It Started in Africa
- Located In:
- Size:
- 20-50 employees (Founded in 2010)
- Member Of:
- IATA, TATO & TALA
- Tour Types:
- Custom mid-range & luxury tours that can start every day
- Destinations:
- Price Range:
- $150 to $550 per person per day (USD, excl. int'l flights)
Reviews
US
Email Jyoti Sarkar | 35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Very knowledgeable and helpful tour operator
While finalizing my first safari trip with my family I spoke to several tour operators to plan the whole trip within my budget and taste. I found Vanessa is very knowledgeable, helpful and to the point always. In 3-4 months planning period we had 100s of email communication and he responded all ontime every time with eight piece of information. He never tried to upsale and I found him very honest and transparent.
Definitely recommend him for my friends Safari planning.
We recommend it to everyone
Safari was an incredible experience for us and especially sleeping in a tent in the Serengeti National Park.
Everything was great and we enjoyed adventure.
Thank you very much for the entire organization, all the praise for the cook who filled our wishes and of course the big greeting and thank you for Frank(driver). He taught us how nature worked and explained to us everything that we were interested in. He took care of everything and we enjoyed it.
Started in Afica make our honeymoon incredible.
CA
Email Michel | 20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Memorable Trip - It's Africa after all :)
It was a memorable journey!
- Safari as such : never saw such an abundant number of animals - we saw the Big 5 and much more!!!
- Hotels : the choices were absolutely great, except for Ang'ata where we were really very very cold at night. The other hotelS really went above and beyond our expectations (nice romantic dinner at Tarangire Safari Lodge, Kubu Kubu is exceptionnaly nice, ...).
- Guide: Mr. Martin was quite shy but very nice, polite, accommodating and very knowledgeable.
- Vehicle : There is definitely some place for improvement here! There was no AC so the road from Ngorongoro to Serengeti was very difficult as we had to close/open our windows and it was very dusty (our clothes, our faces, our luggages, ...).
- Wait at the parks : The wait in general was very long at all the entrance of every park but I guess this is the same with all the companies and is a matter of general organisation in Tanzania.
Email Emma Hankinson | 35-50 years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
7 day Northern Circuit Safari
Had an amazing 7 day safari with It started in Africa. Our guide Erasto was amazing, knowledgeable and fun and really made our trip! The Serengeti and Ngorogoro crater were amazing places. I was really impressed with the professionalism of the trip and how the parks rules were adhered too and the animals were calm and relaxed around us, and not harassed. Our cook was brilliant and the food was amazing. Additionally, the company were quick to respond to messages and were attentive to all arrangements.
I will definitely be using this company again :-)
CL
Email Maria Arzola | 20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Amazing experience!
We organized our trip from Chile, so the company was very helpful, answering all our questions ver quickly. When we arrived, everything was excellent and worked as planned. We had a great time and really enjoyed our 6 days tour: the landscape and animals were amazing! It was a wonderful experiencie. Also our guide, Michael Dominick, he is very wise and kind, so it was very nice to share with him. We are very thankful.
About the details of the tour, the lenght was good, as well as the places we were: Tarangire, lake Manyara, Serengeti and Ngoro Ngoro. Our favorite accomodation was the Burunge tented camp, because of its beautiful view, and also the Kilima valley tented lodge on the Serengeti, where you could hear lions and hyenas from very close in the middle of the night.
We totally recomend this trip and the agency "It Started in Africa".
Email Mark | 20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Amazing safari!
My wife and I chose to celebrate our honeymoon in Tanzania and decided to work with It Start in Africa.
We had such a wonderful time on our safari. Our driver was Tommy. He was a great guy and we had a lot of fun with him! We recommend Tommy to anybody that does a tour with ISIA. The entire trip was so exciting and we both thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.
Some highlights:
- The views from our tent at Mawe Ninga Tented Camp
- Hunting with the Hadzabe tribe - We highly recommend this to anyone that comes to Tanzania. It is a little bit out of the way (not a lot in the scheme of things). For me personally, it was the most interesting thing we did!
- Seeing the Zebra migration
- Watching lion eating a zebra that they had killed that morning
- Watching several prides of lion hunt. Unfortunately, no kill, but still really great!
- The camp site and location of Pumzika - the best!
- Seeing the big five. Tommy was so great. We hadn't seen the black rhino until we got to Ngorongoro on our second last day and he made it his mission to find one for us. He found two! :)
- Seeing the flamingo at Ngorongoro
- The accommodation at Neptune Ngoronogoro - amazing!
- The coffee plantation tour in Arusha
It would be remiss of us to not note several items, which we felt could have been done better. Please note, this is feedback from our perspective and we relayed this to the ISIA team while we were on tour and they were dealt with and addressed these concerns at the time. For items we raised retrospectively, they have advised that they will work through these things.
For anybody that travels on safari, please remember that this is Africa. While we all spend a lot of money to do these tours, it is important to remember where you are.
- We both felt that the car could have been presented better on arrival. It was rather dirty and was quite an old vehicle. I spoke to the sales team about this on our first night and then to Tommy the next morning. How it was handled by both the sales team and Tommy was such great customer service. While things can go wrong, it's how they are handled that makes the big difference.
- Make sure you bring a pair of your own binoculars. The pair provided were not suitable. Again, we have raised this with the team and hopefully in future this isn't an issue. But if you are going on safari, your own pair of binoculars is a minor investment in the scheme of things.
- Bring plenty of US dollars to tip. Being Aussies, we suck at this at the best of times, and really didn't bring enough. Everywhere we stayed and anybody we dealt with provided fantastic service and they do deserve to be tipped.
- We didn't find this too much of a problem but reading the reviews below, it does appear to happen every-now-and-then. Bring a backup credit card to pay for the Ngorongoro entry fee (when leaving the Serengeti NP). As mentioned in reviews below, we had issues with the ISIA bank card. We could have waited to resolve the situation, which would have happened, but it may have taken a long time. We just paid for it on my own card and when we returned to Arusha, the funds were reimbursed. No time lost and no big deal. Obviously, this a personal preference but just a heads up.
All in all, the experience from when we first enquired nearly two years ago to the delivery of the product by Tommy was so amazing. Obviously, it's a very expensive trip for us to do, so we are not sure when we would visit again but there is no doubt that we would love to and we would have no hesitation is doing so with ISIA.
Thank you to the entire team. You are all such wonderful people and we are so happy that you were part of our honeymoon experience :)
UA
Email Lesya | 35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Amazing and awesome experience
The tour was perfect, amazing and unforgettable. It’s worth while going on a safari tour with your company when everything is well planned and organized. I would strongly recommend tourists coming to Nairobi use your services.
PE
Email Edith, Jorge, Denise and Heldy | 50-65 years of age | Experience level: first safari
It Started in Africa ¿An Option?
I write these commentaries because I believe that we have a responsability with other tourists who, as we did, organize their trips taking into consideration the opinions and commentaries of people in Tripadvisor and Safaribooking.com
I will try to be objective in my commentaries most of all because the experience we lived surpasses all inconveniences and obliges us to put things in their true dimension.
All coordinations were wonderful, Luis Gama as well as Joao Oliveira replied and answered all our questions promptly and clearly.
What did they offer us:
1 "Pickup/dropoff from Kilimanjaro airport":
We arrived to Kilimanjaro¨'s Airport on time, the van that was supposed to pick us up was not there, although we must state that they had arranged for someone to have a poster and explain to us that they were on their way to pick us up.
2. "All our vehicles are extremely well maintained 4x4 Land Cruisers with pop-up open roof":
It called our attention that the van was not as modern as others we had seen picking up groups of turists. The handles of the windows did not work and it was very difficult to open the windows. The door on the right side did not have an internal handle to open it so we always had to ask the guides to open and close the door for us.
The seat on the second row, on the left, was totally broken so it was imposible to go through a long journey without causing back pain. Because of our complains they changed the vehicle. This was worse because the transmition, the springs, the shock absorber and the two back tires broke. It was a miracle that it just added up to a big fright. I want to take this opportunity to thank the African Scenic and the group of young doctors of Hong Kong who so kindly helped us and transported us to our camp. Finally we went back to our first vehicle. They had fixed the seat but, apparently, the steer started to fail and we wondered if we would get to the airport in time for our flight
3 "You will have at your disposal, a pair of High End Large Binoculars (Nixon, Olympus of Bushnell) that will dramatically enhance your safari experience when compared to standard binoculars":
This made us think that each member of the group would have a pair of binoculars. It finally happened but only one pair could be considered "high end", the others were broken or you could not see clearly.
4. "All our safaris have unlimited mileage which means you will be able to do game drives for as long and far as you¨[would like within the parks operational hours": Complied
5. "All National Park entrance and camp site fees": Complied
6. "Accommodation as detailed": Complied to our total satisfaction
7. "All food-breakfasts, packed lunches and evening meals":
The lodges were responsable for our food and the chefs were very kind and prepared special meals according to our alimentary restrictions, if somebody could not eat from the buffet. We were surprised, however, to learn that they did not have our meal restrctions registered, This situation delayed our trip to the Tarangire National Park because we had to look for a restaurant where they could cook special meals.
8 "Bottled wáter and soft drinks": We could always find bottles of water but never soft drinks.
9. "Lonely Planet about Tanzania": In January they offered us that they could buy three of these books in spanish. We paid for them in advance. When we arrived, four months after, they had only two books in english. We understand that it may be dificult to find spanish version but they had four months to do it or warn us that they failed finding them. Finally we got a third book in spanish.
10. "Our guides, which are our real stars and the ones who can make the difference between a nice trip and a once in a lifetime journey that you will never forget for decades to come":
We had Frederick Isangya (Alfred) as our guide in spanish as well as Estomi as our driver. This was a plus as we were told that the presentations were in english and we observed that the driver was the guide in other safaris.
Frederick answered with certitude all our questions relative to the animals, their habitat and behavior. He complimented this information with literature that was in the vehicle and thus allowed us to learn more about this fascinating continent. He always fullfilled our expectations. Estomi is an excellent driver and thanks to his skills the accident we had had no mayor consecuences.
Frederick and Estomi, as the visible face of the Company, had at all times the best disposition to face and solve, in the best way, all the problems and inconveniences during the safari.
When they realized that an adequate lunch pack for one of the members of the group was missing they bought a box and searched for the special meal in a restaurant. They made the necessary coordinations with the Arusha office in order to find a solution to all the inconveniences that arose during the trip and never avoided the reponsability that "It Started in Africa" had towards us.
Conclusion
It Started in Africa did not comply with two fundamental things in order to make a safari successfull : i ) The maintenance of their vehicles and ii) the care of the special food we required.
¿Would we hire "It Started in Africa" again? We dont think so, although we must aknowledge that at all times, through their team, they faced all inconveniences. ¿Would we hire Frederick (Alfred) and Estomi? Yes with no doubt, they were extraordinary.
To finish I would like to state that the group had decided from the very start that nothing would ruin this marvellous adventure and that our motto, in spite of the problems, always was "Hakuna Matata"
I hope our commentaries may be of help to you
CH
Email Yann Bolay | 20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
EPIC
The service was excellent, always on time, the guide was up to our expectations. Even in the rainy season we have seen a lot of animals and that with a lot less vehicles in the park. ;)
We had a great time with this agency, for a very good rate. I highly recommend them. The lodge was excellent, we chose Ashnil camp.
I wish them all the best for the future
FI
Email Kimmo | 50-65 years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
A perfect experience!
I have visited many National Parks in Africa. This experience concerning Ngoron Ngoro, Olduvai and Lake Manyara was one of the greatest.
The guide was very helpful and he has a very wide experience.