Money
What your budget buys, shape by shape.
Eighteen trip shapes sit across the six destinations we plan, and every one of them is priced per person sharing. The cheapest is R 7,400 and the dearest is R 38,500, so the catalogue spans 5.2 times from bottom to top. This page prints all eighteen, then filters them by the number you type: what fits, what the next step up costs, and what stays out of reach. Every figure is read out of the destination pages by a script, so none of them was typed here by hand.
Put your number in
Your budget is per person sharing, in rand, and it is the band the shape is priced at, not a live fare. The nights filter is a second cut: shapes are priced at fixed lengths, so it returns the shapes that sit inside the length you pick rather than scaling a price to a different number of nights.
The page updates as you type. Nothing is sent anywhere, and nothing is held or reserved by using it.
Reading the eighteen shapes.
All eighteen shapes, cheapest first
The band is the planning range the destination page prints for that shape, per person sharing, built from the trade's shoulder-season pricing. The per-night column divides each band by its own nights, to the nearest rand, which is the only arithmetic on this page that the destination pages do not already print.
| Trip | Shape | Nights | Band, per person sharing | A night | What the shape includes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Garden Route drive | Self-drive, three-star | 6 | from R 7,400 pp | R 1,233 | Compact car, guesthouses and B&Bs along the route, breakfast included |
| Cape Town and the Winelands | City only | 4 | from R 9,800 pp | R 2,450 | Three-star, one base, public day tours, no driver |
| Garden Route drive | Self-drive, four-star | 6 | from R 10,600 pp | R 1,767 | Midsize car with full insurance, four-star hotels or lodges, breakfast included |
| Dubai short break | Four-star, Deira or Bur Dubai | 4 | from R 14,200 pp | R 3,550 | Return flights from Johannesburg, four nights, airport transfers |
| Cape Town and the Winelands | City and Winelands | 5 | from R 14,500 pp | R 2,900 | Four-star, two bases, driver on the peninsula day, tram in Franschhoek |
| Garden Route drive | With a private driver-guide | 6 | from R 16,900 pp | R 2,817 | Four-star hotels, breakfast included, a driver-guide for the route |
| Dubai short break | Four-star, Downtown | 4 | from R 17,900 pp | R 4,475 | Return flights from Johannesburg, four nights in Downtown, airport transfers |
| Kruger safari | Sabi Sands, three nights | 3 | from R 18,500 pp | R 6,167 | Four-star lodge, shared vehicle, two drives a day, all meals |
| Zanzibar slow week | Four-star, bed and breakfast | 7 | from R 22,800 pp | R 3,257 | Two nights in Stone Town and five on the north coast, return flights |
| Kruger safari | Sabi Sands, four nights | 4 | from R 23,400 pp | R 5,850 | Four-star lodge, shared vehicle, two drives a day, all meals |
| Cape Town and the Winelands | City and Winelands, private | 5 | from R 24,000 pp | R 4,800 | Five-star, private guide days, estate lunch, airport transfers |
| Dubai short break | Five-star, Marina or beachfront | 4 | from R 24,600 pp | R 6,150 | Return flights from Johannesburg, four nights on the water side of the city |
| Zanzibar slow week | Four-star, half board | 7 | from R 26,400 pp | R 3,771 | The same split, half board on the coast, the Mnemba reef day included |
| Mauritius beach week | Four-star, half board | 7 | from R 26,500 pp | R 3,786 | North or west coast resort, return flights from Johannesburg, half board |
| Mauritius beach week | Four-star, all inclusive | 7 | from R 29,900 pp | R 4,271 | North or west coast resort, return flights from Johannesburg, all inclusive |
| Kruger safari | Sabi Sands and the lowveld | 4 | from R 31,900 pp | R 7,975 | Five-star lodge, private vehicle, three safari nights plus one on the lowveld |
| Zanzibar slow week | Five-star, half board | 7 | from R 34,900 pp | R 4,986 | Boutique Stone Town hotel and a beachfront room at Nungwi or Kendwa |
| Mauritius beach week | Five-star, all inclusive | 7 | from R 38,500 pp | R 5,500 | Adults-only wing or a family suite, return flights from Johannesburg, all inclusive |
Half the catalogue sits at R 22,800 or less and half at R 23,400 or more. Eight shapes fit inside R 20,000, spread across four destinations, so a moderate budget narrows the shape rather than the map. Two shapes fit inside R 10,000, and both sit in Cape Town and on the Garden Route.
What the spread says
Four readings of the same eighteen rows. Each one is arithmetic on the figures above, and every figure it uses is printed by the script that derives the table.
- The dearest trip is not the dearest night. The biggest number on the page is Mauritius at five stars and all inclusive, R 38,500 over seven nights, which is R 5,500 a night. The most expensive night is Kruger's four-night top shape at R 7,975, on a band of R 31,900. Nights move the total as much as grade does.
- The cheapest trip is also the cheapest night. The Garden Route self-drive at three stars is R 7,400 over six nights, R 1,233 a night, and nothing else on the page comes close to that figure. It is also the shape that asks the least of a first-time planner.
- Four destinations survive R 20,000. Eight shapes sit at or under that line, across Cape Town, the Garden Route, Dubai and Kruger. Zanzibar and Mauritius start at R 22,800 and R 26,500, because both begin with a seven-night week and a flight.
- One grade step is not one price step. On the Garden Route, moving from three stars to four costs R 3,200 per person and buys a larger car and better rooms. Moving from four stars to a private driver-guide costs R 6,300 and buys a person rather than a vehicle. The second is the bigger change and the bigger number.
The next step up, in the tool above, is the cheapest shape that sits above your number. It is there because the useful question is usually not what fits, but what the next R 2,000 changes. Every figure in the tool is the band alone, and the band is the land arrangement. What the days cost on top of it, at all three styles and against the same band, is on what the day adds.
Three rules before you read a number as a price
- Per person sharing means two people in one room. A single traveller, a third bed or a second room moves the number up. The sharing page sets out what the change costs.
- Every band is a shoulder-season planning range. A school holiday, a peak week or a long weekend moves the live number, and the destination page says which months those are. What it costs sets out who pays what, and when.
- The nights are part of the shape. A three-night safari is not a seven-night safari shortened. How long to go explains why the length changes the product, not only the total.
- A party is a multiple, not a discount. Eight travellers pay eight times a per-person band, and the groups page does that multiplication for all eighteen shapes.
Send the number. We will tell you what it buys.
A budget, a month and how many nights you have is enough to start. Lizanne replies the same working day with the shapes that fit and the ones that do not.
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Free to the traveller.
The planning lane costs you nothing. A plan that never becomes a booking costs nothing either.
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One named human.
Lizanne van Niekerk plans it and books it. She is the person you message on the day of travel.
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Bands, not quotes.
Nothing here is a live price. The binding number comes from Lizanne in writing, before anything is booked.
Build the plan yourself first in the itinerary maker, or read the 2027 long weekends if the dates are already fixed.