Cedarberg’s Accommodation Rating

Our Cedarberg ratings are designed to cover the full range of our safari accommodation offering including the safari lodge accommodation described above.

Top of Class

This is reserved for the most luxurious hotels or game lodges in an area, in terms of ambience, refinement, food and wine. And in the case of safari lodges, the best in guiding and game-viewing opportunities. They usually with an eye-watering price tag to match. But this is the place to head if you want to treat yourself or your loved one.

Luxury

In cities and non-safari areas, this would broadly indicate a five star hotel, an upmarket boutique lodge or country house hotel as well as the more luxurious safari lodges. Please note that these luxury lodges, especially in more remote areas, will not have all the facilities of a five star hotel.

Premier

Luxury and Premier form the bulk of our hotels and safari lodges. Premier indicates a very good standard of accommodation covering a typical four star hotel. Or a boutique hotel or guest lodge with an excellent standard of accommodation. Similarly many of our more affordable private game lodges and camps fall into this category.

Comfortable

This is our lowest rating and indicates a simple (sometimes rustic) standard of safari accommodation. Typically we use this category for rest camps in the National Parks, moderate B&B’s and country inns in South Africa and some of the guest-farms in Namibia. Some of the bush camps are rated ‘comfortable’ even though their standard of guiding, their location and their price tag are much higher.

Family Ratings

We also rate each place on its family-friendliness…

Accepts children of all ages – Pretty self-explanatory, but note that it doesn’t mean that younger children can necessarily join an adult game drive.

Accepts older children – used when a lodge accepts children from 6 or 8 years upwards when they can participate in most of the activities. So they may be as child-friendly but are orientated towards families with older kids and teenagers

Doesn’t accept children – this is used when a lodge doesn’t accept children under the age of 12 (a typical cut-off). Occasionally it may be not under 14 or 16 years. Usually these are the places which are orientated towards couples, perhaps in more remote areas where wilderness and tranquillity is the selling point.

 Note on Star ratings in South Africa

South Africa has a slightly peculiar rating system. Accommodation is rated on a 1 to 5 star rating under different categories such as Hotel, Guest House, B&B. In many ways this is a great idea but it can lead to some confusion. You may see that a B&B has a five star rating for example. This does not mean that it has all the facilities of a 5 star hotel. It just means that it’s considered the highest standard for a B&B. Similarly many lodges have opted not to be graded at all.