SIMON PARKER

WStill basking in the glow of its 2019 Rugby World Cup triumph, Africa’s southernmost superpower will in 2020 reaffirm itself as the indisputable champion of the sub-Saharan safari.

Just one year after welcoming its founding pride of lions, Samara Private Game Reserve in the Eastern Cape is celebrating the birth of its first cubs. In KwaZulu-Natal, the &Beyond Phinda Private Game Reserve will launch a first-of-its-kind Night Eye Experience, allowing khaki-clad night owls to unlock the shadowy mysteries of the African bush, with infrared cameras. Further north, the not-for-profit luxury Lepogo Lodges camp on the banks of the Limpopo will be the first in Africa to offset the carbon footprints of each and every one of its guests.

Beyond the savannah, the national cricket team will look to do the sporting double over England in a highly anticipated quadrennial tour, including a showpiece new year’s Newlands Test match beneath Table Mountain. Telegraph readers adore Cape Town – voting it their favourite city on the planet for the seventh year running in our 2019 Travel Awards. But the most exciting new food scene is being rustled up 70 miles east in the whale-watching hub of Hermanus. It’s been crowned South Africa’s first Unesco City of Gastronomy, due to its proximity to some of the very best wine and seafood on earth. From playing field to plate, Atlantic to Indian Ocean, coming first remains a national obsession.

How to go Llama Travel (020 7263 3000; llamatravel.com) has launched seven new South Africa-wide itineraries for 2020, from £1,899 per person including flights.

Simon Parker is a British travel writer and broadcaster currently based in Cape Town.