My husband, 11 year old and I just spent a month in South Africa and another month in Madagascar. Check out the Trip Report here.

Botswana is WAY OVERPRICED. I don't think there is any advantage to do a safari in Botswana over any of the nicer safari parks near Kruger. Save your money and you'll see the same animals in SA.

Zim. Hmm. I wouldn't go there. If you must, I'd fly into Vic Falls, do the falls, stay a night, max two and get back down to SA. Mugabe is CRAZY. Leave as few dollars there as possible. I would not feel comfortable traveling outside of Vic Falls with my son as a gay couple. No thanks. I do have to say that the Zim people are lovely. But so many have fled or been forced out. It's a sad situation.

Just a side note: I spent two years in Malawi with the US Peace Corps. I love that country. Originally we were going to spend a month there too. Unfortunately, they recently jailed two gay guys that had an engagement party. That was enough for me to chose not to visit there. I don't want to put our family in a position where we might be jailed for who we are.

Make sure to spend time with the kids in Cape Town. Depending on their ages, there is so much to do. We rock climbed on Table Mt and Lion's Head. We hiked up both and also Little Lion's head. We went kayaking near Boulder's Beach. We snorkeled outside of Hout Bay on the Atlantic side. The aquarium at the V&A is very good. It's a great place for kids.

I've saved the best for last: Madagascar. We had one of the BEST EXPERIENCES OF MY LIFETIME in Madagascar. We rented a house out on the coast near Mahajunga. From there we did lots of excursions and saw many lemurs in the wild. We had experiences that I will never forget. Please feel free to PM me if you have specific questions. We never had any issues being a gay couple there. Our neighbor was a wonderful French woman who LOVES the gays! Our cook, house cleaner, guard and driver all were wonderful and didn't have any issues with us being gay. The Malagasy are great people. Plus the cost of living is very low. You could spend a month there for the price of a week in Botswana. Don't spend much time in the capital city. Simply fly in and leave. The zoo was interesting though.

I look forward to spending more time in Madagascar. Our son continues to talk about it months later. Its warm people and unique wildlife make it a MUST SEE destination.

On our year of travel, we did not encounter any homophobia until month six in Vietnam. Even then it was a middle-aged white guy from Europe and not a local.

You will discover that most people will assume that one of you is the parent. We often get asked which of us is the father. Even when we explain we both are, they often just don't have the experience to understand what that really means. The other day here in India. I met two university students and ended up talking about my family. I even showed pictures of the three of us. They could see my husband was a guy. Just when I thought they understood, one of them asked me "So, you guys are here looking for brides?" Ugh. Two guys married with a kid just didn't make sense to them.

Definitely take this trip and have a wonderful time. Consider yourselves official gay family ambassadors. Build bridges between the world communities. Share ideas from other cultures with your kids. Everyone benefits.

Bon voyage.