Gecko Adventure Tanzania

We had to get the bus back

First I would like to point out that out driver was Brilliant the whole way through. He could not do more to help us (his 7 month pregnant wife picked us up from DAS bus station to take us back to our hotel.

Booking was very easy and effective, the booking agent came to our hotel on the morning of pick up to collect the money from us (I think it is expensive, especially with the quality of car we were provided with).

The car was ancient (it never made it back from the trip) we got a flat tyre 2 hours into the journey (fine, it happens) then another few hours in, the car breaks down and take 2+ hours to fix (meaning the journey ended up taking 10 hours to reach the safari).
Lunch on the way to the Safari (not the modern looking stop) was lovely. It was a traditional buffet lunch.

The hotel at the safari was basic but clean and quite close to the Mikumi National park.
The safari was a great experience, our guide was knowledgeable and made the safari a lot of fun. The guys could not explain things enough and went out of their way to make sure we saw as much as possible.

Unfortunately, our trip back was a disaster!!
Our car broke down again in pretty much the same spot it had been fixed the day before. Except this time we were taken to the local mechanics place (off the main road) and were left in the car for 3 hours only to be told it would be $90 USD to have someone else drive us back or we could get the bus or wait another 4 hours for another car to pass on its way back to DAS.

We were not offered any refund from the company and I suspect that much of the cost of getting us back fell onto our driver (not the company we had paid $400USD EACH to). Both these point I find unprofessional and unacceptable. Only when we demanded did the company offer us a 'free' taxi back to the airport the next day'.

So all in all our experience was tainted (but not completely ruined) by poor quality transport provided by an expensive safari provider!
I hope the driver was not punished for the mishap (I suspect he was).