South Africa EF Ultimate Break Trip: Honest Review and Insights for Black Travelers
EF Ultimate Break is a travel company that organizes tours for 18–35-year-old travelers, handling bookings for flights, accommodations, activities, transportation, and more (one of the few pros of the trip!). I booked a trip with them to South Africa (March 2024) for ease, safety, and built-in friends.
South Africa was an amazing country to explore, and these beautiful photos do a great job at hiding the issues of the trip since these are the snapshots of the fun and exciting moments. But regardless of the pretty photos, it is highly unlikely that I would book with EF again. Let’s get into it!
South Africa is incredibly rich in culture, with 12 official languages, yet I found myself experiencing only a fraction of that diversity. Apart from dope club experiences (story for another day!) and a visit to Nelson Mandela's home in Soweto, cultural immersion felt lacking. This sentiment was exacerbated by the fact that our tour guide was a white South African. He was cool! But, I traveled 24 hours from New York with the expectation of gaining insight into more than just 7% of South Africa. With Black/Coloured (multi-generational mixed) people comprising around 90% of the population, it would have been more impactful to learn about the apartheid and various African tribes from their perspective.
And I don’t just want the heavy cultural activities; we can also have fun learning about South African culture through activities such as cooking classes or dance lessons. EF Ultimate Break does offer enjoyable cultural activities on their other trips (Ex. South Korea), but they really dropped the ball with South Africa. I hope the itinerary for South Africa improves in the future because the EF staff did take the time to read our evaluations and have phone calls with us to discuss our experiences. It seemed like they really understood our sentiments regarding the areas where the trip fell short.
Next, we will move on the dynamics with my fellow travelers (Lord!). One of my favorite parts of group trips is making friends with strangers, but unfortunately, you cannot control the type of people who join these EF trips. I wrongly assumed that if you were coming on a trip to SOUTH AFRICA, you would be culturally conscious, but I was very much mistaken.
There were numerous times when I had to correct ignorant statements. For instance, a woman of color said, 'It does not feel like Africa because we are not in poor neighborhoods.' Babes, it doesn't feel like Africa because the Cape Town itinerary only takes us to predominantly white areas, and we rarely encounter Black people. There are wealthy Black people in EVERY continent; poverty should not be synonymous with Black people. Additionally, some of the white participants showed no interest in interacting with Black South Africans. When we did meet locals in Johannesburg and Kruger, they wished we did not leave Cape Town.. Reading between the lines, you can see their true sentiments.
I did enjoy the company of some people on the trip (see the photos right above and below)! We laughed and mad fun of the outrageous things said and done by the others. We also connected on deeper topics like the state of the world, shared values, etc. I even followed a handful of the ones I liked on Instagram. The others are still in my follower request section.😊
There were 12 people of color (8 Black people) on the trip out of 29 participants, which is very high for EF! Other people told me that the range of POC is usually 1-4 people. YIKES!
The schedule pissed me off! Every single day started with an early morning and the day lasted 12 hours before we are at the hotel again! Wake-up times ranged from 4am to 7am. Some of these early wake-up times were so unnecessary! Like, why was I forced to go to a coffee shop at 8am before going on the wine tour when I don't even like coffee? The tour guide made such a big deal about me Ubering later to meet them, and I didn't want to inconvenience any of the other participants, so I ended up arriving 45 minutes earlier than I needed to.
I have done other group trips before, and I loved having the option to opt out of activities when I wanted to take a nap or sleep in. It would have also been amazing on this EF trip to have more free time to do my own exploring especially since they had limited cultural activities. I want to be in control of my vacation, not someone else.
If none of the above issues are a problem for you and you're seeking a trip primarily focused on beautiful scenery and exciting activities such as penguin swims and wildlife safaris, then EF Ultimate Break is the perfect trip for you. 🤣 Despite the flaws of the trip organizers, South Africa is a majestic and eccentric country, and I will have an article soon on my favorite parts of this country!
