50-65 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Fantastic Safari Experience Every Single Day!!
From start to finish, the Nature's Wonderland Safaris team provided excellent preparations and communications that cannot be beat. Their love for and knowledge of the wildlife and their country far exceeded what I could have ever expected. Each and every day were filled with so much wildlife facts and information, the days ending with delicious meals and wonderful camp accommodations. This team is lots of fun, they are super knowledgeable and they provide excellent services.
65+ years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Nature's Wonderland Safaris Rock!
What a fantastic trip. For more than two weeks Nature's Wonderland Safaris took us to the best parks and reserves in Kenya and with the knowledgeable help of our guides showed us the amazing wildlife and helped us with identifying all of the birds and mammals that we saw. They were attentive to our goals and well acquainted with the needs of a group of photographers. It was the best trip ever.
35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Spirit of Kenya cannot be beat, and this will be the trip of your lifetime!
First, I’d like to give a big “thank you” to Tiago for planning such a wonderful safari for myself and two friends. He was truly the best coordinator I’ve ever worked with. He was very thorough and provided very quick responses. We wanted to do something slightly different than one of the pre-arranged safaris, and Tiago put together a great itinerary based on where we were starting (Mombasa) and ending (Watamu). Originally it was just myself and one other friend going on the safari, but we had another friend decide to join after we started building out the itinerary and details. Tiago added her without issue.
Some of the main reasons we choose Spirit of Kenya: excellent communication, ability to tailor the safari if there is something in particular you want to do (instead of a pre-set agenda), and several choices for lodging (you could do all budget or all luxury or mix and match like we did).
We went to Tsavo West, Amboseli, and Tsavo East. We saw so much!!! Hippos, lions, zebras, elephants, giraffes, etc. Samuel was our guide, and I really don’t think there is a better guide out there. Samuel has been doing this for over 30 years. He is extremely knowledgeable, very friendly, and one of the sweetest and kindest humans I’ve ever met.
I would like to go to South Africa someday, and I’m happy that Spirit of Kenya has operations in South Africa (and other countries) because I will 100% use them again.
50-65 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Sunworld exceeded expectations
A lot of research went into planning and selecting Sunworld. I started with 10 companies, narrowed it down to 5 and got quotes. Then narrowed it down to 2 and let my son decide. He chose Sunworld because of the water bottles - he liked the green aspect. I'm so glad that he did.
Everything from beginning to end that was handled by Sunworld Safaris was excellent. This trip had been planned for 2020 but the world fell apart. No problem, Sunworld easily accommodated the change and Carolyn was so responsive and helpful when the airline changed our plans during a layover.
Sunworld definitely made us feel cared for. Every hand over was personalized. We were never made to feel like we were on our own and needed to figure it out. The communications were clear and detailed.
Sunworld booked every accommodation except the last and the places were superb. From the convenient Sheraton at the airport to every single camp. My son and I were convinced that we got special attention at each camp. When we mentioned this to Julius, he said it was probably because of the popularity of Sunworld.
Our first glamp camp (Kibo in Amboselli) faced Mt. Killi - and the clouds cleared up on our first day so that we saw the top. Our next one (Sarova Lion Hill in Nakuru) had the best food. Everything was so delicious - I ate so much more than my share. Our last camp (Mara Bush Camp ) was amazing. From the hippos that made noise all night to the monkeys that fought in the trees each morning. Everywhere we went the service level was top notch. We were spoiled and we learned to enjoy.
Julius - our guide, driver and new family member. He was extraordinary. An encyclopedia of the country, the camps and the animals. This was a private tour, so we were able to make pits stops including the grocery store (I love what a grocery store says about people). We noticed how happy other drivers were to see him and we completely understood why. He was engaging, funny, smart and just a joy. He made sure that we saw the BIG 5. The long drives were a pleasure due to his company.
I was just looking forward to spending time with my adult son (who lives 3,00 miles from me). The experience provided by Sunworld completely enhanced it. We've already convinced family members to go back with us in two years and Sunworld is the only company I will consider.
50-65 years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
Our tour operator, Pleunie, listened to our request and she made our Uganda safari dreams came true
Excellent service day and night with friendly staff
ES
20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Unforgettable experience
What an amazing experience! Our driver, Lewis, was amazing - very funny and extremely helpful. Everything was really well organized since minute one, with Hilary taking care of everything and Lewis making sure that our Safari was a breeze. We got to see animals really close to our car, and the group was amazing. I can't wait to go back to Tanzania and see more of its natural beauty. Thank you so much for an unforgettable experience!
20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Amazing and much knowledge about the wildlife!
We were on a three-day safari in Selous National Park with our guide and driver Lenard.
The tour was an unforgettable experience from start to finish and exceeded our expectations 100%.
Thanks to Lenard's knowledge we saw the National Park at its best and even saw lions mating.
We can highly recommend the tour with Lenard to everyone!
CH
35-50 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Mobile Safari 5 Day (mokoro and moremi)
We, a family of 4 (kids age 10 and 11), were looking for a trip to Botswana/the Delta to finish a long journey through Namibia and Botswana. We choose to do a mobile Safari - which was a absolutely perfect decision. It is an unbelivebal experience to sleep right next to all the wildlife.
Monametsi, our contact at Moonstroll, is a 10 out of 10. He answered questions always immediately, gave us all needed information, took away our concerns about the mokoro (yes, the mokoro really was the best Part of the Trip), welcomed us at the beginning and helped us to get the PCR Tests done to fly home. Also my first thought about transfering money somewhere you don‘t know - I would not hesitate doing it with Moonstoll.
As I mentioned, the Mokoro was the best part of this trip. We got poled by local people to the „Island“ where we spent 2 nights. There we were doing walking safaris, seeing the „usual“ game as well as elephants, buffalo and even 6 lions - on a walking safari! Unbelievable, such an experience! Also the local guides doctor and gottfried were doing an awesome job, my son still talks about gottfried - he was just outstanding, even if he couldn’t speak that much English (that was doctors part), but he was the one spotting everything and making jokes all the time. Both of them were even playing cards with us as we‘ve been in the camp for a break during the day and were telling stories at the camp fire at night. On the Island also the Chef and camp assistant joined and did a good job. The tents were very comfortable and the meals cooked over the fire were good.
The 2 nights after the mokoro were supposed to be in Moremi. As the Guide we had for the next days, forgot his license, we were not able to stay in Moremi over night. Monametsi and the Team tried to find a solution, so we ended up at another place about 45 minutes away from the gate where they organized a night and a morning safari besides a full day in Moremi. Because of what happened and communication or the not existing communication at first point from the guide, this part was a bit disappointing compared to the first 2 nights.
I would definitely go again to Botswana and if I would have the choice of a mobile Safari or a fly-in with lodge, I would go for the mobile one.
RU
35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Best Tanzania Safari Operator
Booked a 2 day Zanzibar Plus Tanzania Safari experience which I used them to organize our car transportation and all activities in Tanzania.
I found the service and response of this travel agency to be excellent. Easy 5 stars. My emails were immediately reacted and everyone showed up when they should. The $ 110 charged transfer fee for my family seemed to be very good value.
The only reason I give this travel agency a 5-star is because our experience tour was very good and overly fantastic, so there is little room for improvement (or, for travelers, for whatever reason, consider other options). While a good tour, we found our private guide's Russian guide to be just good, not excellent (I could only understand 85 to 90% of what he said) and the tour was somewhat "standard. He took us A bit off the beaten path on the sites, however, it was a very enjoyable tour.As the guide and driver were friendly and polite and they constantly rely on the freedom of bottled water (and you need this, Even in the “cool” winter months) 6am sunrise in the Sernegeti National Park was an amalizing etam (my favorite shots are elephants and hundreds of other tourists, snapped photos), but I would do it again "for the experience"
(automatic translation from Russian)
Experience level: first safari
Incredible detail and planning of customized Safari
If you are planning an African Safari, you will want to work with Compass Odyssey (Darren and Kate). Our trip included South Africa, Zambia, Zimbabwe, and Botswana. They were great to work with, always very responsive, and very reasonably priced. We were able to customize our safari to choose which locations we visited and how long we stayed at those locations. They were even able to accommodate some changes we wanted to make within a month of our safari. Darren and Kate provided us with so much helpful information prior to our trip that took a lot of the stress out of trying to research everything for ourselves.
The trip was very well planned and our itinerary was very detailed. During this time of traveling during Covid, Compass Odyssey made sure all of our Covid testing was scheduled and that we would get results back in time before we had to travel to the next country. This was a huge relief as we would not have known where to go to get the tests completed or the contacts to ensure we got the results back. In addition, our drivers/guides helped with navigating through the land border crossings, which was important with the added complication of providing the negative Covid results to health officials prior to going through customs. Compass Odyssey provided us with detailed instructions on what to expect with each of the airport border crossings. It was nice to not have any surprises with those.
When we added a couple of extra days, Compass Odyssey scheduled us to go on the Rhino Walk and go to the Elephant Cafe in Livingstone, Zambia. We were all so thankful they did as these were experiences we will never forget.
All of the accommodations were incredible. We stayed at the Senalala Safari Lodge on a nature preserve in South Africa, Camp Nkwazi on the banks of the Zambezi River in Zambia, Batonka Lodge in downtown Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe, and the Chobe River Lodge on the banks of the Chobe River in Botswana. All of them had great rooms, wonderful food, and extremely nice people.
The guides and drivers we met along the way were all so friendly and knowledgeable. Our guide at the Senalala Lodge was James. He did an incredible job tracking the animals for us on our game drives. He had really good information about the animals and you could tell he enjoyed finding the animals for us to see. In Zambia, we had a different James as our driver/guide. He was very friendly and shared a lot of very interesting information about Zambia and Victoria Falls. Mortimer was our driver/guide in Zimbabwe. He was always willing to help us out when we needed and was a wealth of knowledge. We really enjoyed talking with him. We had a boat guide (Leo) and a game drive guide (Tifl) in Botswana. Both were great guides and were able to get us close to the animals. They too had a lot of information and you could really feel their passion for the animals.
Overall, I would not hesitate for one second to recommend Compass Odyssey to anyone looking to do an African Safari. They made sure that our experience was one that we will treasure for a long time.