Journey to South Africa September 13 24, 2016 Sponsored by: South African Tourism, South African Airways & Advantage International

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1 Journey to South Africa September 13 24, 2016 Sponsored by: South African Tourism, South African Airways & Advantage International September 13: Depart from Washington Dulles International Airport (IAD) to Johannesburg, on South African Airways, Africa s Most Awarded Airline. Overnight flight with meals. Advantage International staff members will be onboard with you. September 14: Upon arrival at O. R. Tambo International Airport, we will be met by our Johannesburg tour guides, who will escort us to the Sandton Sun Hotel, located in the upscale suburb of Sandton. This luxurious five-star property will be home for our four-night stay in the Johannesburg. Check in, relax and join us later for a welcome reception hosted by Johannesburg Tourism. September 15: After enjoying breakfast at the hotel, we will gather in the hotel lobby and our local tour guides will escort us to Lesedi Cultural Village. This renowned village is located in the heart of the African bushveld, amid the rocky hills within the Cradle of Humankind, a World Heritage Site. You ll discover the fascinating cultures and traditions of the people of Africa, visit five traditional homesteads inhabited by Zulu, Xhosa, Pedi, Basotho and Ndebele tribes who live according to tribal folklore and traditions of their ancestors. Our culture is the light of our nation whoever walks here amongst our cultures at Lesedi can also see the light. Lunch is included. Return to the hotel and enjoy the international Joy of Jazz festival at the Sandton Convention Center, just a few steps away, accessible via the pedestrian skyway. 1

2 September 16: After enjoying breakfast at the hotel, we will gather in the hotel lobby to meet our escorts, who will take us on a tour of Johannesburg, including stops at the Apartheid Museum as well as Liliesleaf, the secret hideout of Nelson Mandela and others who plotted there to overthrow the apartheid government. Lunch is included. Apartheid Museum The Apartheid Museum opened in 2001 and is acknowledged as the pre-eminent museum in the world dedicated to 20th century South Africa, at the heart of which is the apartheid story. For anyone wanting to understand and experience what apartheid South Africa was really like, a visit to the Apartheid Museum is fundamental. The museum is a beacon of hope, showing the world how South Africa is coming to terms with its oppressive past and working towards a future that all South Africans can call their own. The first of its kind, the museum illustrates the rise and fall of apartheid. It was created by an architectural consortium comprised of several leading architectural firms who conceptualized the design of the building on a seven-hectare stand. The museum is a superb example of design, space and landscape, offering the international community a unique South African experience. The exhibits have been assembled and organized by a multidisciplinary team of curators, filmmakers, historians and designers. They include provocative film footage, photographs, text panels and artifacts illustrating events and human stories that are part of the epic saga known as apartheid. Liliesleaf: Tucked away in the leafy Johannesburg suburb of Rivonia, is Liliesleaf Farm. Once the nerve center of the liberation movement and a place of refuge for its leaders, today Liliesleaf is one of South Africa's foremost, award-winning heritage sites, where the journey to democracy in South Africa is honored. Top off a day immersed in South African history with a walk to the Joy of Jazz festival at the nearby Sandton Convention Center. 2

3 September 17: After enjoying breakfast at the hotel, we will meet in the hotel lobby and our guides will escort us on a tour of the Struggle against Apartheid, in Soweto. We will visit the home of Nelson Mandela, now a museum, as well as the site of the 1976 student uprising and the Hector Pieterson Memorial. Enjoy lunch in Soweto at a local restaurant. Tonight, enjoy the final night of the Joy of Jazz festival. September 18-20: Today, after breakfast and completion of check out procedures, we will leave Johannesburg for a road trip to the Pilanesberg National Park and a twonight stay at the Ivory Tree Lodge, in the heart of the game park. A typical day on safari consists of the following: Times and events subject to change. 5:00 a.m. Wake-up call 5:30 a.m. Game drive 8:30 a.m. Breakfast 1:00 p.m. Lunch 4:00 p.m. High tea 4:30 p.m. Game drive 8:00 p.m. Dinner 3

4 September 20: After breakfast and check-out, we will travel to O.R. Tambo International Airport for our scheduled flight to Cape Town. Our Cape Town guides will meet us at the airport and drive us to the Pepperclub Hotel & Spa for our last three nights. With an unparalleled level of luxury living and sophistication, the cosmopolitan Pepperclub Luxury Hotel & Spa offers unsurpassed service coupled with a superb location. Centrally situated in the energetic party district, where the pulse beats constantly, Pepperclub Luxury Hotel & Spa enjoys panoramic views of the Mother City. This chic hotel offers many five-star luxuries as standard, including the Sinatra s fine-dining restaurant, Paparazzi Cocktail Bar and Piano Lounge, a 29-seat private cinema, the Cayenne Spa and Fitness center and a spectacular rooftop swimming pool offering panoramic views of Table Mountain. September 21: After breakfast, we will visit Table Mountain and tour Cape Point and Cape Peninsula. Lunch is included. Table Mountain By the late 1870's, several of Cape Town's more prominent citizens had suggested the introduction of a railway line to the top of Table Mountain. Plans to implement a proposed rack railway got under way but the outbreak of the Anglo-Boer war put a halt to these efforts. By 1912, with a strong desire to gain easy access to the top of Table Mountain, the Cape Town City Council commissioned an engineer to investigate the various options for public transport to the top. The new cableway was officially opened on October 4, 1997: the anniversary of the original launch, almost 70 years earlier. Cape Point and Cape Peninsula Tour This is an awe-inspiring tour to the towering headland known as Cape Point perceived as the meeting point of the Atlantic and Indian Oceans. En route, we ll see magnificent beaches, breathtaking views, historic and picturesque coastal villages. 4

5 The Cape Peninsula is one of the world's most scenic areas and stretches from the city center to Cape Point. We will travel along the Atlantic Seaboard via Sea Point, Clifton and Camps Bay, stopping at a Llandudno look-out point before continuing to Hout Bay, a quaint village and fishing harbor with magnificent mountain views and beach. We ll proceed through Chapman's Peak, one of the world's most breathtaking coastal drives, to Cape Point and the Good Hope Nature Reserve, which has magnificent fynbos vegetation, birdlife, endemic antelope species and zebra, historic lighthouses and shipwrecks. After lunch at a nearby restaurant, we continue to historic Simon's Town, a village with charming Victorian architecture, a naval base and a large penguin colony at the beautiful Boulders Beach. Boulders Penguin Colony is home to a growing colony of the vulnerable African Penguin. Wooden walkways allow visitors to view the penguins in their natural habitat. Next, we will visit the well-known Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens, one of eight national botanical gardens covering five of South Africa's six different biomes. When Kirstenbosch, the most famous of the gardens, was founded in 1913 to preserve the country's unique flora, it was the first botanical garden in the world with this ethos. The garden is world-renowned for the beauty and diversity of the Cape Flora it displays and for the magnificence of its setting against the eastern slopes of Table Mountain. 5

6 September 22: After breakfast we will venture via ferry from the Waterfront on an emotional journey to Robben Island, home to Nelson Mandela for 18 of the 27 years he spent incarcerated. We will return to hotel in the early afternoon, allowing free time to shop before departing for the Farewell Dinner. Robben Island Formerly the site of a political prison and before that leper colony, this well preserved historic landmark was recently established as a museum and national monument heralding the triumph of freedom, dignity and determination over humiliation and oppression. Experience the conditions of incarceration, view Nelson Mandela's maximum-security prison cell (Cell 5), and see the lime quarries where he and many other prisoners later developed eye problems due to the sun's reflection off the lime surfaces. While serving hard time, these quarries offered opportunities for prisoners to discuss strategy, freedom and the future. No easy road to freedom was a central theme in most of the Mass Democratic Movement's campaigns, from the early days through to the late 1980s. Any understanding of present day conditions in South Africa is greatly enhanced by looking at past injustice, the legacy of the struggle and the promise of reconstruction and development initiatives under way at present. Please note that on Robben Island, visitors' movements are restricted, by regulation. We must stay with our guide. This evening, you will enjoy our Farewell Dinner with a Difference at Gold Restaurant. From the moment you walk through the glass doors into the aged brick interior with its ancient doors, wooden beams and iron pillars, you will feel the pulsating rhythm of one of Cape Town s most unique African restaurants. 6

7 September 23: Today after breakfast and check-out, we will return to Cape Town International Airport for our overnight international flight home. Meals served onboard. September 24: We will arrive in the U.S. at Washington Dulles (IAD) early in the morning to clear customs and either terminate or connect to other flights. END OF SERVICES. Itinerary subject to change. 7