Thorn Tree travel forum

seeking advice regarding travel in south africa in the area

hello fellow travellers!
i received a free ticket from the airline company, and on a whim i decided to fly for 2-3 weeks in the beginning of october to south africa, despite having no idea about anything. i have lots of questions, i'd be happy
for any advice ! so here goes

1) my main concern, travelling alone, is that i'll have hard time meeting people, since i don't feel like travelling by myself all the time. i've travelled quite a bit in the western world,
and also in asia - it seems to me that the countries divide into two - countries in which there is strong atmosphere of mingling between travellers, such as india, and countries like
those in europe where it's more difficult to really make friends while travelling, besides small chats at night in the hostel. which does south africa belong too? did anyone else
here travel in south africa by himself? i've read that the buz bus thing is pretty big , i'm counting on meeting people there - should i? are there at all any other young
backbacking travellers ( i'm 24... )
which leads to next question -

2) the buz bus - do i need to reserve my ticket more than a few days before? any general impressions of anyone who used it?

3) what places should i visit? it seems that most of the posts are related to kind of "upper class" travelling compared to what i used to - adventure attractions, jeep safaris and so on,
which are probably costly, while i'm used to more mellow travelling of hanging around nice places, and not really jumping around too much. is that kind of trip at all possible in south africa? any good treks i can do ? ( preferably by myself or with fellow travellers, not with a travel guide or something... )

4) costs of travelling - what should i expect to be my daily expense? and are there any reasonable priced attractions ( jeep safaris and such, which are catering to the backpacker
budget? diving courses which aren't TOO expensive? )

5) countries around south africa - my flight is to johannesburg, but if someone has a strong recommendation about a country which i can get quickly and not too expensively ( is there
a low cost african air company? is taking over night busses an option?) , i wouldn't mind going to another country instead....

6) i know this is kind of a recurrent subject - but safety - would you say that it's particularly irresponsible for me to go travelling alone in south africa, assuming i get
out of johanesburg as fast as possible?

all in all, my main frustration in searching the web about south africa is that it seems that most people putting posts on are couples who did a honey moon in south africa or something
of the sort, and not really backpackers. i don't know if that's just a result of the options in south africa, hopefully i'm wrong. ( not that there's anything wrong about honey moon
in south africa :) )

by the way if anyone plans to go travelling around then in south africa and wants to hook up, feel free to say....

will be grateful for any help!
thanks
dan