LV
20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
King of Safari
We went to Nyrere and Mikumi National parks and both were great but Nyrere was my favourite because it was so dense with animals and looked more like Safaris in the movies and even exceeded my expectations. Btw I am not sure if we missed any animals, because we saw it all, even leopard which are difficult to spot. We had an unforgettable Safari experience thanks to our guide William. The experience was so great that we named him Sir William King of Safari and even bought him a crown to thank him for our incredible memories he was a part of :D William was patient with all of our needs and wishes, ghought us a lot about Tanzanian culture, animals and Africa overall.
Communication with all of the staff that we got in contact with was nice and respectful, they took great care of us. Definitely recommend the company and will book it for future trips. Very happy with our holiday!
SG
20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Extremely professional and heed to your needs
Absolutely Beautiful tour spanning over two countries - Zimbabwe and Botswana. We went as a family of 3 and everything was absolutely breathtaking. The planning was done perfectly, and we managed to see many animals over the course of this trip. We were also vegetarian and it was so easy to get food according to our dietary requirements. Got to see so many animals including Giraffes, Ostriches, Elephants, Hippos, Zebras and Lions. The tour also accommodates for optional activities that you would like to do.
US
65+ years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Lovely trip to Murchison Falls
If you are planning a trip to Uganda, I strongly encourage you to visit Murchison Falls! Beautiful Safrais Uganda picked us up right on time at our hotel in Kampala. We had an interesting drive up to the Falls. Daniel provided very interesting information along the way. We arrived at the Falls and it is breathtaking. It is the most powerful falls in the world!! We were so blown away. After viewing the Falls from the top, we headed to our hotel, arranged by Beautiful Safaris Uganda. The hotel was nice and had a pool, poolside bar and a good restaurant. The service was good and the employees there were friendly and attentive. It was situated on the hill overlooking the Nile. Baboons visited the grounds in the morning and we had elephant visitors to the grounds at night. The next morning we went for an early game drive in the National Park. We returned to the hotel for lunch and then departed on an afternoon cruise down the Nile toward the Falls. We passed so much wildlife. - hippos in the water, a hippo out of the water, elephants, tons of amazing birds and crocodiles. I was pleasantly surprised by how much we enjoyed the boat ride. Totally worth it!!!! We returned in time to clean up for dinner, had drinks by the pool, chatting with other visitors. We returned to Kampala the next day - totally satisfied with all the arrangements and everything we saw, experienced and learned. I highly recommend this trip with Beautiful Safaris Uganda. We even received some nice souvenirs of 2 pillows and 2 travel neck pillows!!! These will come in handy on the long flight home. Thanks, Daniel for a lovely experience.
BR
35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Full budget safari
Safari through 3 national parks (Masai Mara, Nakuru and Amboseli) costing less than 800 dollars. Everything included in this experience: accommodation, food, water, entrance fees to the parks and travel distances, which are far away. The agency team spoke to me all the time to make sure everything was ok. The only negative point was with the first driver, who did not check the car properly, and we had to stop on the road to check the brakes. Furthermore, he drove irresponsibly, and while overtaking improperly, he tore the tire, so we had to change cars. Super Eagle immediately provided another one. The first car was also full of cockroaches, which shows that proper cleaning was not done. I emphasize that this was not under super eagle's control, and when informed she quickly resolved all issues. I highly recommend this company for a safari in Kenya.
IT
50-65 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Amazing experience
I booked a 8 days safari plus a 2 days trekking on mount Kilimanjaro with Luna's wild rides in January 2024 for me and my grownup children and we had an amazing experience.
The manager Ana was very helpful both before the trip to customize a vacation just how we wanted, maximizing the time in the parks and also during the trip, for example, as we asked to make a diversion to visit Olduvai Gorge museum and in one day she organized everything to let us see this important archaeological site.
Our driver/guide for the safari, Rashid, with his 12 years experience allowed us to see all the big five and many more animals. He introduced us to the different landscapes and habitats of Tanzania, teaching us the habits of the different animals. He also explained us how people live in Tanzania, both in traditional and modern way according to the different tribes cultures.
In our mount Kilimanjaro trekking our guide Daniel and the three porters were very kind and helpful to us, who have absolutely no experience of climbing such a high mountain.
[ ] To sum up I strongly recommend Luna's wild rides for organising an unforgettable vacation in Tanzania
US
35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Disorganized and Poor Customer Service
We went with this company on back to back days…1 in Zanzibar and 1 in Kenya. On day 1, we were supposed to swim with dolphins and sea turtles. We were also supposed to have time to explore Jozani Forest. Instead, we spent most of the day in the bus (2+ hours of it were with it not moving). We had a short stop at a beach, but were told we had to make it quick to make it to our lunch reservation at The Rock Restaurant. We were assured that we would get a chance to swim with dolphins and sea turtles afterwards. While the meal was nice, it was very disorganized. After the meal was over, it took Marl approximately an hour to settle up the bill with each person in the group. Rather than spending an hour at the restaurant, it ended up being 2 hours which further pushed things behind. We were then told we wouldn’t be able to stop for dolphins because it was too hot for them. I found out later friends of ours with a different company did swim with dolphins. We were then given a choice of aquarium to see the sea turtles, Jovani Forest or go straight to the cruise ship we came in on. If we chose the turtles, we wouldn’t have time to swim with them. We chose Jovani Forest. We only had 20 minutes there due to the disorganization. We had to stay close by due to the short amount of time. Luckily, we did see a few monkeys. So…our group of 4 spent over $400 for a glorified meal, 20 minutes at a forest that we didn’t get to explore much of, and hours on a hot bus.
Since the company is from Kenya, we gave them the benefit of the doubt. We expected the next day to go smoother. We got off the ship and made our way to the Jeeps. We were told before the day started it would go smoother. We were told we would load up the jeeps in order of arrival and each jeep would leave immediately once filled. Did that happen? Nope. We waited an hour before getting started with the long drive to Tsavo East. Once there, we had to wait another hour and a half to get in because of “system error”. Even though there was a “system error” there were still other people going into the park who were with other tour groups. The safari itself was nice. We saw lots of animals. When it came time to leave though, I’m pretty sure our driver got lost. We didn’t leave the park until nearly an hour after the rest of our group had left the park. A lunch at Voi Lodge was supposed to be included. We were supposed to go to Masai Village. All of that was cut out.
Everything that went wrong on both days always had an excuse that was blamed on someone or something else rather than taking responsibility for their mistakes or their miscommunication. There was no attempt to reconcile what was promised to be included but wasn’t. There was no offer of a partial refund for the things we were supposed to do but didn’t get to do. We felt like we were taken advantage of. We felt like we were lied to. We felt like we were scammed. This is a company that I highly recommend others to AVOID!
BR
35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Amazing safari experience, highly reccommend
I recently joined a 2-day safari in Tanzania as a solo Male traveler, and it was an incredible experience. Innocent my tour consultant curated a seamless itinerary, ensuring a perfect balance of wildlife encounters and cultural immersion. The group dynamic was fantastic, making the journey even more enjoyable. Highly recommend this safari for solo travelers seeking adventure and camaraderie.
CN
20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Full score travel agency
Morning Star gave me a very good experience, which made my family and I successfully complete this trip to Kenya，and Morningstar has a WeChat account, which brought great convenience to China tourists. As a China person, I highly recommend this travel agency.
Dennis is in charge of contacting me. He is very warm and considerate, and we all like him very much.He patiently helped us work out the itinerary and gave us a reasonable quotation
Originally, I appointed Alex as our guide. He is modest, polite and experienced.Due to some small circumstances, Willie finally became our guide.Willie's personality is very interesting, and he takes us everywhere to find animals.Although we didn't communicate much because of my poor English, we got along very happily for eight days. Although we returned to China, we still missed everything in Kenya, as well as Willie and Dennis.Willie is highly recommended. He is a great guide, and he is very safe and happy to get along with.
US
35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Nice, responsible, and easy to communicate.
“I am sure this will not be just a tour but a lifetime experience of Africa.” — Dennis, Kibena’s tour operator.
He was absolutely right. We totally enjoyed the tour a ton. The itinerary was well planned starting from the first airport pickup. Our group arrived in Kilimanjaro separately in two days. I appreciated that Dennis and his crew came to the airport twice to pick up all of us.
The tour started from the Tarangire National Park, where we encountered a couple of resting lions, a group of elephant, and some giraffes. In addition, a double rainbow in the late afternoon. It was a good taste of African wildlife on the first day of the trip.
The tour then continued with Lake Manyara National Park, which had the large lake on one side and rain forest on the other side. We didn’t encounter any predators and large animals here, but just some monkeys on our way out of the park.
The third day at the Ngorongoro Conservation Area, especially the Crater, was the first highlight of the trip. There were abundant of zebras, wildebeest, buffalos, flamingos, and many more. More importantly, two rhinos! Although they were super far from us, it was somehow lucky to see the rarest of the Big Five.
The excitement continued to the next 3 days, where happened in Ndutu, Southern Serengeti. It was common to see lions, cheetahs, and leopards, just to name a few. The coolest moment was to see 9 lions approaching us altogether. Some went resting on the tree, while the others were under.
A relatively unfortunate days were the 2 nights we spent in Central Serengeti. This year rained differently than usual. The grass here grew much longer and it consequently made the game drive much harder. It was difficult to spot the predators when there were lying down in the bush and grass.
The trip ended with a surprising moment to us. Now please allow me to give the biggest applause to our tour guide, Raymond (Ray). This trip wouldn’t be perfect without him. Ray was an extremely friendly, knowledgeable, responsible guide, and at the same time, a skillful and considerate driver. The main purpose of this tour was to see wildebeest migration. However, we couldn’t encounter the head of wildebeests throughout the first 7 days because of the unusual rain and weather. In the last couple of days, Ray kept asking all other tour guides to obtain the weather information of the Southern Serengeti. Based on his 17 years of experience, he predicted the location where the wildebeests would be. On the very last day of the trip, he brought us back to Southern Serengeti and seek for the head of wildebeests. We made it! Massive zebras and wildebeests covered the plain. They spread out all the way to the horizon. Ray spent extra hours to let us see what we came to Tanzania for. We truly appreciated him being such responsible to the clients.
Speaking of experience, Ray also re-arranged the order of the parks to make sure we had enough time to enjoy Serengeti. Each game drive he drove around the territory and successfully found the animals we would like to see. Furthermore, Ray was so knowledgeable that he kept providing animal/parks/ecology/cultural information and answering numerous questions from each of us.
On the last day in Arusha, Ray kindly drove us around the town and kept us company before heading to airport in the late afternoon.
At the end, we highly recommend Dennis and Kibena. He has arranged nice accommodations and trip plans. Raymond deserves 100 stars if I were to rate him.
FI
65+ years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Great, but lousy in communication prior to the tour
You only needed to see the first bright smile of Eddy, " the Elephant son" at the Entebbe airport and you felt, that Uganda wishes you fully welcome.
Eddy, my driver-guide for the next two weeks (14-Days Best of Uganda Safari Tour) was standing there in the early morning hours, held my name correctly written- which surely doesn’t happen too often- in the nameplate. And from that very moment on I knew, that I shall have a great journey with NGONI safaris in Uganda.
Eddy took me straight to sleep in the comfortable Cassia Lodge, helped me to buy a sim card in the afternoon and the safari proper was to start after a good sleep in the very next morning.
And what a great tour I had. Fell in love with the smiling Uganda, with the stunning scenery, with the wildlife all around.
Of course the most impressive memory of this “once in the lifetime journey” was the encounter with the enchanting gorillas.
The whole trek in the jungle was already wonderful, but staring at these beautiful creatures in the wild was the unforgettable moment, that I had always dreamed of: so fascinating, so intense.
It surely was worth every dollar invested. And even after a week of my arrival back home I’m still dreaming of these black furballs in the midst of the green jungle. Seeing them so close, that I was almost able to touch them, was an amazing experience.
The hike uphill was not at all so hard as I feared, despite of the fact, that it was raining cats and dogs in the previous evening and night. Yes, the path was partly muddy and very slippery, but surely tolerable.
Luckily I had hired a porter to carry my backpack filled with 2,5 liters water, spare jumper, camera lens and a lunchbox. That made my steps up and down so much lighter during this 5,5 hours’ walk in total. My porter, a young and strong lady was always ready to offer her hand for help in the trickier bits of this jungle adventure.
Before getting to the gorillasI had praised my safari already daily. I loved the rhinos, loved my Uganda baptism by the powerful waters of Murchison falls, and I loved every second of the excitement of chasing the lions and leopards, hippos and giraffes in the wild.
Another mega-highlight was naturally the other jungle trek to see the chimpanzees, in the Kibale national park. What a powerful and great experience it was as well. I never knew, how cute they can be in their real habitat and how near I was able to get to stare at them- just a couple of meters away.
And surely I loved my ultra-relaxing and comfortable lodges. I had chosen a midrange level safari, but felt very often being treated as a first class customer. The meals were generally great, occasionally brilliant.
Especially the fine dining-level reached at the Zigarama and Arcadia-lodges was just incredible. Not to talk about the comfort of zipping the morning coffee at my own balcony in the wonderful Turaco Treetops lodge. It will never be forgotten, nor the meditative moments spent in the swimming pool in the Buffalo Safari lodge.
On top of this great safari I got also a wonderful new friend, a Spanish lady, Begonia. She was also travelling solo with the Ngoni safaris at the same time as I.
We had our own cars and drivers and rooms, but shared the same itinerary and the lodges. Begonia is such a brilliant and inspiring travelmate, that I was more than happy to enjoy my meals and drinks with her daily.
Also her driver and interpreter, the two D’s (Dennis and David) were wonderful fellows, kind, fun and so helpful.
I surely owe warm thanks of my great safari to Eddy, to my talented, intelligent, entertaining and caring guide. He loves Uganda and he wants to share that love with his customer, too.
During the long drives we were sometimes listening our favourite songs from Eddy’s smart phone. One song uniting us deeply was Tina Turner’s “Simply the best”. Just like you, Eddy: simply the best!
I give five stars of my safari to Ngoni safaris, BUT there is a slight minus attached to these stars as well. That minus goes to mr Sedrick, to the boss. His customer handling and communication skills prior to my journey were pretty hopeless.
I had to contact him far too often via what’s app, phoning and messaging just to confirm, that my payments have arrived and my tour is due to come true as written in the itinerary.
Finally, but only two days before flying to Uganda I got all the necessary information I had been longing for, including the name of my guide. Had I got that information at least a week earlier, it had saved me a lot of unnecessary worrying and stress. I even started to think, that Ngoni safaris is not at all a true company and all my thousands of dollars were sent to a hacker firm.
So mr Sedrick, please, send just a simple “welcome to Uganda letter” to your customers EARLY enough, and make your clients start enjoying one of their greatest ever journeys already prior to getting to Uganda. If you are too busy to do it, please, delegate!
And tips for the fellow travellers: make sure that your drinking water supply is secured - as written in the itinerary - all the time: not only during the transfers and in the meals, but also in the lodges.
With all those thousands of dollars paid for the tour, the price must cover also all the drinking water consumed.
Remember also to carry only newer US dollar notes with you. I was able to change only the notes from the year 2009 onwards, none before that.