US
65+ years of age | Experience level: first safari
Earthlife is fabulous
The Earthlife Expeditions African safari in Tanzania led by our remarkable guide/driver Daniel Balela was a life changing experience for me. It gave me a whole new perspective on my life in the larger scheme of nature—we are all unique, but related.
I gazed at animals in awe. They hardly noticed me. I felt like I was in a big zoo, only it was me in the cage/Jeep, out of my element, yet safe, in the animals’ world of nature. Humbling. A truly spiritual experience.
Thank you Earthlife for flawless logistics.
Thank you Daniel for helping me see the wonder and beauty of nature and my tiny, insignificant place in it. You are amazing.
IN
under20 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Awesome
What an incredible experience we had in Namibia! The trip was perfectly organized, the accommodations great and the food was fantastic especially at Etosha safari camp. We had a 10 Days Highlights of Namibian Safari that starting from Sossusvlei and ending at Waterberg Plateau. Everything went according to plan except for 2 flat tyres along the way. Our greatest activity was the Sandwich harbour which was very breath taking and was ideal for great pictures. Overall I would give our tour a 4.5 Star. Planning to book a Botswana tour with the same company next year.
MA
20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Amazing Safari:Great experience
My friend and I booked a 6 day private safari for (Tarangire, Serengeti , Ngorongoro) , everything was perfect: the organization, the logistics, Car and foods.
A very nice team, our guide Ricardo was so friendly and knowledgable, our dear cook that I want to thank for his great meals .
A very big thanks also to Godfrey for his special help and for his professionalism and for his smile It was pleasure to meet him.
Really it was a life experience.
I highly reccomend this agency for your trip in Tanzania.
US
20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Best tour i ever did
We had an absolutely wonderful 6 days Safari in Namibia, and Enrico’s Tours and Safaris did an exceptional job in making that happen. They were responsive, extremely easy to work with, and helped put together an itinerary that was really wonderful and well balanced. We started at Etosha National Park then Swakopmund and then Sossusvlei. The tour was overall the best tour we had in Africa. Would surely recommend this tour operator to my friends.
RU
20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Discovering Africa with the best guide driver ever
We took 5-days safari tour (Nakuru, Naivaishi, Masai Mara) with outstanding Runi from 1st till 5th October and it was mostly totally great! At first we visited Nakuru for 1 day, saw there rhino! In the first day, can you imagine! But unfortuntelly flamingos were too far to see them. The accommodation and meals was reasonable for the budget tour. The second day we spent in Naivaishi and there were extra costs that we didn’t expected as boat trip (30$) and bicycle tour in Hell’s gate (25$). Bicycle tour is 1,5 hours and 8 km, so we would prefer to do it with Runi rather than with other tour guide, because eventually Runi as usual gave much more information about the park and animals! The accommodation in Navaishi was not as good as previous one. Then we met other guys and went to Masai Mara and it was so unbelievably great: the place, animals, accommodation, meals, our company! This was the best part of the tour, because of the Runi and all his efforts we watched leopard eating zebra, migration of wildebeest, walking hippos during the day, lions doing it and brest feeding, family of elephants, cheetos and dozens of other species! So it was great and we thankful for Runi and our company for this amazing experience!
US
65+ years of age | Experience level: first safari
The trip of a lifetime
The 8 day safari my friend and I took was even more amazing than I could have imagined.
Before the Safari I really appreciated Manager Peter N. prompt responses to my many questions.
Our driver Anthony on Kenya portion of the Safari was not only knowledgeable, but also attentive to our needs and had a great personality. He also was very good at driving to the locations where we had the best view as possible of the animals.
Victor, our driver in Tanzania was also very knowledgeable and considerate.
Thank you Peter for arranging a trip of a lifetime.
CZ
20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Breathtaking wildlife experience
We had an amazing 7 days tour through Kenyan parks. Our journey started few months ahead when booking and discussing all the details with provider - all simple and instructions clear, they were even able to buy us extra train tickets for our next travels (thanks Susan!). Our real journey started in Nairobi where Anthony, our driver, picked us in a hotel and brought together with other 6 guys. All of us together made a great group and had a lot of fun, sharing this experience in larger group was definitely a pro. Our path went through Masai Mara, Lake Naivasha, Lake Nakuru and Amboseli. All these places were amazing and very variable, from landscape, flora and also fauna point of view. Our driver and guide Anthony was very skilled and passionate to his work, all made with love and smile on his face - from crazy bumpy driving to quietly spotting the smallest birds. And always dealing with all our requests and lots of silly questions in very friendly way.
Not everything is easy and comfortable on a safari tour, you will wake up very early, keep up with simple local food, sleep in tents when hearing the roaring wildness all night and spending most of your days in car. But once you take all these "struggles" as a starting point you will deserve truly breathtaking experience and you will love it all (as we did).
65+ years of age | Experience level: first safari
More fantastic than I ever dreamed!
I never imagined that an 8-day safari tour would be twice as fantastic as I expected. The best part was that my friend & I were not added to a bigger group - this was our private safari with two great & knowledgeable guides; one for Kenya & another for Tanzania. The two drivers were skilled at handling the very rough roads, generous with their knowledge of the country/cultures & adept at finding & positioning us to view them. Thank you Peter N. for organising such a smoothly managed experience at such a reasonable price. So glad I followed all those other positive reviewers and put my trust in Africa Flash MCtours for my trip.
US
50-65 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Trip of a lifetime with Bright African Safaris!
I apologize for the length of this review, but it's hard to be brief when singing the praises of Bright African Safaris. This wonderful company recently organized an adventure of a lifetime for me and my husband, and we have so many good things to say about it. When we decided to do this trip, we looked for a local tour operator, as we wanted all of our money to stay in Africa. After reading reviews, we sent inquiries to several companies, and quickly settled on Bright African, because they were the most responsive and offered the most reasonable prices. Their trip planner, Salim, patiently answered our questions and reworked our itinerary many times to fit our interests and budget. We had the pleasure of meeting Salim upon our arrival in Arusha, where he introduced us to “the other Salim”, who was to be our safari guide in Tarangire, the Serengeti and Ngorongoro Crater.
I knew we’d really hit the jackpot when I heard this second Salim was our guide, as I had read so many positive reviews about him. After spending eight days with him, I can confirm that all the rave reviews are bang on. Salim is a very kind, conscientious and caring person who made sure we were always happy and comfortable. He speaks perfect English and, to my delight, he is also very fluent in French. He is very engaging and intelligent. He has so much experience that he brought us to three Mara River crossings with virtually no wait time, and led us to the most remote corners of the Serengeti (without a single wrong turn!) for up-close animal encounters with no other jeeps in sight. He even took us to the Eastern Serengeti, where other jeeps do not seem to venture much, and although the wildlife was less plentiful there, we were very excited to discover a hyena den. He taught us the value of patience! The other guides have great respect for Salim and call him a walking encyclopedia, as he knows pretty much everything you’d ever want to know about every animal in East Africa. He is also absolutely amazing at finding the animals. I truly think he has eyes in the side of his head, as he is able to look left and right to spot animals, all while navigating very bumpy and challenging roads in the parks. With his eagle eyes, we were able to see pretty much every non-nocturnal animal in his wildlife handbook, even an African wild dog, which is apparently very rare in Tanzania. The only exception was the elusive rhino. Salim tried very hard to find rhinos in the Ngorongoro Crater for us, even stopping rangers to ask if they had seen them, but alas, the rhinos had decided to sleep in the deep forest that day, and not even the rangers had seen them or heard of anyone who had. We were one of the last jeeps to leave the crater, as Salim wanted to give us every possible chance to spot them. We have decided we will just have to go back one day to see the rhino, and if we do, we would certainly ask for Salim as our guide. Other than the magnificent animals, he was the best part of our safari!
We were also very happy with the tent camps and lodges arranged by Bright African, with their luxurious beds, hot showers and good food. Our favorites were the Tanzania Migration Bush Camp at Mara River and the Serengeti Safari Lodge. We were also particularly thrilled with our amazing lunches, usually eaten in the middle of nowhere! The few times we did eat at picnic grounds, we felt sorry for all the other tourists, whose companies just provide boring brown bag lunches, for not only did they have to see us set up a beautiful table, with a tablecloth and proper plates and cutlery, they then had to watch in envy as we indulged in a large selection of delicious food that had been kept warm in environmentally-friendly stainless steel containers. We even had coffee made fresh in a French press every day, and Salim always made sure I could top off my meal with chocolate! He kindly spent his own money picking up treats like avocadoes and bananas from roadside stands. He also got up early every morning to make sure our jeep was spotless and stocked with everything we’d need. Extra touches like these make all the difference and really set Bright African apart from other companies.
Bright African’s excellence even crosses borders, for we got the same royal treatment when we went on to the next part of our trip, in Rwanda and Uganda. Upon arrival in Kigali, we met our second wonderful guide, Bosco. He is also a very conscientious and kind person, and he did a great job driving us through the beautiful Rwandan countryside, with stops at the quaint Migano Café with spectacular drinks (Try the Bob Marley!), and a very fun roadside eating area where we got kebabs, hot sauce and banana beer. Bosco set up WiFi in his car so we could catch up on messages while driving, and he even got a link to a Canadian radio station to make us feel totally at home! We told him that we were so comfortable that we could happily spend the rest of our holiday in his car, but in fact, the highlight of our trip was yet to come….a gorilla trek in Bwindi Impenetrable Forest! I didn’t think anything could be more exciting than our safari, but seeing a gorilla in its own habitat is an experience like no other. Gorillas are so like humans, and being in their presence is indeed a magical experience that I’d suggest to anyone with a little adventure in their souls (and lots of money in their pocket, as it is quite expensive!)
We are very grateful to Bright African for arranging all of these wonderful adventures, and would heartily recommend them to anyone interested in travelling to East Africa. They are also looking at expansion into South Africa, and we hope to use them there one day. After our trip, I had a lovely email exchange with one of the founders, Msangi, who told me that after working as a waiter, and then as a driver/guide, he built Bright African from scratch. What a fantastic job he has done! In addition to our excellent guides, we had many lovely drivers on our journey, and each one of them seemed to take great pride in their work and their company. Many congratulations to Msangi and all of his team for creating such a special company, and many thanks for giving us the trip of a lifetime. I was a little nervous about everything that could go wrong on this trip (insect-borne diseases, tummy troubles, security concerns, etc.), but all of my fears were unfounded. We had nothing but pleasure on our holiday thanks to the excellent work of Bright African Safaris.
A few last useful tips:
We wished we had bought our Tanzanian visas online ahead of time. Although the visa process was very smooth in all other countries we visited, Tanzania is in the process of converting from a manual system, and the line-ups to purchase a visa can be extremely long, so I would not suggest waiting to get the visa upon arrival.
I would not fret too much about insects in the dry season. We sprayed all our clothing with permethrin and brought 100% Deet, but never actually saw a mosquito. It’s probably better to be safe than sorry when mosquitoes carry malaria, but having spent much time in Canadian woods, Africa in September seemed like an insect-free paradise in comparison!
If you travel with Bright African, you probably don’t need to worry about bringing binoculars. They had excellent ones in the jeep. We also could have left behind our anti-bacterial wipes, as they provided them for us.
The toilets in East Africa were surprisingly clean, and we tipped every bathroom attendant to show our gratitude (After a recent trip to China where the bathrooms were filthy, I was hugely relieved!) That being said, there are not a lot of them in the parks, so you will need to be ready for “bush pees”. Bright African kindly supplies toilet paper, but I must say I was grateful not to have any tummy troubles!!
US
65+ years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
In all, extremely enjoyable and interesting tour. Driver was excellent.
Tour was excellent. Driver was so helpful, friendly, knowledgable and considerate. Lodging was good with one exception, where it seemed it must have been a new contact, as we couldn't even find it until after dark, and much of the necessities didn't really work. But in all other ways, highly recommended.