BR
35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
100% of our expectations
Everything done, always in the correct time, our driver was very nice, polite, helpful.
Our doubts always answered. Nice tips!
US
35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Far surpassed our expectations:)
I can't say enough about what a wonderful experience working with Red Africa Safari has been. They have been extremely communicative and attentive since the very first email, thoroughly answering all of my questions (even the seemingly small and trivial ones) almost immediately. Not only did they provide me with options for the tour but they worked with every request I made making his a truly unique and customized experience for my family and I. It really took the stress out of trying to arrange such a tremendous experience with little to no knowledge about the area on my part and allowed me to focus on the excitement instead. It was well worth every single penny and by the end of everything I found it to be quite affordable considering all of the accommodations, travel, dining, tours, sights, I mean, the list goes on and on, I feel like I found the deal of the century. I am not typically a "tour" person, I tend to prefer the more independent way of traveling as it feels like you have more control, but this didnt feel like one of those "cattle drive" tours, in fact, by the end of it, our guide Jaco felt like an old friend on vacation with us. He even got me a birthday gift, how thoughtful is that!!! Not only was he personable and friendly to be around, but his knowledge gave the experience a whole new angle. Yes it is beautiful, but it is so much more than that, and without him we never would have had the opportunity to to learn the things we did and see more than just a pretty view. We did absolutely everything we wanted, PLUS some extra stops and never once felt rushed. For that, I cant thank him enough. He even ensured we made our return flight and handled our bags. WOW!! Obviously the game drives and landscapes were amazing but if you're considering this tour I'm sure you already know that so I won't ramble on and on. What I will do is highly recommend this tour operator, you will not be disappointed. It has completely changed my opinion of guided tours and I dont think my trip to South Africa would have been the same without it. Thanks again Jaco!!
BE
50-65 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
once in a lifetime safari
I was investigating for more than 3 years how to organize a family Botswana Safari trip and chose in summer 2018 to put my trust in Moonstroll Vantage Expeditions. We wanted to offer our 2 kids (after finishing their university studies) a unique experience before flying out of the family nest. And what a unique experience it became!
The trajectory that we chose (after many interactions with Monametsi) was Maun - Makgadikgadi - Maun - Chiefs Island - Khwai - Savuti - Chobe riverside - Kasana (+ transfer to Victoria Falls). Monametsi quickly understood that we wanted to combine a variety of 'off the beaten track ecological experiences' with a private Safari experience and sufficient comfort. The trip formula we agreed on was to combine the private experience of camping in nature parks (1 night Makgadikgadi, 2 nights Chiefs Island, 1 night at Savoti, 2 nights at Chove rivers side) intermitting with a bit more comfort at affordable B&B lodges along our way (2 times 1 night at Maun, 2 nights in a container lodge at Khwai). The campfire dinners of the cook that joined us during our trip were also much appreciated. The cook really made the best out of the limited supplies he had available - ... - even succeeded in cooking a birthday cake for my daughters' 23rd birthday.
Monametsi chose to involve Teenage as a freelance guide for our family trip. He had quickly understood that we wanted to get accompanied by a guide with strong ecological experience (our son is a Biologist) who could also share with us all he has learned about the fragile balances in the wildlife and nature in general.
As a guide, Teenage was a fantastic match with the profile we had been looking for. He is an experienced guide, driven by nature preservation and he left no effort to match our expectations. Teenage really pushed himself each time up-to the end of the day to maximize our satisfaction. We also appreciate he joined our dinners, telling us about Botswana history, how satisfied he is with the recent evolution of his country etc.
As our trip really went in crescendo all along our trip we have been joking with Teenage about 'his challenge for the next day to surprise us even more'. And yes indeed, each day again we were really amazed. In taking up our challenge, Teenage systematically checked with the other tour-guides that crossed our path and made sure that we always were on the right spot at the right moment. His maneuvring skills were truly exceptional - we were always positioned in the optimal shooting position to take the best photo's - even if other jeeps would make it more difficult. With my 'big mama' lens (500mm mounted on a D850 camera) I now have a set of fantastic photo's from very closeby.
Some highlights of our Safari
- day 1 at Makgadikgadi: a cadaver of a giraffe with vultures, jackals & marabu feeding on it ... awesome as first impression during our trip
- day 2 at Chiefs Island: Elefant sights during our mokoro trip & crossing our path during a late Safari walk, one elephant shaking a coconut tree
- day 3 at Chiefs Island: traces of a hypo sleeping at & lions passing our camp + an unforgettable Safari walk with locals, and late evening mokoro
- day 4 arriving at Khwai: our only leopard sight; Teenage maneuvered our jeep through the bush so that we could follow it at just a few feet
- day 5 at Khwai: a barking hypo at just 5m from the jeep, and our first 2 hyena during a night safari
- day 6 starting the day at Khwai with 2 lions hunting for impala, ..., arriving at Savuti with a close sight of lions with pups (3 of 2 wks; 4 of 2 mths)
- day 7: we failed to find (the only 2) Cheetah or other lions in Savuti, and spend rest of the day crossing the landscape towards Chobe
- day 8: a Hyena as the first sight of the day, followed by lions mating along our path to a Chobe river cruise
- day 9: on our path moving out of Chobe park, still enjoyend some last lions
All along during our Safari, next to 23 lions - 1 leopard - 3 hyena - between 5 or 10 jackals - too many to count hypo pools, crocodile, vultures and marabu, sea eagles (on with a cath) many other bird types like spoon birds etc. We also passed many big herds of buffalo, elephants, zebra, gnu, .... and much more I here forget to mention here. We only seem to have missed cheetah, wild dog and rhino (these do not reside in this region) on our trip.
What an experience we received. As the locals were singing at Chiefs Island: 'we will never forget'
Teenage, many thanks for making this a trip of a lifetime!
(ps for others planning to go on this route : if you plan to take the same itinerary, I would recommend taking a day more at Makgadikgadi (combine with NXai pan ?) and at least one or 2 days extra at Savuti + to also travel from west to east to make sure the wildlife sightings improve as you move further on your safari ...)
LK
35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
It's simply amazing. Worth every single USD we paid for the safari
Great communication. Service was More than expected. Our driver usuf was amaizing
FI
20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
very interesting new experience!
Safari and game drives was very new adventure for us!
Jacob the organizer put all our needs and wishes in to a same package. Arrival and departure hotel, tented camp accommodation, transportations and safari game drives. Thanks for that! Everything went just how discussed and communication before and during the trip was fast. Tented camp was great, with those silly staff people and our driver Isack many thanks for him for teaching us a lot about animals and their life but also telling about local people life, culture and history. Isack was just right guide for us, although he learned Finnish very slowly :) Arrival and departure hotels was B&B so they were what they were.
One star we have to take away, the reason really is the cost. Safari is quite expensive. And we never really got a clear idea of what the sum consists of. Afterwards, I wondered if I had paid too much, too little or just right. Well, usually you can't make new adventures without money.
BE
50-65 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Top quality!
African travels tailored a self-drive tour from Cape Town to Johannesburg for the four of us, which perfectly suited our wishes and expectations. They were of great assistance when our in-flight was delayed. The guesthouses and lodges they suggested were great. We enjoyed every minute of our trip!
BR
20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Went to the police
We went to the police station after Mr. Otieno didn’t show up as agreed.
After 3 police station the 4 was the correct place. It’s at Ngong road besides kenyatta hospital.
The policeman in charge of the case said he has 10 cases like ours at the moment.
He said that last year he had a similar problem and he payed everybody. I just don’t know how we couldn’t find coments about that on the internet.
If you are in a similar situation, I recommend you book another safari because he won’t show up. And if you come to Kenya, go to the station make a complaint so he can be sued and stop stealing from people.
NL
20-35 years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
An unforgettable experience!
Last year we visited Namibia, this year we decided to travel on our own through Botswana and the northern part of SA. However, it was difficult to book campsites on our own in Botswana, communication with the campsites was bad or we got late responses. Therefore, we decided to contact African Travels for help. It was the best thing we did. Marijnke (owner of African Travels) knows a lot about Africa and she knows the most beautiful places. Thanks to her, it was an unforgettable experience!
Communication with African Travels was more than good. Because of the weather, we changed part of the trip. Marijnke was reachable 24/7. She came up with good ideas how to travel and which campsites/accomodations were still available and she also booked the locations for us while we were in desert.
Furthermore, African Travels arranged a very good car for us (Toyota Hillux 4x4) by a trusted partner of them. The owner of the rental company also knew a lot about Africa and told us the most beautiful stories.
I definitely would recommend to contact African Travels if you want to travel trough Africa so that your dream can come true!
CH
20-35 years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
Unfortunately NOT satisfying!
We booked and paid our trip 6 months ago already and our trip started mid July. Unfortunately it all started with a misunderstanding already when we had our meeting/introduction in the beginning. Because we had organised a city walking tour ourselves after the intro (which we told OT about beforehand) but he he other plans for us which were at the same time he tried to move things and told us our tour would start a day later, which we actually didn’t really want. He said not to worry, we should relax and the guide in Ugands will be informed about the day that was supposed to be scratched from our trip (which we also didn’t want). We had to then start our trip a day later than expected, which was a pity but ok, because at the end of our trip we had an extra day before our flights went. We had also booked a hotel ourselves for that last evening.
When the trip finally started we had a fantastic first guide named Frederick who was very knowledgable and told us a lot about the animals, the country and it’s culture. After that we had friendly drivers but not really someone I would call a guide. They weren’t very talkative and didn’t inform us.
We started getting worried in Uganda when our guide wasn’t informed by the office of the change in itenerary and it was even possible to change it. We then sent OT an email, complaining about how he handled the situation in the first place and that he shouldn’t scratch one day of our safari because we actually paid for it. Furthermore we just wanted to know how the rest of our safari would go because now it was all a bit confusing how it would continue. And if we would stay for the whole trip then we would have to cancel our hotel for the last evening. He hadn’t replied ( which was odd because before our tour started the office replied VERY quickly) for more than a week. We asked our guides/drivers to ask the office to contact us because they must be in contact with the office all the time. The drivers just answered that they couldn’t reach the office, which was also very odd because they had to get info from the office to change drivers. After the 3rd driver told us that story we knew it was bullshit. We phoned and got through immediately twice!! Unfortunately OT was NEVER available to talk, he never phoned back and after a those two phone calls we weren’t able to get through either. They blocked us.
Then we told our driver to take us to the office on our way from Naivasha to Kenyan boarder, because the LACK OF COMMUNICATION AND THE NON-EXISTING CUSTOMER SERVICE really frustrated us. At the office we couldn’t get answers to why they had never replied and we found out that our itenerary had been changed by OT (via phone) which was a big surprise to us. If we hadn’t demanded to go to the office we would have never found out because the drivers didn’t know about the change.
Then we went to the boarder to Tansania. We waited for 2 hours for our next driver, who had more than enough time to get there on time, just to find out that he wasn’t coming anymore and we should stay st a nearby hotel. No one from the office called us to inform and update us, not even to say sorry for the inconvenience. The next morning we waited for an update until 10:30 (we actually tried to phone and find out what’s going on-that didn’t help because they didn’t know themselves and they didn’t have a plan B) that our next driver would be there at 11. We waited at the boarder again just to wait for 2 hours AGAIN!! He finally got there but we basically missed a whole day and we missed a game drive.
The next guide named Francis in Tansania was great as well. At last we could enjoy our trip again. We had two great days in Ngorongoro and Serengeti. Our last day, because our trip started a day late, we had to speed from Serengeti to Nairobi airport to catch our flight in the evening. Why OT planned the last day like that we will never know. He said there was enough time to even do a game drive in the morning and get to Nairobi Airport on time in the evening. That was bullshit. We even asked him to change it but he said it would be fine. We missed our last game drive and the guide had to drive 140km/h on a 80km/h road to get us there on time.
Summary:
The things we saw during our trip were amazing!! We had two great guides.
BUT the people working in the office and especially OT have been incompetent and very unprofessional. There is a total lack of communication at a time when it should be the best ever because it was DURING our trip, and there is definitely no customer service whatsoever!!! It was really disappointing because before our trip they seemed very professional and they responded very quickly to emails.
I just hope we, and other groups we met that also had a lot of problems which were even worse than ours, had some bad luck and that other groups won’t be stuck with this kind of mess!
IN
35-50 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
FRAUD FRAUD FRAUD....Beware
It is a fraud company. They have taken $500 as advance
Our tour is starting from 9th August and today, 2 days prior to the safari, I have received a mail to inform us that they have cancelled the tour due to some technical problems. They are saying that they will refund the money but i am pretty much sure that that would never happen.