Happy clients inside Serengeti National Park
Taste Of Afrika Safaris
- Located In:
-
Germany
- Size:
- 20-50 employees (Founded in 2010)
- Member Of:
- TATO & TALA LICENCED
- Tour Types:
- Customizable private tours and fixed group tours
- Destinations:
- Price Range:
- $160 to $650 per person per day (USD, excl. int'l flights)
Reviews
NL
Email Pieter | 20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Terrible experience, Seka gave us a lot of trouble
Do not book with this company! We had a terrible experience with Taste of Afrika for our five day safari in Tanzania. First of all they mixed the dates up. When we arrived and called they knew nothing about our booking, even though we had paid a deposit. Then on the morning of our safari they told us we weren't going that day, but the day after. Instead the offered us a coffee tour, which was very boring. Then they were going to send us to the wrong national park. When we told them that we booked for another park they send us with very last minute with a different guide. We had to join our original guide later that day, but our guide refused to bring us there initially. When we insisted he became very angry and unpleasant. We tried to bargain for a discount for the inconvenience and after a long discussion we were promised a discount of 400USD. But then later that day they denied this promise and threatened to skip our last day if we didn't pay up. Especially Seka, the owner, was very unpleasant to deal with and made a lot of mistakes in communicating with us.
Reply from Taste Of Afrika Safaris
Posted on Nov 1, 2017Dear Pieter,
Firstly we wish to extend our sincerer appreciation for choosing and booking your safari with us.
It's our humble request for an apology for whatever had happened during your safari not to be the way it could be. Please that should not ruin your entire trust for your next Travel to Tanzania or Africa and get your happiness away.
As Taste Of Afrika Safari we are very thankful for your review on our overall facilities specifically that during your safari time you had good services.Taste of Afrika we were very committed towards providing you with the best services in every aspect of your Safari with us. We're taking this matter very serious note and investigating on this matter of organization, communication, payment & our Stuff too. It's our promise to improve our services.
Once again, we thank you for bringing this vital information on this review, We assure that all strict measures will be taken over once we are done with our investigation.
We're looking forward on serving you once again with our best services.
Yours sincerely,
Taste Of Afrika Safari
CA
Email Matthew | 20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Owner is awful
Sekanawo Gondwe did not spend one penny of the money we sent him on our safari. First, he tried to get us to send him the full amount for the safari 6 months in advance of the safari. Then he tried to add people to our private safari. Finally, we sent him the other half of the money 1 month before the safari. He never made reservations on our behalf. He never sent any of the accommodations our money. We even gave him extra money to book our PCR tests and he failed to make those reservations. He continued to lie to us and say he would make the reservations and they never materialized. He lied to us all the way up to the moment the Diplomatic and Tourism Police arrested him Arusha and charged him with obtaining money by false pretences. Every word that comes out of his mouth is a bold-faced lie. Steer clear of this unscrupulous operator.
Reply from Taste Of Afrika Safaris
Posted on Nov 12, 2021Hello Matthew
We definitely understand your frustration and are very sorry to hear about your Experience with Taste of Afrika. As you can see by our other 5 star reviews your experience was a typical. We pride ourselves on making sure that all of our clients have exceptional memories captured during any of our offerings. The problem occurred here with the employment of a new guide that took advantage and manipulated you. Our guides are just as committed to great service as we are; however, a new guide fell through the cracks.
The guides simply guide the tour. Any changes that you are informed of should be confirmed with your initial point of contact as we handle all of your bookings. It is unfair to label us a scam, as you did in fact complete your 5 day safari and received a majority refund. We have both been victims of an untrustworthy individual and have since taken measures to ensure that this will not happen again with any of our other guests. It is unfortunate that you must spam our reviews with untruths. We are a local company that wants to provide our guests with an enjoyable and authentic Taste of Afrika.
US
Email Maarten | 20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
2 hours late and ripping me off
Booked a day trip to Arusha NP with Seka from Taste of Africa. The guide was supposed to pick me up at 7.30, but at the agreed time there was no one to be seen. No one from the company was available until I got a call from Seka at 8:55 AM. He told me that there was a problem, but that it was solved and that he would come in half an hour. At 9:25 AM I was finally picked up by Seka and the guide, after which we still had to leave for Arusha NP.
Seka left and I continued with the guide and we were only at the park well after 11 o'clock, where we then also had to wait at the entrance because the entrance fee had not yet been paid...
We had a nice day and the guide did his best, but was not very experienced and often busy taking selfies. He didn't know the answer on many questions and didn't know the animals very well. He also said that unfortunately this was not the first time that Taste of Afrika was late, because the owner was a drunk and often overslept.
We nearly ran out of time to see the entire park, but luckily we managed to do so in the end because the guide drove very fast.
I didn't get a discount on this day trip, but could get a discount on another day trip. However, I got the same price as quote as I've had before, so Seka wanted to rip me off again.
I would definitely not recommend Taste of Africa.
DE
Email Dominic | 20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
!!!WARNING FROM SEKA GONDWE (owner of Taste of Afrika)!!!
!!!WARNING FROM SEKA GONDWE (owner of Taste of Afrika)!!!
1.) FAKE REVIEWS!
Seka writes fake reviews himself under alias names! I know it 100% and I can even prove it, because the Google rating of the user "lil-emky" includes the pictures shot by me! I only provided these photos to Seka so he could create a video of our hike for extra payment. NOBODY except seka and me is in possession of these pictures. SO SEKA MUST HAVE WRITTEN THE RATING HIMSELF! I explicitly told Seka to delete the photos after creating the video and not to use them elsewhere.
When I look at the reviews so also noticed that very many positive reviews were written by users who have only written a single review... funny that people specially create a new Google account to write a single review or...? (but can also be a coincidence)
2.) SERVICE NOT PROVIDED, PROMISES REFUND FOR MONTHS, BUT DOES NOT REFUND!
We had booked some extras for additional payment. One of these extras did not take place and it does not matter what reason Seka comes up with all of a sudden for the failure of the extra. It's annoying enough when something you were looking forward to doesn't happen, but for Seka not to refund the extra cost is FRAUD! He has been promising me reimbursement since June and postponing it until the following week every time...SINCE JUNE, for 4 months!!!! By now I know I will not get the money back.
3.) His employees are not salaried, but are contracted as "self-employed".
He does not discuss what has been agreed with the customer with the "employees", so they get into difficult and unpleasant situations with the customer.
4.) He tries to save money even during the tours: e.g. booked beverage flats are suddenly to be paid by the customer (only clarified after discussions).
(supposedly) positive:
5.) At the beginning (online booking) and when you talk to him (Seka) personally on site, he always seemed very friendly and customer-oriented. He planned our tour according to our wishes and took a lot of time. However, the moment he got the money transferred, the contact already became less.
I think we were very lucky. Probably the special occasion of our trip - which Seka knew about - led to the fact that Seka didn't cheat us completely and that our trip was carried out at least to a large extent as planned. (Cheaters apparently sometimes still have a bit of heart!).
6.) What was really SUPER were the super dedicated staff (=self-employed) of our crew during the ascent of Kili (including Nickson and Brison + all porters) as well as our safari-guide Moses! Thank you for giving us a beautiful and successful climb as well as a unique safari despite the problems with Seka!
Without these people our tour at Taste of Africa would probably have been a total failure.
Conclusion: Taste of Africa and especially the owner Seka Gondwe are NOT TO RECOMMEND! Seka only wants the customers' money. We were lucky in our misfortune, but other reviews show that this is unfortunately not the case with everyone.
Reply from Taste Of Afrika Safaris
Posted on Nov 20, 2021Hi Dominic,
Thank you for taking the time to leave us a review.
We also thank you for recognizing that our team consists of the best to bring you an enjoyable experience when working with Taste of Afrika. We are grateful that many of our clients felt compelled to write a review even if that means creating a new account. We did not take any extra consideration into your trip because it was a special occasion. We feel that the safaris are all special to everyone that books with us. The adventures had with us may be a once in a lifetime experience for many people so we aim to make them as pleasurable and memorable as possible.
We are sorry that we did not exceed your expectations on your safari and will use your feedback to improve for our future clients.
Manager
DE
Email Mara | 20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Amazing!!!
Wonderful trip to Tanzania with excellent organization and very professional Guides
We booked our trip Tanzania with Taste of Afrika Safaris the tour of 11 days. Taste of Afrika
designed a wonderful trip with private guide and porters for hiking Mount Kilimanjaro and
mid rage tour to the most famous National Parks in Tanzania. The organization of the whole
trip was excellent, airport transfers to and from the hotel, accommodation and activities. The
guides and porters were very knowledgeable and told us a lot about the countries, their
history, people, economy and much more. We did 6 days hiking Mount Kilimanjaro and 5
days safari tour, we had a chance to see the Black Rhino in Ngorongoro Crater and it was a
really amazing! We had tremendous further game drives in Tarangire park, Serengeti park,
Lake Manyara and we saw very many animals, really, we did the Big Five trip. We had much
more activities than planned and enjoyed very much.
Our request of the accommodation throughout the hiking and safari in different parks were
fully arranged and booked according to our wishes, we stayed in mid-range budgeted lodges
and tented camps. We had clean rooms, nice foods and friendly staff in all places we spent
except in one lodge in Tarangire during the dinner our chef forgot that one of us was
vegeterian but was not a big deal because we got special vegeterian meal for my Dad .
Taste of Afrika Safaris helped us to get PCR test in Serengeti National Park, Moses our Guide
drove us in the morning hours after our sunrise game drive to the PCR testing Center in
Seronera in Serengeti National Park. Seka and Charles from the office communicated the whole
time with us so we felt very safe. We strongly recommend taste of afrika to everyone planning
your trip to Tanzania.
Reply from Taste Of Afrika Safaris
Posted on Jun 23, 2021Hi Mara,
Thanks for having a 11 days hike Kili & mid-range tour with us.
Hope to meet you again.
Regards,
Taste of Afrika
LU
Email Phillip | 35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Affordabble Safari with good with price for lodge & Camping
Our Tanzania holiday with locally owned, tour Operator Taste Of Afrika Safaris, Seka and his team were very helpful to arrange our budgeted camping safari. They were honest, flexible, fun, and very informative. We were so impressed with Gabriel our Guide how knowledgeable is with animal, plants and bird life. We saw everything even Big 5 Lion, Leopard, Rhino, Elephant and Buffalo and that was our main dream. We had mixed safari Lodge and camping we had a chance to have experience to stay 2 nights at Simba Campsite inside the National Park and 1 night at Lake Manyara Serena Safari Lodge, we highly recommend them for your dream Safari.You will not be disappointed at all. Thanks a lot once again.
DE
Email Hanna | 20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
5 Days Adventure with great experience
We had a Chance to enjoy our 5 days Camping and Lodge Safari with Taste Of Afrika Safaris, wished we could enjoyed a lot but the time was against us because we had to go back home early. We had relatively enough of time to visit only 4 National parks with great and beautiful places our first was Tarangire, Lake Manyara, Serengeti and we end up with Ngorongoro crater. We saw all animals big 5 in which was interested: Lions, cheetah, hippos, giraffe, elephants. Gabriel is very knowledgeable,hummble,friendly and well skilled. He made our safari to be the best and full with good memories. I highly recommend 5 days safari with Taste of Afrika for anyone who really wants to visit 4 National parks with great experience.
I wish to come again to Tanzania.
Hanna
DE
Email Sofia | 35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
2 week safari with high expectations
Our family of 4 people I and my boyfriend and my parents did safari with this company. The owner, Seka was very communicative on all emails prior to our trip to Tanzania, he planned the safari to our satisfaction. Our flight was cancelled in Amsterdam Airport but when we called Seka and inform him, he understood our situation and maintain a new itinerary, very nice of him to create a new start of our safari.
When we arrived at the airport, Seka and our Guide for the safari were already there at airport waiting with for us. During our safari it was amazing to see live animals close to our safari vehicle. We saw all of the animals (BIG 5) we expected to see and many more. We stayed in tented camps and all camps were great places for us to overnight. We recommend Taste of Afrika Safaris to all,book with them you will have great safari. Ahsante Sanna
Sofia,
Aus Mainz Germany
IT
Email Chiara | 20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Wonderful wildlife and landscapes of Tanzania...only the first!
We spent our first safari and first tent experience this summer in Tanzania with Taste Of Afrika Tours & Safaris and we could not ask for better! It has fully answered to our requests and met all our expectations. First of all Seka was very patient in answering all of my questions and providing me advices during the planning of the trip. Then all the staff was present and helpful from our arrival at the airport until departure.
We spent 6 nights and 7 days with our tireless guide and the cook who took care of us by providing everything we needed and answering our requests. We had the opportunity to observe many animals and different landscapes, but above all to assist the big migration of the gnu crossing Mara River. Finally we also lived the incredible encounter with Lake Eyasi tribes.
I highly recommend Taste Of Afrika Tours & Safaris and camping safari as a real 24 hours nature experience. I hope to go back soon for a new adventure with them.
Hakuna Matata!
Chiara e Giuseppe
ES
Email Aitziber | 20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Great Safari Experience
Everything related to the Safari was great. The personel of Taste of Afrika came to the hotel the day before our departure to arrange all the last minute details and was puntual on the day of departure.
The safari was an amazing experience (Tarangire, Serengeti and Ngorongoro) and we managed to see all the big 5, and other beautiful animals as well.
Good food, excellent driver and good guide.
Overall great experience. Perhaps a bit more of communication prior to arrival in Tanzania would be good to know further details, but just a minor comment.