Cornel Schalkwyk

Can always trust Cornel to book an incredible holiday. Listens to requirements and feedback to generate a fantastic tailored experience.

Cornel and her associates are so helpful and efficient. Nothing is too much trouble. It really saves you time and indeed it is a delight to have them as your advisors. Highly recommended.

I would like to thank you for organising our Golden Wedding celebration house. The house, garden and general setting was perfect. All the family had a wonderful time. Thank you for your excellent attention to my communications and prompt replies. I will certainly recommend your services, as situations arise.

There’s literally no-one else I would approach to book us a trip abroad. Cornel takes the time to understand where we want to go, what we want to do, what ballpark budget we are thinking off and then she goes off and conjures up an itinerary just for us. She comes back with a first pass and she’s happy to tinker with it as much as we want. Then she books it all with timings sorted, transfers organised, excursions lined up - it’s like magic!! 🪄

We are using Cornel again for our holiday planning. She has always been very quick in responding and coming up with some great options. This takes out a lot of the hassle and time you would need to spend to organise the holiday.

This company is very professional and their responses are very prompt. Excellent service . I would highly recommend them - as they were recommended to me by someone.

Cornel was really helpful and proactive in helping us to book our honeymoon. She was upfront with logistics and cost, whilst also discussing our hopes for the trip to come up with the best itinerary possible. She made the process incredibly easy and we’re both so excited for our trip!

Thank you for organising what was a fantastic experience for my daughter and me. I am pleased to say that absolutely everything worked smoothly. The pick-up arrangements and flights etc all worked well in what was a complicated itinerary. We even had a pleasant surprise in the Okavango when they provided a helicopter for the hop between camps and we had a birds eye view over the Delta, which was unbelievably good. The lodges were all very good, met or exceeded our expectations. We saw pretty much everything we wanted to and, in most cases, saw more than we expected. The stop at Vic Falls was a good idea as it gave us a break from 5 o’clock starts and the white water rafting was really exciting (but not the climb up the gorge at the end which was very arduous) .

I have used Cornel a few times now and always had a great experience. We have just got back from our holiday of a lifetime to Bali. Everything was fantastic from booking to coming home, we could not fault the service. We had an issue with an excursion and I called Cornel at 7.40am UK time to check some details that the on-site tour guide was telling us, which was different to our booking. Not only did she take our call out of hours, she also called her head office and was on and off the phone with us for about 45mins whilst we sorted the problem. We booked 2 hotels with Cornel and whilst the first was good, the second one, was literally something else. Hubby was so blown away he just kept saying "this hotel is just so amazing isn't it". It became a bit of a joke with the kids to see how long we could go without daddy mentioned the hotel LOL! It was literally luxury at the top of a jungle, quite literally amazing. Bali did not disappoint and we are already thinking what to do in 2025. Thanks again Cornel.

Cornel has been fantastic, turning things round in a short timescale and still keeping an eye on our journey post-booking. I'm a big fan.

Fantastic service by Cornel! A short telephone chat ended with Cornel sending over 3 quotes within 48 hours…a couple of questions later and our holiday was booked. Highly recommend.

We just have returned from our family trip to France. Despite my last-minute search for a Disneyland trip, Cornel's travel service was extremely helpful and promptly booked everything, ensuring the best deal in terms of price and quality. I will certainly use her services again in the future and definitely recommend her services to anyone who wants a great break.

Cornel is the perfect travel counsellor! Nothing is too much trouble to her … one message and she replies swiftly with a carefully thought-out travel plan and useful suggestions. Holidays that Cornel has arranged for us have been perfect in every way and we look forward to our next one.

Cornel took the stress out of planning and booking my summer holiday - very much recommended!

Great, personal service. Really helpful to have her in hand at all times and to answer questions. Would highly recommend.

I have already recommended Cornel both on a FB group and to a friend. She was patient, made good suggestions, kept going when we couldn’t make it work, found a great holiday and communication was excellent throughout.

Cornel has been amazing - so helpful and understands exactly what we were looking for. Super speedy too!

Cornel was so efficient and helpful. We feel our holiday is safe in her hands!

Extremely efficient and helpful

Cornel was brilliant! Listened to my rather ropey instructions, came back with options which really reflected what I had said and was tailored towards my individual interests. Really great!

Cornel was superb in helping me book a fabulous last minute vacation at very short notice. Throughout the booking process she was very professional and diligent to ensure I make the best choices available within my budget. Post booking, Cornel constantly kept me up to date and immediately informed me of any rule changes as they happened that may have impacted me, working out of hours in doing so. Her friendly personality and dedicated client focus made the whole experience very rewarding. I would highly recommend Cornel in future and would rate her one of the best I've experienced in the travel business. I very much look forward to working with Cornel again on future trips.

Cornel has been so helpful with our holiday, I would really recommend her service to friends and family.

Cornel has been fantastic - so patient and helpful. We wouldn't hesitate to recommend her to friends and family in future.

Very attentive, knowledgeable and thorough.

In January 2020 we contacted Cornel to help us plan our August 2020 holiday. We did not know where we wanted to go, just had a few ideas about the type of holiday we wanted. Cornel met with us and discussed what we were looking for, found out that our daughter was really into archaeology and had loved our trip to Cyprus in the previous year. Cornel then came back with a plan for Mexico. She would arrange everything, the flights the hotel etc and it looked like the perfect holiday for us. If 2020 had been a normal year, then this review would most likely be telling you about the fantastic time we had. However, 2020 was not a normal year, the worldwide pandemic saw to that. Instead, this review is a testimonial about the service we received from Cornel. Because Cornel is ATOL protected it meant that we did not lose our money when the trip had to be cancelled. Cornel kept us informed during the whole process as it become more and more likely that we would not be able to travel. When it finally became obvious that the holiday was not going to happen, we did not cancel – we postponed for a year. This is where Cornel really came into her own. Whilst the hotels were putting the price up for the following year, Cornel was able to negotiate the same price for us. In October, during the brief break in lockdowns, I contacted Cornel about finding a hotel in the UK for my wife and me to celebrate our wedding anniversary together. I fully expected to be paying her a commission on somewhere she found. However, she advised me that whilst she could find and book somewhere for me, there were a few hotels that I would be better off direct booking and then provided me with the list. This level of service is why I would wholeheartedly recommend you book your holiday through Travel Counsellors with Cornel.

Brilliant service, nothing is too much trouble. Will definitely recommend to friends and family.

Cornel has been great dealing with our queries and finding lots of options. She's very responsive and we always feel our enquiry is important to her. Great touches like the travel guide is lovely as well.

Amazing service, went above and beyond to find what we were looking for, even received a guidebook in the post!

Would definitely recommend Cornel for any trip that involves long haul, transfers and excursions etc. She just makes it so easy and whilst you may find it a little cheaper by searching for hours online, for me it's about the peace of mind that what you booked is exactly what you get!! Cornel is very patient with me whilst I dither about what to book when! So easy to talk to and discuss options without making me feel bad for changing my mind!

Friendly, responsive, informed, helpful.