DE
20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Wonderful 2 Day Trip with Engagi
Organizing the trip was totally easy. Robert was very helpful arranging the trip (bank transaction, gorilla permits, etc.) and gave us good advice to plan our trip.
The lodge is completely new and lies at a very quiet place right at lake Bunyonyi.
The only negative side was the aspect of waiting really long for our meals. In addition, communication with the staff was sometimes a bit difficult in English. Despite that, everyone was totally friendly and helpful!
We can definitely recommend booking a trip with Engagi. Great time and worth the money.
20-35 years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
Brilliant!
My husband and I just finished a 9 day private tour around Uganda, and absolutely adored our time spent there!! Our driver/guide Frank was amazing - knowledgeable, kind, always ensuring we got the best out of our Ugandan experience - we will miss him very much! Rachel and the team were also a pleasure to deal with in the leadup to tour aswell, adjusting our itinerary to get the best out of our short time there, whilst accomodating our personal side plans we wished to visit along the way. We would recommend Kombi to anyone - plus the accommodation and food were next level!
Amazing times!
20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Offers great ideas and suggestions with customer’s interest at heart. I recommend
It was a pleasant experience booking with you. Our tour to Maasai Mara, Lake Naivasha, and Olkaria was a great success. Our guide was very resourceful and made constructive and helpful suggestions about the places we visited, the accommodation, which would meet our expectations. I cannot exhaust everything here. However, I won’t hesitate to book with HomeAway safaris anytime I wish to tour Kenya and East Africa at large
FR
35-50 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Avoid Tropical vacations Inc
Avoid Tropical vacations Inc, his manager Mathew Adams is a lier and a thief, and avoid as well his Tanzanian partner, World Tour Tanzania. Here is the story in brief:
We booked a 4d/3n safari in Serengeti/Ngorongoro with this Kenyan based company. The detailed program has been comunicated to us, we have received photos of the cars we were supposed to use, the price and terms of payment has been agreed, everything seemed perfect.
The day of departure the pick up time was planned at 8h30 by people from the "Tropical vacations "ground office" Mathew wrote to us. At 9h30, no news from anybody, we started calling Mathew Adams, that we could not reach, and later our Landlord in Arusha ( we gave her phone number for more convenience) told us that she received a call from a guy in Arusha, saying that the safary was cancelled (....). After again many sms and attempts to speak with Mathew adams, he sent us an sms saying that things has been solved(...). We indeed were picked up and ended up at 11h30 am in a far away offices of a company called World Tour Tanzania, from which we have not heard about before. They told us that we were going with them in Safari, but they asked us to pay more than what has been agreed and under different payment terms than the ones agreed in written with Tropical vacations.
We refused and asked the Tanzanian guy to call Tropical vacations to solve this problem. The guy said he does not want to spend money calling Kenya from Tanzania, and told us that we have to call ( !!!).
We went back to downtown and again tried to call/sms ( at our expenses of course) Tropical Vacations. At 5 pm, World Tour tanzanian called us back , the price he asked was finally the one agreed with Tropical vacations, but still not the tems of payment. So after loosing one full day of our holidays trying to reach Tropical Vacations and solve the problem, as we coudl not get the terms which has been agreed in written with Tropical Inc and as we had now little confidence in this company, we decided not to go with this company. So Tropical vacations Inc did not respect the terms of its written commitments + was hiding to us the fact that it was just a simple intermediary company + lying to us on the service rendered : we have indeed not seen in the office of this World Tour Tanzania any of the nice cars that we have seen on the fotos sent to us by Mathew Adams. Later Mathew told us that the kenyan cars he showed us were not allowed to go to tanzania ( !!!). And regarding the non respect of the agreed terms he told us that a new regulation has been enacted in Tanzania 6 months earlier, that he was not aware of... while he is claiming to have, I quote " +14 years experience in Safari Tour Operations".
Last lie, back in Europe we proposed to Tropical Inc to reimburse us the paid money and we would forget about this sad story, Mathew Adams proposed to reimburse us 75% of the money we paid, we agreed on that. He was supposed to reimburse us before the end of last year, then he said he would pay us after the 26th of January... we are at the end of February and we still did not get our money back, and now he is no longer answering the mails. Maybe this comment will make him respect at least this last commitment ?
As a conclusion, avoid Tropical vacations Inc, and generallly speaking, I would advise you to use local companies, ie for Kenya kenyan based companies, and for Northern Tanzania, Arusha based companies.
65+ years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
Sabi Sabi
Excellent communications via Adelle and very pertinent advice regarding the choice of Little Bush Lodge
NL
20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Serengeti Safari with Perfect Arrangements
On a very short notice RA Safaris able to arrange our Safari to Serengeti and Ngorongoro Crater.
Indeed its a lifetime experience and Eli who was driver/guide provides a lot of valuable information and help us to understand the Life in National Park and also in general the Culture and Life of Tanzania People.
NE
20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Beyond expectations.
Beacon Safaris was a great find on my part. When I was looking for short safaris to do during our 5 days in Kenya, everything looked outrageously expensive, or just too long a trip for the time we had. I came across the website for Beacon Safaris and saw the luxury camp option for a 3-day tour of the Masai Mara. I sent an email inquiry about it and Robert responded quickly with a great itinerary for me.
I checked out the itinerary and it seemed to be exactly what I was looking for. A two-night, three-day safari, with transportation from Nairobi, as well as through the reserve, a guide, accommodation at a luxury camp ground, and all meals provided, for $600 per person. This may seem like a hefty price tag for 3 days and 2 nights but if you look at the costs of safaris across Africa, it is very reasonable. Robert even gave suggestions for hotels to stay at for ease of pick-up in the morning for our safari and we were pleasantly surprised with the hotel we chose from his selection (La Maison Royale).
Kenneth, our driver and guide, picked us up from the hotel at 7am to head to the Masai Mara from Nairobi. We had the whole vehicle and tour to ourselves, which was a nice bonus. The drive to Masai was along but scenic one, with stops to check out view points, as well as an extra stop at a Masai village to learn more about the Masai people. It was an extra cost, paid to the Masai people, with the money going towards funding their schools (which are not funded by the government), so we had no problem spending the money. It was very interesting learning about the Masai people from the Masai men who showed us around the village and even did a couple dances for us, involving us in it as well. Seeing the way they constructed houses out of mud, sticks, grass and cow dung, which they said takes 3 months to build, and last about 10 years. It was a very interesting experience, which may not have been the most authentic way to experience the Masai culture, as it was a quick visit but it was very enlightening nonetheless, and we do not regret it.
Our accommodations provided for our tour was the Ilkenani Camp Ground, which I have wrote all about here, and we were very impressed with it. There were quite a few places around the Masai Mara, but we liked the feel our camp ground had. As it was luxury, but not too commercial like some of the other ones located there.
Kenneth, our driver and guide, was so friendly and knowledgeable. He was a great driver, who had clearly a lot of experience on safaris in the Masai Mara, as well as other locations. He answered any questions we had along the way with no hesitations. He did all he could to make sure we were able to see the most that we could in our short stay, and we managed to see the Big 5 (lions, elephants, buffalo, leopard and rhino), as well as zebras, impalas, hippos, cheetahs, giraffes, ostriches, and many more I can’t even remember them all.
I would highly recommend looking into Beacon Safaris when booking your next trip to Kenya.
20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
An excellent Safari with Grassrootz
My friend and I did a 3 day tour with Grassrootz to Murchinson Park in Uganda. They provided an excellent service at a very agreeable price. Our guide Paul was knowledgeable and really looked after us. I would thoroughly recommend Grassrootz for an enjoyable and safe trip.
50-65 years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
Absolutely Outstanding
Wow where do we start.Everything about our trip was absolutely outstanding.From the moment we started liaising with Cuan with our dates & ideas ,& with his expertise he managed to put together the most beautiful holiday for our whole family.Its the finer details that Cuan & African Ubuntu offer that really make a difference.We had follow up phone calls,personal appearances by his people in Africa to make sure you the client are satisfied.His people are reliable,helpful,local & knowledgeable.Nothing was ever too much trouble & they will accomodate you in anyway they can.The accomodation was absolutely beautifully and we felt that everyone did a outstanding job looking after us.We think this trip was the holiday of a lifetime & sincerely would like to Thank Cuan & African Ubuntu Safaris for putting this African Adventure together for us all.We love Africa & were lucky enough to share these experiences with our family.
SG
20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Big Five and so much more!!!
We booked an 11 days individual safari program in the northern circuit including Tarangiere, Lake Manyara, Ngorongoro crater, Ndutu region and central Serengeti. Already before coming to Tanzania the contact and planning was excellent - thank you so much again Mwanaidi!!! Our guide and driver for the trip was Gerald. He is a very experienced guide (20 years on safari) who seems to know everything about the animals, the Massai and Tanzania in general. We kept asking questions and always got very comprehensive answers. This is something so important for such kind of a trip - thank you very much again - Gerald!!! Besides, we had all the time we wanted to watch the animals and take pictures. The accommodations were also beyond our expectations.
Even for the not predictable things they took good care of us. My flight was delayed by one day and later during the trip my friend got sick and we had to spend a night in a hospital. However, in the end we almost didn't miss anything since they rearranged our itinerary accordingly.
As so many others already said before - Go with Easy Travel and you will have a wonderful trip!!!