Ultimate Africa Safari with Overseas Adventure Travel (OAT)–Botswana, Zambia, Zimbabwe including Victoria Falls was the best adventure ever.
Shortly after booking a trip to Southern Italy with Rick Steve’s Travel we received a phone call from our good friends, the Walters asking if we would like to join them on an Ultimate Safari to Africa. I really didn’t want to go to South Africa and join a Safari, but my wife insisted that the trip was on her “Bucket List” so I reluctantly agreed to the trip. Now that we are back, I can say that there are absolutely no regrets. This was truly an amazing adventure!
It is a very long way from San Francisco to Johannesburg, SA–eleven hours to Heathrow in London, then another eleven hours to Joburg. There were six of us that rented a car at O.R. Tambo airport and made our way to the Ascot Boutique Hotel on Grant Avenue in the Norwood section of Gauteng, Johannesburg, South Africa. We did have directions to the hotel, but it is extremely difficult to find street signs and often times the name of a street changes without warning. We had to make numerous turn adjustments and stops to figure out that we passed our original turnoff miles ago. When we finally arrived at the hotel, the staff at the Ascot Boutique was awesome–not only in recommending things to do, but providing with new printed copies of directions to places we decided to visit. It is extremely difficult to find a city map of Johannesburg (Joburg). We even stopped in several shops and bookstores in a nearby shopping mall. We did have with the printed directions from the hotel but eventually, I realized that my iPad was perfect for travel. I thought that I had to be on wifi to use the GPS feature, but not so. Once in awhile the GPS would be off a bit, but we definitely didn’t get lost as often. I should clarify that a bit. I was the navigator, and the pilot expected me to tell him exactly when to turn–that didn’t happen all of the time, and in one particular occasion I broke down and basically said f * #k you, and decided to give the navigation job to another (I refused to continue). We ended up getting really lost and went about 100 km out of the way until I got over my brooding. After that my navigating was welcomed.
The location was perfect for us to find several wonderful restaurants. We only picked two main restaurants during our eventual four nights at the hotel–the Fireside, and the Schwarma Company on Grant Avenue. I would strongly recommend both restaurants. For example, I could have had a one-pound T-Bone steak at the Fireside and salad for about 160 Rand or about $13.00. I had an Ostrich filet for one of our dinners–excellent! Breakfast was served as part of the room cost at the Ascot, and this was not the typical continental breakfast. We had a waiter, were served great coffee, ordered breakfast from the menu, had juice, fruit if wanted, macon-not bacon, omelettes or whatever. I looked forward to breakfast.
The menu shown will give some small idea of Schwarma Company. This is basically a very popular falafel house on
Grant. The prices are in Rand. A U.S. dollar is about 15 R. The Meze Platter at about $6.75 is way more food that one person should eat at one sitting–with a choice of several “salads”. When they refer to salad think of most any salad topping that you can think of heaped onto a pita bread. The most expensive item single choice on the menu is more than a half pound steak for $12.00 and as you will notice this is served with chips or rice/beans or salad. Eating in a Johannesburg restaurant was a real treat. I too am confused by what I wrote. A starter priced at 60 Rand or about $4.00 is what I would normally call a falafel wrap. Hummus and meat for less than $6.00 would include the meat and a choice of three or four of their salads–like filled with any of the items shown.
During the first three days in Joburg, we visited Constitution Hill, the Apharteid museum, and several sites in The Cradle of Humankind. More to come regarding these ventures. 
The Maropeng caves visit was much like going to Disneyland or the Exploratorium in San Francisco. I was very impressed with their displays. From Joburg we also took a trip to the Bush Babies Monkey Sanctuary, and the adjoining Elephant Sancturay. This was an excellent way to get a pre-Safari feeling for wildlife.
After three days in the big city, we flew to Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe to begin our “Ultimate Safari“. Much more to come but I have added a several photos to perhaps gain some interest.
While at Chobe National Park in Botswana, we witnessed an event rarely seen by even the guides. We watched a pack of lions peacefully sunning themselves at a distance of about 50 yards. All of a sudden, a young elephant came out of the bush and everyone in our group feared what was next to happen. The elephant, for some reason or other, was alone and was spotted by the pack of lions. We witnessed the takedown and the beginning of the end of the elephant. 
I filmed and took photos during quite a bit of the event and watched the elephant get up twice! The elephant eventually got up three times, and it survived for about 45 minutes. One of my friends took a video of the entire event.
By the way, if you browse the slider (slide show) using the left arrow, it will roughly follow our trip.
I decide to insert a section for each section of the Safari. I begin writing this section 3 months ago, and am barely having time to write. Seems as if my time has been spent answering comments.