Go Touch Down Travel & Tours

Great itinerary and guides, and but a couple things need to be tightened up.

Generally, for less than a two week trip, the itinerary was perfect to get a great flavor and feel for what South Africa has to offer. Essentially the first week is for a Safari out of Johannesburg with the second portion being a number of days in Cape Town. We cannot say enough great things about the guides and drivers at all locations. Top notch! They went above and beyond what could have been expected catering to our schedule and “off tour” trips and experiences.
The price was really a great value considering all that was included. You get to see and do so much. For a ten day tour, you come away feeling that you have accomplished a lot of what you need to say you have seen and gotten a feel for South Africa.
However, there are a couple things which need to be tightened up to make this a true five star experience. There is no way to say this that doesn’t sound like an entitled tourist, but here goes. The bar set up at Hamala Lodge has to be updated to service its guests. One example. on the first morning of our several day Safari tour based at the Humala River Lodge, one of our party ordered a Bloody Mary. The bartender, a great young gentleman named Blessing, could not have been more accommodating and was able to make several Bloody Marys. The other half of the group also staying in the Hamala River Lodge at the same time, heard our order and also ordered Bloody Marys. Turned out that the 6–7 Bloody Marys completely wiped out the bar’s ability to make Bloody Marys for the rest of our stay. It would appear to be a very easy fix to have either a greater supply of Bloody Mary mix available to the bar or have someone run out the approximately 45 minutes – one hour to the town right outside the reserve to resupply the bar with Bloody Mary mix. Again, not a big deal, but such an easy fix.
The seafood restaurant for lunch in Cape Town prior to the boat tour should be deleted from the itinerary. It’s a tourist trap with no real flavor or anything special to either Africa or Cape Town. A more traditional African restaurant would be a much better option.
More importantly, there was some transfer issues that, again, would appear to be easily addressed and corrected. On the first day on our arrival from the US following a 14 hour flight, 9 passengers were transported from the airport in an 8 passenger van to the Seasons Resort. The last thing I needed was to have to sit on an armrest of the van for about the hour transfer to the Resort following that long flight. Again, not. a deal breaker, but Go Touchdown knew how many would be on the transfer, and could easily have provided more suitable transportation.
Lastly, one of group was completely left off the flight to Cape Town. Fortunately, we caught the error and we’re able to have the fourth person in our group added to the flight. Inexplicably, that same person was given a different flight back from Cape Town to Johannesburg. We were unable to get them on our same flight. They had to take a much later flight which was delayed causing a big rush in Johannesburg to make the flight home. Lastly, and again, as all the flight arrangements had to be left to Go Touchdown, and particularly after leaving this person off the flight to Cape Town, not having them booked on the same flight as the rest of our party to Johannesburg is just inexcusable.