Untouched Southern Africa: Safari, Swaziland & Lesotho Tour

Africa's fables start with wild mammals, the true giants of the savannah. They're quick to leave an impression as elephant and buffalo herds are regularly seen around the Sabi Sands airstrip. After landing at O. R. Tambo International in Johannesburg, it's a short domestic flight into this Sabi Sands wilderness, where you're picked up in an open-sided safari vehicle for the first in a series of game drives. Paw prints in the sand lead you to a leopard's hideout, high in a sausage tree. A pair of rhino wander past, elegantly, stoically, every footstep a display of defiance against poaching. Giraffes dapple the horizon, and you quickly come to recognize the different antelopes, from nimble springbok to large bashful hartebeest.

An intimate lodge provides the base for the next two nights in this private reserve. It's a gentle introduction to Africa, wild sounds accompanying the evening yet opulent fittings providing a Western-style luxury. Your private terrace overlooks a floodlit waterhole, helping bring safari sights long into the evening. Today's afternoon's game drive is flexible dependent on your mood and energy levels; perhaps a short loop around the surrounding savannah or a longer journey attempting to spot all the revered mammals on your first day in Africa. As with most days on the itinerary, meals are included, and local guides offer a fascinating insight.

Echoed grunts accompany breakfast, the guttural sounds of male lions in the nearby bush. Head out in the morning light and the whole pride is revealed, including small cubs who wrestle besides their father's flowing mane. Zebras skip across the short grasses while the sight of buffalo and elephant are starting to become commonplace. Head down to the Sabi River and a procession of wildlife waits to drink, the queue dictated by the size and aggression. Spotted hyena nip in front of a kudu herd, using a snarl that also causes three giraffes to lope away. It's this permanent water fixture that attracts so much life to the Sabi Sands, a private reserve that shares unfenced borders with Kruger National Park. Compact and captivating, the reserve is home to both diverse species and abundant big game. For this reason, it's an idyllic place to start an African adventure, enjoying a landscape that preserves the ancient rhythm of nature. Today's game drives are flexible, usually with a few hours of downtime at the lodge during the middle of the afternoon.

Kruger's scale is legendary, endless square miles of savannah sweeping across the northeast corner of South Africa. To cross it is a journey of a lifetime, the road twisting past popular waterholes and wide grazing lands. For a few hours, it feels like the Kruger will never end, and rhinos and elephants will keep appearing at every corner. But gradually the roads ascends into the mountains, before sharply rising towards the clouds and the Kingdom of Swaziland.

Descend from the pass and you immediately sense a new realm. Colored circular huts dapple the green hills, each a small homestead surrounded by maize crops and wandering goat herds. Tribal dress, particularly headwear, remains popular here, and you pass many women clad in traditional outfits. Many wave hello as you wind up and down the hills. A local Swazi guide joins you for this portion of the trip, and you're free to stop in different villages as you travel to the Ezulwini Valley in the heart of the country. Here you stay at Mlilwane Wildlife Sanctuary, where wild zebra and warthog roam past your verandah. A traditional dinner, cooked over the fire, continues your introduction to the country.

Big cats don't occupy Mlilwane, making it a safe place for mountain bike safari. Spend two of the morning's hours peddling around, getting close to a wide range of different antelope. For the rest of the day, you journey into Swaziland's villages, starting with the ancestral home of the royal family. Princes and princesses continue to live here – the last king had 70 wives and over 200 children – and you could meet them while exploring local traditions. Try maize beer, meet village elders, stop at an art gallery in a mud hut, and discover some of the traditions that live on in this remarkable country. Swaziland still has a number of fascinating local festivals, including the Reed Dance, where unmarried women from across the country come to dance for the king, who traditionally picks a new wife at the ceremony. Timing your arrival for a local festival is the finest immersion in what Swaziland is all about. Rather than following the line towards Westernization, this country proudly continues the customs that have served it for centuries.

Swaziland is small; its size dwarfed by that of nearby Kruger National Park. It takes less than two hours to leave the Ezulwini Valley and descend into Zululand to the south. Along the way, the guide can continue the local immersion with stops in a variety of villages, markets, waterfalls, and canyons. Descend into the land of the Zulu and you don't need road signs to indicate a change of country. Faces are different, landscapes have switched from bucolic to exotic, and a soft haze rises from the Indian Ocean. For two nights, you're staying in St Lucia, where white sand and palm trees provide a new postcard image on Africa's beauty. The afternoon and evening are at your leisure.

Africa's oldest game reserve has played a pioneering conservation role, protecting dozens of species in a land that's been scarred by various wars. White rhinos have been a major benefactor, and there are close to a thousand in this small reserve. You'll have the opportunity to meet conservationists before taking a game drive across the park's rolling savannah. While the game isn't quite as plentiful as in the Sabi Sands, there's an iconic mystique to the reserve and the conservationist guide can lead you directly to the hangouts of various lion prides and rhino families. You'll arrive back in St Lucia around mid afternoon, where a sunset boat cruise across the iSimangaliso wetlands continues the safari theme, this time bringing continual encounters with hippos and elephants.

Today you cross Zululand, a local guide using the journey to reveal the tales of the land's past. Pass a series of battlefields, both those from the time of King Shaka Zulu and those from the Anglo-Boer wars. Howick Falls provides a scenic interlude, just along from the site where Nelson Mandela was arrested in 1962. Rolling across The Valley of 1,000 Hills you stop to visit a sangoma, a traditional doctor or healer, in his incense-filled circular hut. There's a chance to wear local clothes in one of the valley's small villages along the route, and an opportunity for the tribal drums to be beaten for your arrival. Continue towards the mountains, winding towards the peaks that the Zulu know as uKhahlamba, the Barrier of Spears, referring to when the Basotho people defended their new Lesotho territory from the summit. It's a full day of driving, with countless places to stop en route. After arriving, views towards the Amphitheatre mountains provide pure serenity.

Historic tales are painted onto the walls of the mountains. They're drawn by bushmen, narrating of successful hunts, prowling leopards, and the arrival of the white man. Over 40,000 paintings can be found in this World Heritage site, and an expert guide helps you connect the storylines. By hiking and driving, you explore the art, for either half or a full day. The other great Drakensberg attractions are the hiking trails, winding beneath the vertical faces and along the 3,000-meter summits, including a five-hour hike to the world's second highest waterfall. As always, having a private local guide enables today's tour to be completely flexible and adapted to your interests, whether that's exclusively rock art or also the hiking trails.

One of Africa's most adventurous roads zigzags into Lesotho. Eight miles of steep switchbacks are only drivable by four-wheel drive, the road cutting a stark path into the dramatic country. Enter Lesotho and you might expect the mountains to continue. But they don't. A plateau extends, fiercely protected by jagged peaks on all sides. You've entered a new world, one without paved roads, where messages are passed on by riders on their ponies. Bumping across the country, you pass semi-nomadic shepherds in their thick woolen blankets and gumboots, the local guide interpreting when you'd like to stop and stay hello.

Villages are little more than a small cluster of huts, where men as young as 30 sit in their retired bliss; most shepherds start work aged 11, getting paid in animals. By the age of 30, they've gathered a large enough herd to sit back and let the next generation of shepherds do the work. You stop at Malealea, where the accommodation provides a charming base for the next three nights. It's not luxurious – Lesotho doesn't have any truly luxurious accommodation. But it's very comfortable, comes with all the necessary amenities, and there's a wonderful opportunity to feel a part of village life. Traditional meals, cooked in large pots over the fire, continue the local immersion.

The Basotho mostly travel on the back of local ponies, sturdy little rides that can cover huge daily distances. These ponies are also how you will travel for the next two days, cantering across fertile plains backdropped by spiky peaks. Custom dictates that you're welcomed into villages, where locals share food and drink with their guests. Journeys can go in many directions dependent on your energy levels, every angle an expression of open space and opportunity. It's not a point-and-shoot-the-camera cultural experience. It's a raw and rustic journey through a country mostly unseen by foreigners. Spending two full days gives you a chance to move slowly and appreciate the little things that make Lesotho so special. If riding ponies doesn't sound appealing, then these two days can be spent exploring in the four-wheel drive.

Lesotho has a small international airport with daily connections to Johannesburg. After breakfast, you'll be transferred to Moshoeshoe Airport and connect in O. R. Tambo onto your homebound flight.