One booking, two very different holidays

South Africa had always been somewhere we wanted to go. Actually booking the trip was another matter.

There was the beach, the safari, the question of where to stay, how to get from one to the other, and how many separate reservations it would take to make the whole thing happen. For a first visit, it felt like a holiday that required quite a bit of homework before you could even begin enjoying it.

Then Club Med opened its first South African resort in July 2026, bringing two of the country's biggest draws together under one booking. An oceanfront resort on the Dolphin Coast and a safari lodge in the heart of Zululand.

Image Credit: Club Med South Africa

We spent the first part of our trip at Club Med Beach Resort in Tinley Manor, KwaZulu-Natal, before heading inland to Vikela Safari Lodge for three days and two nights in a private game reserve. Four days later, we returned to the coast.

It was our first time in South Africa and we quickly learnt that the country doesn't need to be experienced in any particular order. You can spend one morning watching the Indian Ocean from the beach and the next looking for lions in the wild. Both feel distinctly South African, but they could hardly be more different.

The appeal of combining the two is obvious once you're there. What surprised us was how much we enjoyed the space between them, too.

A resort that feels like where it belongs

Image Credit: Club Med South Africa

Tinley Manor sits along the Dolphin Coast, north of Durban, where the Indian Ocean meets a stretch of coastline known for its beaches and marine life. Club Med's 32-hectare resort is around 40 minutes from King Shaka International Airport, making the journey from the plane to the beach a relatively easy one.

After the long flight from Kuala Lumpur via Dubai, we were grateful to have someone waiting for us at arrivals. The transfer was taken care of and before long, we were walking into the resort.

The property is expansive, but its design keeps it connected to its surroundings. South African architecture and materials meet contemporary interiors, with natural textures, local influences and open spaces that make the outdoors feel like an extension of the resort itself.

Image Credit: Club Med South Africa

It's a welcome departure from the kind of resort that could have been built almost anywhere. Here, the sense of place comes through in the details, from the design to the landscape beyond the windows.

And then there's the ocean. You don't have to plan an excursion to enjoy it. Sometimes, all you need to do is look up.

All-inclusive, without having to plan every hour

We've always thought the best holidays leave room for a little spontaneity. Having a list of things to do is one thing, feeling obliged to get through it is another.

Club Med's all-inclusive model makes the former much easier. Meals, drinks, a wide range of sports and activities and the evening entertainment are included in the stay. Expect to have days when you can spend the morning trying something new, have a long lunch, then decide what you feel like doing next. Some experiences, including spa treatments and selected excursions, cost extra.

The resort has four pools, each serving a slightly different purpose. There's the main pool at the heart of the property, a family pool, an adults-only Zen pool, and a private pool for guests staying in Ilanga, the resort's Exclusive Collection space.

Accommodation ranges from Superior and Deluxe rooms to Ilanga's suites, which come with additional services and access to exclusive facilities. For families, childcare programmes cater to different age groups, while adults have plenty of opportunities to find their own time away.

But what we like about this setup is that you don't need to be travelling with children or have a packed itinerary to appreciate it. The convenience is just as useful for couples and friends who want to do a lot one day and very little the next.

From the dining table to the beach bar

Food is a substantial part of any all-inclusive holiday, particularly when you're staying somewhere long enough to settle into a routine.

At Oceana, the main restaurant, meals span different cuisines alongside local flavours. Nguni Gourmet Club offers a more intimate dining experience centred on South African ingredients and regional produce, giving guests another way to explore the food culture of KwaZulu-Natal.

Injabulo serves as the main bar and coffee house, while Dunes Beach Bar looks out towards the ocean. The latter is particularly well placed for those afternoons when the plan is to stay near the water for a little longer than intended.

It's easy to see how the days begin to blur together here, in the best possible way. Breakfast turns into a morning by the beach. An afternoon drink becomes an excuse to stay outside until the light changes. Before long, you're checking the time only because dinner is coming up.

Evenings bring the familiar Club Med programme of shows and entertainment, with opportunities to gather at the bar or enjoy events around the resort.

A morning in Durban

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One of the advantages of staying on the Dolphin Coast is how easily you can venture beyond the resort.

We wanted to see Durban properly, especially since it was our first time in the country. It would have been easy to spend the entire trip within Club Med's grounds, but doing so would have meant missing an important part of the story.

Durban has a character of its own that's shaped by its coastal setting, diverse communities and layered history. Its streets carry traces of the country's colonial past alongside the people and movements that helped shape modern South Africa.

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We visited the City Hall, completed in 1910 and modelled on Belfast City Hall, before exploring the city and learning more about its history. The surrounding streets bear the names of figures such as Dr Yusuf Dadoo and Dorothy Nyembe, both associated with the struggle against apartheid.

At the Moses Mabhida Stadium precinct, public memorials bring that history into the present. These aren't simply landmarks to photograph on a city tour. They offer a reminder that South Africa's appeal extends well beyond its landscapes and that understanding a place also means making room for the stories that shaped it.

We came away appreciating Durban as more than a stop between the beach and the reserve. It's a city worth giving time to in its own right.

The first Club Med with a surf school

Image Credit: Club Med South Africa

Club Med South Africa features the brand's first surf school, with lessons available for adults and children. Surfing is a natural fit for this stretch of coast. Within the resort, there are trained surf instructors which makes it easier for beginners to give it a go without having to organise everything independently.

It's part of a wider range of activities that includes padel, archery, yoga and the flying trapeze, alongside other land and water sports. The wellness facilities offer another option for those who prefer to slow things down, with spa treatments and a hammam available at additional cost.

The point isn't to do everything. In fact, trying to fit every activity into a stay would rather defeat the purpose.

We found that having so many options made it easier to follow the day wherever it took us. There's something to try if you're feeling adventurous, but just as many reasons to stay put. A beach holiday doesn't always need to be productive.

Four hours inland and a completely different South Africa

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If the beach resort was about finding our feet, Vikela Safari Lodge was where the trip began to feel surreal.

The journey inland took around four hours by road, carrying us away from the coast and into Zululand. The scenery changed along the way and so did the pace of the trip. We were trading the ocean for open land, and the idea of spotting wild animals for the possibility of actually encountering them.

Vikela sits within an approximately 18,000-hectare private game reserve in northern KwaZulu-Natal. The lodge has 75 premium safari tents, with accommodation designed to combine the comforts of a resort stay with a closer connection to the surrounding landscape.

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And yes, they are much more than what most of us imagine when we hear the word tent. The rooms are spacious, with proper beds, comfortable facilities and views of the landscape outside. There are shared dining spaces, a pool and places to unwind between game drives.

But the accommodation is only half the experience. The reason to come here is to head out into the reserve, preferably early enough to catch the landscape before the day warms up.

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Our mornings began in the cold, heading out with experienced rangers who seemed to notice things we would have driven straight past. A change in the ground, movement in the distance, the faintest sign of an animal nearby. The guides read the landscape in a way that makes you realise just how much there is to see when someone knows where to look.

Game drives also take place in the evenings, when the light changes and the reserve takes on an entirely different character. The reserve is home to the Big Five: lions, leopards, elephants, rhinos and African buffalo. Not every reserve in South Africa has all five, which makes the opportunity to encounter them here particularly special.

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Over our stay, we saw four out of the five. Lions, elephants, rhinos and buffalo. That’s reason enough on its own to come back.

You might think a safari is about arriving with a mental list of animals you hope to tick off. Once you’re out there, it stops working that way. You can spend an hour waiting for something to happen, then have a sighting appear when you’ve stopped expecting it. When it does, what gets you is that these animals are moving through their own environment, on their own terms, and you’re simply there to watch.

Seeing them up close is hard to put into words. The size of an elephant. The presence of a lion. A rhino standing out in the open. You can watch all the documentaries you like, but being there is something else entirely.

There’s never a guarantee that the animal you’re hoping for will turn up, and that’s probably what makes it stay with you when it finally does.

Between drives, we came back to the lodge for meals, time by the pool and a rest before heading out again. With meals, drinks and twice-daily game drives setting the rhythm, there was nothing to organise beyond turning up when it was time to go. Three days and two nights went quickly, and we’d have happily stayed longer.

What happens between the big moments

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It's tempting to make the safari the headline of a trip like this. But looking back, some of the things we remember most clearly happened when we weren't actively trying to see anything.

The cold mornings before sunrise. The journey back to camp after an evening drive. The feeling of returning to a comfortable room after hours in the open air. The conversations over meals, when there was time to compare what everyone had seen and wonder what the next drive might bring.

These are small things, but they are part of what makes a multi-day safari worthwhile. You aren't going out to find animals and returning to sleep. You're spending enough time in one place to become familiar with it, even if only briefly.

Image Credit: Club Med South Africa

At Vikela, the all-inclusive model carries over into the lodge experience, with accommodation, meals, drinks and guided drives forming part of the stay arrangement. However, the safari itself is booked separately from the beach resort package. Guests need a minimum five-night stay at the beach resort to add the safari, it's worth planning the two together from the start.

For us, the combination made sense. The coast gave us room to ease into the holiday, explore Durban and enjoy the resort. The safari brought us closer to the natural environment we'd travelled so far to see. Returning to the beach afterwards gave us time to take it all in.

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We went to South Africa expecting the safari to be the part we'd talk about most. While those game drives will stay with us for a long time, the trip was better for having the beach alongside them.

The two experiences balance each other out. One gives you the freedom to fill your days with activities or spend them doing very little. The other asks you to wake early, venture out and accept that nature will do what it wants, whether or not that includes the animal you're hoping to see.

Together, they make a compelling introduction to a country that has so much more to offer than any single itinerary can cover.

Image credit: Name

For Malaysian travellers in particular, having the logistics of the beach and safari brought together makes the prospect of visiting South Africa feel more manageable. You still need to plan your flights and decide how long to stay, but you don't have to piece together the two main experiences independently.

Would we go back? Absolutely, and for longer.

We'd give ourselves more time at the coast, explore more of Durban and return to the reserve knowing that no two game drives are ever quite the same.

Some holidays are remembered for what you managed to fit into them. This one reminded us that a good holiday can also be measured by how much space it leaves you to experience a place.

For rates and bookings, visit Club Med South Africa.