On arrival at Cape Town International Airport you are greeted and transferred straight to More Quarters Hotel where you enjoy the independence and flexibility of having your own self-catering apartment with the conveniences of hotel facilities – a concierge service, laundry and of course breakfast. The hotel is set just off Kloof Street, home to a great range of restaurants, and you have a large supermarket right across the street. With two full days in store, you have time to explore the city and local attractions such as the V&A Waterfront and the beaches of Camps Bay as well as the must-see destinations south of the city: the penguins of Boulders Beach and the wave-thumped tip of land that ends the peninsula, Cape Point. Ask us about booking suitable day tours or talk to the concierge at the hotel.

You swap an urban environment for a rural one today but the mountain scenery remains. Instead of Table Mountain, you now have the Stellenbosch Mountains as your backdrop while you check into the Spier Hotel, set on the eponymous wine estate and your leafy retreat for the next two nights. There is plenty to do for all ages at Spier – markets to shop at, local cheeses and chocolates to taste, great wines to sample, farm walks, art exhibitions, and a bird of prey sanctuary to visit. Supervised play rooms and a baby-sitting service means that parents can also have a bit of time to themselves too – this is the Winelands after all.

A transfer back to Cape Town Airport and a flight to the town of Hoedspruit takes you to within arm’s length of the Kruger National Park. But your destination is a private reserve that adjoins the Kruger, giving you all the wildlife of South Africa’s best safari destination but in an exclusive and unspoilt setting. You check into an air-conditioned two-bedroom chalet at Simbavati River Lodge and can look forward to morning and afternoon game drives with sharp-eyed guides on the lookout for the classic Big 5 animals – lion, leopard, buffalo, rhino and elephant – plus hippo, giraffe, zebra and all the other animals from our story books.

Younger children won’t be left behind in the fun: the lodge provides supervised activities that range from archery and animal tracking to pizza making. And because Timbavati is a private reserve, you can also look forward to opportunities to explore on foot with your guide as well as spot-lit night drives, a rare treat and the best way to see Africa’s elusive nocturnal creatures such as bush babies and porcupines.

After breakfast at the lodge you are driven back to Hoedspruit Airport for your onward travel arrangements and the end of this tour.