SOUTH AFRICA

It's a little difficult to give much valid information on our current trip through Seffrica as it was essentially a "farewell" trip with us visiting friends and family in Port Elizabeth, Cape Town and the West Coast before making a bee-line for the Namibian border.
We can't give accomodation information - well, we could, but I don't think our friends would like hordes of travellers arriving on their doorsteps and wanting free bed and breakfast for the night - but we can list what we consider our highlights in Seffrica. These are places we will definitely be going back to on future trips. Most of them require your own transport to appreciate fully.
Starting in the North, Kruger National Park - all of it - must rate as one of the best features of the country. The Lowveld of Mpumalanga and Northern Province are also great. Further west and midway between Naboomspruit and Nylstroom is the Nylsvley Nature Reserve which is particularly great for birding on the floodplain and walking in the veld.
Still further west is Pilanesberg Nature Reserve which is our idea of what a zoo should be.
In Zululand, anyone who doesn't visit Ndumo Game Reserve on the Mozambique border and Kosi Bay if they get the chance are complete fools. Sodwana Bay is also special, but try and avoid times when fishermen and 4x4 owners are present (I know it's difficult!).
Mkuzi and Hluhluwe game reserves are also spectacular, with us narrowly missing seeing a black rhino wander through the campsite at Mkuzi.
The Drakensberg are brilliant, whether you view them from the KwaZulu-Natal side or along the eastern Free State-Lesotho border. Each side has a different feel but both are awesome.
Hogsback, in the Eastern Cape is great for a couple of days of complete relaxation, has a great mountain bike race in June (I'm reliably informed) and, if you're lucky, is a good place for a snowball fight in winter.
The passes of the Southern Cape, all the way from Port Elizabeth to Cape Town, are isolated, quiet, marvellous feats of early Cape roadbuilders and deserve a visit.
While the coastal road is also beautiful, it is worth taking a couple of days to explore Meirings Poort, Swartberg Pass (with a detour down to The Hell just for, well, the hell of it), Seweweeks Poort and Robinson Pass.
Visit the indigenous forests between Storms River and Knysna but stop for at least a night at Storms River Mouth in the Tsitsikamma Forest and Coastal National Park and don't pay the tool fees on the national road at Nature's Valley: the old road down the passes is far more scenic, has great birding and the sea is wonderful for a swim at Nature's Valley.
Cape Agulhas, the southern-most point of Africa, is a bit of boredom (I'm not surprised it got stuck so far out of the way!). Far better is a visit to Hermanus to see the whales (turn your back on the commercialism, literally, and you can watch these enormously graceful creatures) before heading for Cape Town. Don't spend too long in the City Bowl or on the Atlantic shore or you'll pick up a strange accent and think you're really cool. Instead, head up the mountain, on foot (there are loads of good guidebooks), then travel south to False Bay, stopping for dinner or a dop at the Brass Bell in Kalk Bay, a wander around Simon's Town and a swim with the penguins at Boulders Beach (the best on the peninsula) before reaching the Cape of Good Hope Nature Reserve and Cape Point.
The West Coast of Seffrica has numerous great spots, including Langebaan Lagoon, the Cedarberg Mountains (again, go hiking - maps from the forestry station), Citrusdal and Clanwilliam and the Fish River joining them. Namaqualand is aridly beautiful, whether the flowers are out or not. The stretch from Calvinia to the Namibian border might not suit everyone's taste but it is starkly beautiful and peaceful and certainly shouldn't be driven through at high speed (or hot weather!).
The Orange River is a strip of greenery in the midst of drab sand and rock and the area around Upington is fascinating, as is the Augrabies Falls. The final destination in our potted tour of Seffrica is the Kalahari Gemsbok National Park (although it's name is slightly different now that it is part of a transfrontier park) where dryness and sand are the ruling factors.
There are many other places worth visiting but they are too numerous to list and anyway, we need to keep some spots secret for the locals!
Here are the pages we posted on Seffrica:

PORT ELIZABETH
We have a lift-off, albeit a very slow one, and we've reached the coast without any further major mishaps.

CAPE TOWN
The unfairest Cape and all that, with some nice sights, some nice company and some (more) bloody thieves.