"We had a wonderful time in Malawi, with all accommodation of a good standard and all travel arrangements working more or less to plan.

We were glad that we had the night in Blantyre on arrival to recover from the journey out (exactly 24 hours door to door), prior to going to the game park.

The drive from Majete to Liwonde was arduous and took nearly 7 hours. This was partly due to misty conditions through the mountains, bridge repairs in Blantyre and the poor quality of the roads, particularly the access road into Liwonde National Park.

The drive from Liwonde to Nkhotakota was extremely arduous and took about 7.5hours. The driver did not seem too well to start with and had to stop for a short while. We fed him some of our packed lunches as the monkeys had apparently pinched his breakfast!. We had a stop in Salima for toilets and refuelling, but there was a delay due to an issue with the driver's office, in sending him through sufficient funds to buy enough petrol. We moved on and had the same issue in Nkhotakota town, where we stopped for nearly an hour while he tried to sort it out. The driver had not been to Tongole Lodge before and had to keep stopping to ask how to get to it. Once in the park, signposting disappeared and we ended up at the sister camp and had to be re-directed. We were concerned when the driver said that he was driving straight back to Blantyre without a break. It might be worth exploring air transfer - the pilot we spoke to said it was possible via Lilongwe. Obviously the cost would be higher but after undertaking the road journey, this could be worth it.

We are not sure why Expert Africa are offering South African Airways via Johannesburg as their preferred route. We found Ethiopian Airlines flights to be extremely good, with modern planes (Airbus A350 and Boeing 787) and excellent crew. The issue about flight changes that we were notified about prior to departure were due to the main runway at Blantyre being closed for several months for re-building. Only small planes can land at Blantyre on their small runway, and so all large planes have to go into Lilongwe and then a shuttle service is run down to Blantyre in small turboprop planes. Ethiopian could have explained this to us when they changed the flights. Our luggage was taken right through to Blantyre and immigration was also done at Blantyre, even though we arrived there on an internal flight.

The only other downside to Ethiopian is the airport at Addis Ababa. although a relatively new terminal, is not to the standard of Johannesburg airport, although is tolerable for a few hours.

Our Business Class flights (for 2 people) cost £4545.24 compared with your quote with SAA of £9841.98 and we were extremely happy with the service.

Thank you so much for organising this trip for us. we had a fantastic experience and really enjoyed our time in Malawi." Read full review: 18 nights in Africa; 16 on a Malawi trip

"The trip was everything we had hoped for! Very hot for much of the time (40-42C) but we coped with that." Read full review: 12 nights in Africa; 10 on a Malawi trip

"Claire Scott arranged our second trip to Malawi. She organised all that we had wished for.

How fortunate to see three leopards while visiting Chelinda, the trip was made!! A challenging first week walking the Livingstonia Trail. Great fun, wilderness & sense of achievement. Cannot praise the staff enough.

My heart is lost in Tongole a very special place. Enjoyed all our other accommodations too. A real comfort to see Abasie our driver from our previous trip, we were right at home! All in all another very successful trip. Thank you." Read full review: 13 nights in Africa; 7 on a Malawi trip