50-65 years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
Superb 11 day honeymoon safari
We looked at several safari operators, but decided on Transtrek very soon after Dan contacted us and tailor made our trip to suit both time and budget. David was a fantastic and very knowledgeable guide and we would like to use this platform to thank him again for an unforgettable safari on our honeymoon. Some of the highlights: Elephants and views of Kilimanjaro from Amboseli; Kilanguni lodge in Tsavo West, with view of waterhole from our room; Sheldrick elephant orphanage in Nairobi, where we met our fostered baby elephants; bird life at lake Naivasha; lions, cheetah and leopards at Masia Mara. There was much, much more including the comfortable accommodation, swimming pools and exceptional food at every camp.
Highly recommended.
IQ
20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Beautiful country and professional company
I visited Africa and Uganda gave me the most memorable experiences. When I contacted Mukisa Safaris Uganda, their replies were always prompt and genuine. They advised me on how to go along with the tour. indeed my trip was customised according to my preferences and I can't thank them enough for the way my trip was organized and executed. We had a very good guide Veronica and driver John who are very professional, friendly and curtious.
We visited Jinja , Murchison falls , Queen Elizabeth national parks and Saw alot of animals. Africa is indeed where nature is and it was unbelievable that we were just walking in the midst of animals which we had only seen on TV.
Gorilla tracking was awesome and it's such a wonderful experience that every person should undertake when you visit Uganda. It involved walking up and down in the thick forest for several hours and when we finally saw them,it was such amazing standing a few metres from these huge creatures. I really thank the team of Mukisa Safaris for my Wonderful trip and I recommend them for everyone in the world who wants to travel to Uganda to seek their services
CN
20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
SUMMIT KILIMANJARO SAFE
Brilliant team at Dahlia tours kilimanjaro team a trek leader was excellent, you have a great administrator who not only ensures safety of his Trekkers but also manages the support staff with dexterity. With Dahlia team around, we knew nothing could happen to us, on this challenging trek. The guide Michael was our true mountain man. Soft spoken, always on the move and disciplined. You have a real gem in him in your team, preserve him his porters were great support to this team which has made our Mount Kilimanjaro climb a safe and memorable trek. I remember every single moment when you stood in those dangerously rocks and places to ensure each one passed safe. Exceptionally best guides to the summit. We strongly recomend you
US
65+ years of age | Experience level: first safari
BEWARE: INSOLVENT BUSINESS. DO NOT SEND MONEY
Open Africa Safaris is run by John Williams, who is a middleman for safari tours. The business is insolvent and John took my payment but did not forward it to the African operator Dilunga (even though he kept assuring me he would), so I could not do my safari. DO NOT SEND him any payment. Use another agency.
20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Wouldn't use again
I did the 52 day Southern Safari trip with Absolute Africa traveling from Nairobi to Cape Town. Highlights include rafting along the Zambezi river, Spitzkoppe and of course all the amazing animals we saw on safari (Serengeti, endangered rhinos at Matopos, Etosha). Some driving days were long (we covered a lot of countries in 52 days), tent equipment was good quality and food was usually plentiful (unless people in your group want to eat breakfast before breakfast time and they don't save you enough food). For the first 10 days our tour leader Kip/Edmund was great, he had a positive attitude and he was really patient. Then we joined another group and had Martin as our tour leader. Whilst Martin was really informative in the beginning about the daily itinerary, with time i felt he became less informative. It was also clear to some people that Martin favoured certain individuals in the group. I understand that there will be people (even tour leaders) that get on with certain people more than others but as a professional i expected him to treat the group as a whole and listen to us as a whole, taking control of the group during more difficult situations when needed. There were certain situations where Martin acted quite childishly to certain members of the group, a few times he did not respect people's confidentiality by talking to certain members of the group about other people. One particular incident he publicly ridiculed someone in front of the whole group during dinner for not helping cook dinner one night because she was tired. You wouldn't expect this from someone who's been a tour leader for 20 years.
Some of the optional activities i did i felt like it wasn't worth the money, for example we spent 3 days in the Okavango Delta and one day had 9 hours of free time where we had to stay in the bush camp or swim in a pond. Our tour leader didn't tell us this so some people didn't bring things like books etc. Absolute claim that they send you the most updated information (itinerary and optional activities list) however they included activities that haven't been running for years or they don't even run. We went to Antelope Park, Zimbabwe a private reserve home to a lion conservation programme with the aim of breeding lion cubs from captured lions in order to release them into the wild. Since 2005 they haven't released a single lion. I read articles by National Geographic and Africa Geographic that questioned the ethicacy of the programme and there was also speculation about whether the park involved itself in Africa's lion industry (look up Blood Lions for more info). Animal conservation should never involve animal-human interaction or breeding and these do/use to do both these things e.g. cub handling and lion walks.
Correspondence with Absolute prior and throughout my trip was thorough and professional. After giving feedback about my experiences there was an obvious lack of accountability and ignorance. Overland tours are a great way of traveling to so many African countries and overall i really enjoyed most of the activities i did and the people i traveled with. However there are quite a few African overland tours and I am unlikely to use them again.
IN
35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Good
Excellent communication specially by fredreena .she was there for us always and her choices for our accommodations were excellent
Except for planning of safari to Masai Mara —we had to go with some other driver and he of course gave more importance and privilege to his group
KR
20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
This operator just took my money and didn't make a refund until now. Operating skills very poor too.
I would just write facts here. It is your option to judge.
In brief, this operator
1) Took my money(entrance fee) and made me pay twice. Didn't make my refund until now.
2) Didn't inform me about changes within the tour
3) Didn't pay hotel in advance
4) Doesn't keep promises
1. Just took my money and didn't make a refund
I met Cate(Operator) at my hotel before my trip to Masai Mara. I paid the remaining deposits to her, including Masai Mara entrance fee(280USD for 2 pax). However, when I arrived at the national park, the park rangers said no entrance fee was paid. I had to call her(several attempts since she didn't pick up the phone) and she said the queue for the bank was too long so I should pay the rangers 280USD and she would pay back my money once I get back to Nairobi. I told her to tranfer the money directly to my Mara hotel but she said that was not possible. I had no other choice so I paid the rangers 280USD and went for my tour.
Cate promised me to meet me at Wilson airport once I get back, but she didn't show up. (She was in Tanzania) I needed to keep calling her and check how things were going. (Why would I use a tour operator if I needed to do EVERYTHING by myself?) She promised me (again) that she would send someone to my hotel in Nairobi and give me back my money. She didn't. I came back home after my trip and requested online refund. She said she will but kept ignoring my emails and said she needs a month due to funding issues. (She obviously used my money elsewhere) So I waited with patience but she decided to ignore my email again. She knows that she owes me my deposit(she stated that in her own email) but keeps on refusing to pay me back.
2. Not a professional operator.
- This operator must have done hundreds of excursions but never notified me regarding which domestic airport I should book for Masai Mara. I used skycanner and searched an airport and booked it in advance, but Cate said it was another airport few weeks before my trip. Shouldn't I be notified?
- Due to booking a different airport, my hotel was changed to a more expensive hotel. However, since this was my honeymoon, I wanted to have a private game drive. That was why I booked this tour in the first place because it was all private. However, I found out that my game drive was shared by 6 people. I understand what happened with the hotel but nothing was informed. I needed to call her(again) to check.
She insists that she is making nothing from this tour due to a more expensive hotel, but this wouldn't have happened if she informed me about the aiport.
- When I was checking out at Masai Mara Hotel(Serena Lodge), they said my balance was not paid. I paid everything to Cate, but the operator didn't pay the lodge in advance. I needed to call her(again) and check what was going on. The operator was on his/her way to pay and I needed to wait until I was free to go. I had a flight coming up so wasn't comfortable with waiting.
I strongly recommend you to look for another operator. This is how this operator does business.
CA
20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
EVERYTHING TOP QUALITY
Having returned from Mount Kilimanjaro Trek, I feel compelled to write a review, from start to finish the trip excelled.
A special thanks to our wonderful guides. They exceeded our expectations and I can't thank them enough. So a big shouts out to Brian, Faza and Catherine who led with patience and professionalism. They were a force to be reckoned with and through their knowledge, experience and friendliness it made the trip the amazing experience it was. Also big thanks to our porters and cook who ware an integral part of the team. From the onset of our journey it was an excellent experience. Hotels and eco lodges were top class.
Many thanks to all the team at
Dahlia Africa
US
20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Fantastic Gorilla Trek in Bwindi
We had a wonderful experience with Encounter Africa Safaris. They were very prompt in their communications before the trip and then on the trip everything was as described. Our guide/driver Abdul was very informative and friendly and the whole trip from pick up, border crossings, lodgings, gorilla trek, and transportation back to the airport went smoothly. It was a fantastic trip and I would absolutely recommend EAS to others in the future!
20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Appalling service
4 Day budget camping safari. Ok I must say our desire to visit Ngorongoro has been fulfilled, We have seen the big 5. But not thanks to Bobby tours, Its a magical place and getting there is all you need.
We are hardcore backpackers and not fuzzy at all. We have traveled around Africa quite extensively using some really bad and uncomfortable buses.
Our safari trip was actually kind of treat as we were not relying on Public transport.
The car came to pick us up from our lodge in Arusha, First impression is that the car was quite old which again it was ok with us as It was a treat compare to what we had before. But so we thought!
First game drive and everything was fine, lots of Elephants at Lake Manyara NP.
We were told that we will visit a Masai Village inside Ngorongoro Area and will cost us 20USD when we booked the tour. Our driver claiming that we were short on time suggested we should visit a Masai Village near lake Manyara NP which was also near our first camp site. We agreed to do that but we were asked to pay 50USD instead which seemed that it was including a commission to whoever was taking us there and we were not impressed by the village at all as it seemed like a tourist trap. By that time we gave all of our cash we had on us as who needs cash in the bush anyway.
The camping site was in a nice forest area. However the tent we were given had a broken zip and lots of holes. It could not close properly but again as naive were we did not mind much. The camping site was fenced and other than few harmless monkeys they were no big animals around.
The second day we proceeded to Serengeti National park. A long dirt track driving! Here I realise how bad idea was to ride an old worn car. Dust was unbearable. There was no escape from it as it was simply coming inside the car because the roof could not seal properly. I discovered that the plastic that seals the roof was worn and almost totally gone. There was simply no way to keep the dust out. We had to endure hours of driving with hazardous dust which basically went everywhere on our clothes, cameras, phones you name it.
When we arrived at our Serengeti Camp we found out from other people on similar tours with us from other companies that they simply closed the windows and had no dust at all.
The night was really scary. Our faulty tent could easily let a Hyena to get inside our tent as the Camp was not fenced and wild animals where actually freely roaming around our tent.
After we finished with Serengeti and on our final night after a filthy dusty day again the tent was useless against cold weather as our last camp was high up on the Crater Rim of Ngorongoro.
ThereThereThe last day just before were dropped back to our lodge we had to drop our Chef first who was making our meals through the tour. We were asked to give some tips and we kindly gave him around 3-4USD as much as we had on us as were in the bush for few days. Our driver went furious saying that the guy was crying because he went home with out making any money as he was relying on tips and we should give him a minimum of 10USD which was what you must give to the Chef. The same story followed when were dropped back tour our lodge, the same story for the stupid tourists and that we must give 20USD of tips to the driver. We had paid our tour in full well in Advance and a Price tag on tips made us to feel really stupid.
We found out later from some other local guides there that they are actually getting a decent salary for African Standards and they should never asked us that question.
After we came back home I send an email explaining the situation to their office but they never got back to us