural Wonders of the World. From the hotel we could see the towering cloud that rises into the sky from the falls in the distance, but up close on the pathways to the various viewpoints on the Zimbabwe side of the falls all that water comes back down like a constant heavy rain. In places it was too wet to even try taking pictures, but I still tried to take as many shots as I could, and the little Olympus camera survived even though it did have a watermark across one side of the LCD screen for days afterwards.

I only scheduled a couple of days at Victoria Falls on this trip, enough for a visit to the falls, an evening cruise on the Zambezi, and a little free time for something optional. If I had allowed another day or two I might have gone over the border to see the Zambia side of the falls, taken one of the Botswana safari day trips, or perhaps even a helicopter tour of the falls. But I did have time to do the "Walk with Lions" conducted to support the African Lion Rehabilitation & Release into the Wild Program (www.lionencounter.com).

Walk with Lions was absolutely one of the most incredible experiences of my life! The lions you interact with on the walk are young adults which are used to humans, but the opportunity to get up close to these magnificent animals is just awesome! Something truly one of a kind, and to know that it supports such an important and worthy cause just makes it all the better...

Cape Town, South Africa -

The flight out of Zimbabwe was probably most interesting for the fact that it is the one I have ever been on where a flight attendant walked throught the cabin with a bug bomb before take off. Then when we got to Cape Town our schedule got a bit jumbled by the fact that the Robbin Island tour had been overbooked, and the cable car to the top of Table Mountain was closed due to high winds for a couple of days. But I think we still managed to get in most of what had been planned for the tour.

On our first day in Cape town we started off with a drive south along the Atlantic coast to Hout Bay where we took a boat trip around Duiker Island (Seal Island) to see the wild cape fur seals on the rocks there. They say that sometimes you might see sharks there too, but the waters were a bit rough the day we went out so if there were any sharks around that day I must have missed them.

Our tour then continued on to Cape Point in the Cape of Good Hope Nature Reserve. I think even if you didn't know geographically that you were on the southernmost point of the African continent there is still some small sense that there is something different here. From up on the rocks by the lighthouse, looking out on the ocean to the south you can just start to see the curvature of the horizon.

Returning to Cape Town we traveled through Simon's Town to see the African Penguin colony at Boulders Beach. The Penguins are smaller birds than I had imagined, and while it is easy to see them grouped on the beach sand while wandering the wooden walkways around their habitat it is easier to miss them in the grasses and trees.

During the rest of the stay in Cape Town we visited the Kirstenbosch National Botanical Gardens, took a side trip to Paarl to sample wine and cheese at the "Goats do Roam" winery, and celebrated New Years Eve at the Cape Town waterfront where we saw fireworks over the World ship. On the last day we also finally got to take the revolving cable car up to the top of table mountain too, although we skipped the Robbins Island tour to do it.

Hoedspruit, South Africa -

Of course, when in Africa one imagines the opportunity to see big game animals in the wild and on this trip we got our chance to do just that while staying at the Kapama River Lodge for a few days. Located in the Greater Kruger National Park region Kapama is the largest private game reserve, although I'm not sure you could actually call it a safari when the facilities are sophisticated enough to rival a five star resort with a wine cellar, swimming pool, and spa (even the tents had indoor plumbing and minibars according to the brochure). But it was still exciting.

They do two 3-4 hour game drives a day with a ranger as a guide at the wheel of the open topped LandCruisers and a tracker on a seat above the front bumper. On our first afternoon-evening drive we went off-roading for glimpses of a leopard moving though the brush with a fresh kill, and just after dark saw a pair of female lions with a couple of cubs.

Johannesburg, South Africa -

Jo'burg was the final stop on this tour. Here we visited Soweto (southwestern township) which contains the historic homes of Nelson Mandela (now a museum), Desmond Tutu, the Regina Mundi church, and Hector Pieterson Memorial for the 12-year-old that was the first person killed during the Soweto Uprising in 1976. Nelson Mandela Square which contains an immense shopping mall (a hotel and casino too), the Apartheid Museum which is a large and richly detailed presentation covering about 60 years of South African history, and Lion Park where we got to interact with some of the animals including white lion cubs.

Our final group dinner was at Carnivore Johannesburg. There are Carnivore Restaurants in many parts of Africa, basically the concept is that they serve meat from a dozen or more animals including African game animals like crocodile, zebra, giraffe, impala, ostrich, etc., and you eat as much as you can. Honestly, fine dining it is not, and if got away from the hotel buffet to try local restaurants better dishes with even the exotic game animals were not hard to come by. But if you want to tell your co-workers that you went to "Carnivore", by all means go for it...

South Africa Tour - December 2011

Antarctica - November 2012

Tokyo, Japan - September 2011