Travel + Leisure Awards: South Africa stars!

2009 is the 14th year that Travel + Leisure have held their global voting polls - for the world's best tourism products.

The readers get to vote for their favourite cities & islands, their best hotels, cruises, airlines, car hire companies, tour operators, safari companies and so on.

It's one of the major events where Joe Public gets to cast their votes and this year's votes have just been counted and shouted!

And South Africa has come out strongly in many of the categories. For starters, they've voted Cape Town as their second most favourite city (second only to Udaipur, India). Next in line are: 3 - Bangkok, 4 - Buenos Aires, 5 - Chiang Mai , Thailand, 6 - Florence, 7 - Luang Prabang , Laos, 8 - New York, 9 - Rome & 10 - San Francisco.

And in the hotels section, six southern African lodges have made it into the Top 15:

Bushman's Kloof, Cedarberg

No. 1 - Bushman's Kloof in Cedarberg Mountains, Western Cape, South Africa - with a whopping score of 98.67!

No. 3 - Earth Lodge, Sabi Sabi Reserve, Mpumalanga, South Africa

No. 6 - Singita, Sabi Sands Reserve, Mpumalanga, South Africa

No. 10 - Jack's Camp, Kalahari, Botswana

No. 13 - Eagle Island Camp, Okavango Delta, Botswana

No. 15 - Twelve Apostles Hotel & Spa, Cape Town, South Africa

Others in the Top 100 worldwide include (all with a score of 90 or above):

No. 24 - Lions Sand Private Game Reserve, Sabi Sand Reserve, Mpumalanga, South Africa
No. 25 - -Royal Malewane, Kruger National Park, Mpumalanga, South Africa
No. 27 - Shamwari Game Reserve, Eastern Cape, South Africa
(No. 29 - The Saxon, Johannesburg, Gauteng, South Africa
(No. 29 - Singita Kruger National Park, Mpumalanga, South Africa
No. 34 - Londolozi Private Game Reserve, Sabi Sand Reserve, Mpumalanga, South Africa
No. 44 - Khwai River Lodge, Okavango Delta, Botswana
No. 58 - Cape Grace, Cape Town, South Africa
No. 60 - Le Quartier Français, Franschhoek Valley, Western Cape, South Africa
No. 69 - Mombo and Little Mombo Camps, Okavango Delta, Botswana
No. 75 - -Savute Elephant Camp, Chobe National Park, Botswana
No. 77 - MalaMala Game Reserve, Sabi Sand Wildtuin, South Africa (with a score of 90)

Well done all award winners - you rock!