Instead of embarking on a safari holiday why not consider making a difference to the South African wildlife and volunteer to work on one of the many conservation projects that are ongoing. By working together with people from around the world there is an opportunity to work on real conservation project that can benefit the community.

One of the most exciting projects is the wildlife veterinary project which offers you the opportunity to join the day to day activities of an experienced wildlife veterinarian in South Africa. This may involve assisting with wildlife capture, putting tracking collars on predators for research purposes or micro-chipping the horn of a rhino.

Another project that directly involves contact with wildlife is working in a rehabilitation centre for injured, poisoned and confiscated animals and birds. As a volunteer, you’ll be helping with the daily care for all the animals, from feeding them and cleaning their enclosures, to nursing infant wildlife and helping with rehabilitation and releasing recovered animals into the wild.

If you fancy volunteering on South Africa’s coast then there are costal conservation projects available where you will get the opportunity to join in with the marine conservation work done by this incredible project. This may involve monitoring dolphin, whale and seal populations and helping with hands-on conservation work like turtle and penguin rehabilitation or beach clean-ups.

If you are considering going on a safari holiday, you will need to spend a little bit of extra time planning and preparing if you are going to be taking children with you. Safaris can be an amazing experience for all the family, but some places are simply not suitable for children.

Did you know that children of all ages now need their own passport? Previously babies were able to be on their mother’s passport but recently the law has changed meaning even a newborn child will require their own to travel abroad.

A new passport for a child costs £49 and the application can be done online. You need to allow at least three weeks for the passports to arrive so make sure you apply in plenty of time. Ideally you should apply for a passport at least 6 weeks in advance of the safari trip.

The initial passport will be valid until the child reaches the age of five regardless of how much they change. The rules regarding the actual image for a under 6’s passport are also a little more lenient, such that a child under one can have their eyes closed and under 6 do not have to have a neutral expression on their face.

Wedding and safari are not usually two words you would put together, but it can make for a wonderful experience.

South Africa may be a popular destination for honeymoon holidays, but did you know that you can have your wedding in the African bush? Safari’s offer a once in a lifetime opportunity to really get drawn into the wildlife and sights that places like South Africa has to offer. There is truly nothing like seeing a lion sunbathing in the plains of Africa or watching a elephant bath in the water hole so it makes sense to combine your once in a life time wedding day with all that a safari has to offer. Choosing a South African wedding venue with a safari theme for your big day not only gives you the opportunity of experiencing something very different with your family and friends but also allows you to create the sensational wedding of your dreams.

Planning a wedding in a safari destination may take a little more planning and will often mean that your wedding will have to be a smaller one than if you had it in the UK but it will certainly make your memorable day even more special.

It is no secret that South Africa is one of the best destination for a safari holiday. With its perfect climate and huge population of different types of animals, its easy to see why thousands of people flock here every year to experience it for themselves. The weather in South Africa means that bushes, trees and grass thrive when needed and provide plenty of food for the wildlife.

Travel arrangements are imperative when organising your safari holiday and you take time to plan them carefully to ensure you can get to and from your destination. You also need to decide what type of safari you want to do. There are a number of different types of safari holidays such as self-drive, guided tour, trekking safari and even hot air balloon safari trips. 

It may be that you need to fly to a main airport in South Africa and then travel by car or further smaller flights to get to your final destination.

If you fancy a challenge and are not afraid of a bit of hard work, then a walking or biking safari may be the one for you. If you are looking for something a little more relaxing then taking a guided tour bus or jeep may be the best option.

The main holiday season is fast approaching and if you are not jetting off this Easter then you may be planning a summer getaway instead. For some people, a pool, sun and sand is all you need to be able to enjoy your holiday but for others, they may want a little bit more adventure. You may often travel thousands of miles to another part of the world and yet do you really get to explore the area and the culture and find out about how the local people live?
You can learn a lot about a culture of a particular country or group of people from studying historical places, sampling the local traditional dishes and spending time with the local people, understanding more about their day to day life. Some may say that it is a bit of a waste to go all that way away from home and not get involved in exploring your surroundings but for others this may not be what they want from a holiday.
Going on a cultural holiday does not mean you cannot have time lazing by the pool or topping your tan up, it just means that within that, you get to do some discovering and sample a bit more of what that country has to offer.

The most obvious fact about giraffes is that they are tall – they are the tallest mammals on the planet. They have very long legs – longer than the average height of a human – and very long necks. They tend to eat leaves from trees, wrapping their long tongues around them to grab hold of them, but get a lot of their water from the plants too. Their necks are too short to reach the ground comfortably, so on the rare occasions they drink water they need to kneel down to do so.

Giraffes spend the vast majority of their lives standing. Calves are born whilst the mother is standing – dropped to Earth from quite a height! They even sleep standing up, although they only need half an hour or less per day and often have tiny power naps spread across the day.

Despite their size, giraffes are prey for some animals such as lions and hyenas. They are therefore surprisingly quick, even though they generally appear quite docile. They can also fight between themselves – the hairy lumps on a giraffes head are called ossicones and the males sometimes use these hairy horns to attack each other.

When planning a safari holiday it is important to research the area to find out what time of year is best to go and what animals you can expect to see. You may think that you can go on a safari holiday in Africa any time and see the same sights, but this is simply not true.

If for example you are interested in seeing the gorillas then you may want to consider booking a gorilla trek rather than a jeep safari as this is the only way to get up close to the animals in their natural environment. Gorilla treks are not for the faint hearted but off re some amazing experiences that you could only imagine.

Find out before you go what times the safari trips are and how you will be getting around. You should be given a rough itinerary that will tell you day by day what you will be doing. If there is something missing off the trip that you would like to do, then why not ask your tour operator before you book the holiday if there is a chance that you can add it in.

Giraffes are amongst the most highly rated animals to see whilst on safari in Africa, but what exactly makes them so special? Well here are some interesting giraffe facts:

A baby giraffe, known as a calf, is born with the mother giraffe standing up, this means that the poor baby has a 6-foot drop to the floor to make its dramatic arrival! It will then get up and walk within five or so minutes.

All giraffes have a blue tongue! This tongue is about 50 cm long and is cable or reaching and stripping leaves of high branches to give the giraffes the best nutrition.

Giraffes have special veins in their neck which have valves in them that control the blood flow so that they can lower their head to drink without passing out. They don’t need to drink often and can live matters of weeks without drinking water! Pretty impressive and very useful in Africa’s dry season.

But don’t expect to hear much from giraffes whilst on safari as they are naturally very quiet animals and tend not to cry out to each other unless distressed.

Defiantly one to see the giraffe truly is one of Africa’s greats!

Safari holidays are not cheap and combined with the long flight times from the UK to South Africa (most popular safari destination) are often not suitable for families with young children. If this is the case then why not let your children experience the next best thing and boost their education at the same time.

Many safari parks across the UK offer educational workshops. Although these are entirely different from going on an actually safari, they can be fun and educational at the same time. These workshops usually include time behind the scenes with the animals such as helping feed them, clean them out and observing their behaviour with humans and other animals. There is often a chance to meet with the other staff members and ask them questions about their day to day job and also time to play and participate in games. Often these trips are organised by schools, but if you can get a group of children who want to go, you can sometimes book these workshops privately.

A recent incident of Lions killing several cattle in Kenya’s Masai Mara has led to reprisals from the local herdsmen, who laced a carcass with pesticide. Two of the lions succumbed to the poison and a third was trampled by buffalo, being too weak to escape. Happily, a further eight lions appear to have recovered from the poisoning and are now doing well.

The news made headlines as the Lions in question where from the Marsh Pride, which was the focus of the long running BBC programme Big Cat Diary. The lion’s plight was discovered by a BBC film crew who noticed several lions going into spasm’s. The herdsmen are being charged with using chemicals to deliberately kill wildlife.

The incident highlights the tensions that arise from farmers trying to make a living sharing land with large predators. While it’s natural to feel sympathy only for the lions, iconic wildlife like this can only be protected by supporting and understanding the needs of the people sharing their environment.