Are you feeling rushed? Busy? Are you ready to slow down the pace and relax?
This is what “slow travel” does well – it helps us to take our generally fast-paced lives and slow them down to a relaxing, thoughtful speed. With travel, this could mean staying in one place for your entire trip, enjoying the local food and making connections with the people of the place where you are.
Africa is the perfect place for slow travel, for taking in your surroundings with a relaxed pace. One example of this type of travel is to enjoy the beautiful Zambezi Valley in Zambia’s Lower Zambezi National Park. One of our favorite safari camps is Old Mondoro. Their philosophy is simple – “to provide guests with an authentic, intimate Zambian safari that concentrates on the wildlife and bush experience, whilst not forgoing any creature comforts or service.”
What I love about Old Mondoro is you could be washing your face at the basin of your luxurious tent and come eye to eye with an elephant outside, or you could be sitting at the river front watching the world go by (nothing really – just listening and watching) and all of a sudden a herd of elephant is crossing the river. This really did happen – here’s a picture of me and my dad. Old Mondoro offers many opportunities for you to slow down – being on the Zambezi River I love the canoe trips and river safaris, you could also partake in some catch and release fishing for the mighty Tiger Fish. The Zambezi Valley has an excellent game viewing, lots of lions if you’re lucky some good leopard sightings, elephant are all around. You could also do some guided bush walks looking for the little things in life – I think this is the perfect way to slow down – looking at birds, finding and identifying spoor, checking out the different plants and flowers.
Another option to slow travel down is to take a trip to the Cape region. You could do our Private Cape Town Eats Tour where you get to walk around Cape Town sampling local food from street vendors (I promise it is heaven on earth), striking a conversation with the local people and really getting to know them and how they live, or to ride a bike through the vineyards of Capetown.
Whatever you choose to do, make the most of each moment. Slowing down as you travel allows you to enjoy the connections you make completely – with the people, with the environment, and with the local food.
Life moves at too much speed in our everyday lives – isn’t it time you slowed down. Slow travel enables us to shed our stressful lives at home and find the rhythm of a different culture. Let us know if you are ready to slow things down a bit! We can design an incredible (and slow) African experience for you!
