Best Group Safari Tour
Fig Tree Tours and Travel
- Located In:
- Size:
- 20-50 employees (Founded in 2015)
- Member Of:
- TANAPA & BRELA
- Tour Types:
- Small & medium group tours (Budget & mid-range)
- Destinations:
- Price Range:
- $195 to $850 per person per day (USD, excl. int'l flights)
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Reviews
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Email Andrea Naselli | 20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Thieves, they stole our money
Incredibile, but true story
We booked a safari in Tanzania with John (Fig Tree) on January 2021 to July 2021 and paid more Than 1.000 euro in advance.
We asked whether the Safari was fully refundable or not (because of risk related with covid19). Of couse John answered us yes.
Now (AFTER TWO YEARS) we are still waiting our money.
We sent thousand of message, but we are still waiting.
An endless story. The Air company (Oman Air) refund us our flight tickets (even though after 1 year), but we are still waiting Fig Tree.
I think that we’ll never receive our money back, but i DON’T SUGGEST FIG TREE AND DON’T SUGGEST TO GIVE THEM MONEY IN ADVANCE
IT
Email claudia | 35-50 years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
Unprofessional as they did not follow the agreed plan
I have contacted Fig Tree for the positive reviews and for the reasonable prices, though, I did not have a good experience for a number of reasons. First of all I was given a program and ended up doing another! So a piece of advise, make sure you are very specific on your requirements, making plenty of research and you get a program confirmed in writing exactly as you have understood it and you want it. I have asked for a 5 nights budget camping safari with 3 nights inside the parks (2 in serengeti and 1 in Ngorongoro) and I got instead a 5 nights with only 2 days inside the parks (1 in serengeti and 1 in Ngorongoro) I never asked to go to Tarangine and we found ourselves spending the first day there instead of Serengeti and slept outside the park. Serengeti is big, if you do not spend at least 2 nights inside you waste a lot of time traveling between parks and you don’t enjoy much time game viewing! In fact out of so called 5 days in reality you do 4 days of which 1.5 days game viewing and the rest is traveling or waiting). Second of all you need to know if you are going with the actual company car and driver for the whole trip or not. In our case they just gave us a freelancer driver with other people from other agencies, sometimes they do this in case they don’t find enough people to fill the car and they don’t have drivers available. Funny enough we were 6 people coming from different agencies and we all had the same program but ended up doing another one. Or we were all stupid or it is common for agencies to be unclear and unprofessional. We got 2 different drivers in 3 days while another couple which stayed longer got 3 drivers in 4 days ending up wasting time and therefore money (we got delayed a couple of times during the trip for missing payments from the company to the driver, literally 2 hours waiting!). Third of all you need to make sure you clarify in advance the amount of tips to give to the staff; we were told we had to give 10 usd per day per person to the driver but we ended up having to give tips also to the cooker, which was not expected. Ref. Tips it would be much better for the company to pay for the drivers and cookers and include that amount in the overall price! It would avoid misunderstandings and uncomfortable situations and leave the customers choosing if a tip is worth to be given (tips should not be forced!). Fourth of all, be aware of the extremely bad conditions of the public camp sites, overcrowded with dirty facilities! I have been camping several times in Zimbabwe and other places and the experience of the camping is incredible, you are immersed in nature, hearing the animals around you after a nice meal cooked on the fire. In Tanzania the experience is far from this; I have never experienced such crowded camps and you loose completely the connection with nature (if you are in a safari for this reason!). You will only hear people talking, and more, all night and no sound of animal! Also, be aware of the commercialization of the safari and expect many cars around; if you are sensitive about animals conservation it can be quite overwhelming seeing how many cars can surround a lion surely disturbing them... Our driver was old school and very sensitive about this matter which I have appreciated. After all I could not recommend this company as after the trip and discussing the program issue they are still insisting they did nothing wrong. And note I have confirmation in writing of the 3 nights camping from them! Literally unprofessional.
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Email Michael | 20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Nice safari, guide & cook. But got scammed by a company employee right on the first day.
*** UPDATE ***
John, the owner of the company, offered us a full refund of the 30$ and let us know, that he fired Ibrahim. Due to his professional response to this issue, I am upgrading the rating from 2 to 4.
*** ORIGINAL REVIEW ***
We were picked up and dropped off by John, the owner of the company & a nice guy. For the Safari you are reshuffled every day with other people coming/leaving earlier/later than you but our Cook & Driver were very good.
However, on the moring of our first day, we were picked up by Ibrahim. He said if we want to go on the Safari, we need to pay 30$ extra for rental sleeping bags. When we asked if we could buy some new ones he said there was no time for that. So we paid... 30$ is a lot of money there. And a crazy lot for old rental sleeping bags for 2 nights.. However Ibrahim let us no choice..
On Safari our Driver said, that it is a very common scam to ask for some last-minute extra dollars when tourists have no choice to say no. Very disappointing.
Crazy fact: all the other tourists on our car were provided the exact same rental sleeping bags without paying extra money.
But as I said, the Safari itself was very nice & the promised itinerary was followed perfectly.
Reply from Fig Tree Tours and Travel
Posted on Aug 9, 2023Dear Customer,
We Highly value and thanks for posting your feedback with us here, First of all we appreciate that you Expressed truth that we did it nice for you and respect the plan.
We sorry that the mentioned name Ibrahim Is not our company employee, and we didn't even know him, It's really sad as I was seeing you every time for the feedback and any help and also communicating with you all the time and me John as the owner I dedicated my time as it was your honeymoon tour of which I was protecting any bad experience as it was your special day hope you also mentioned in review that you appreciated also, so as I well illustrated in your itinerary sleeping bags was included if you reported to your host this wasn't be a problem at all, as it was shared tour and we didn't have group and we use to work together with other companies so the one who did this was not as and we are now asking them who did that and we will refund you the $30 scammed
As well for the price others did 5 Days for cheaper as they booked direct no any commission from where they booked via and as well your safari was 4 Days including 2 nights Nice hotel in Arusha before and after Safari with breakfast included, Pick from private from Kilimanjaro aiport to your hotel in Arusha plus extra coffee tour, and lastly long distance drop off from Arusha to your hostel in moshi then from your hostel to off-road chemka hotspring which is far so if you put into account you are the one who got good price that any other member and very hospitable service my friend.
Kindly we would like to hear from you who introduced to you as Ibrahim as for us we don't have that stuff please.
Sincerely Yours
John
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Email Marta Petkova | 35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Good budget safari
The safari is exactly what you have paid for. Well organized, you see a lot of animals. The guide was fantastic
BE
Email Liesbeth | 20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Very nice one-day safari
We had a nice day in Arusha National Park with our guide mister Frank! He was very nice to hang out with, gave us good information about the park, his animals and fauna and flora.
Email Magarah | 20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Magnificent
Every thing went well as planned, they picked me on time starting away from the airport to my hotel the food was a walk to remember and my tour guide was informative never left me to wonder great great guy! Can't wait this year to curry my family with me.
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Email Stefan | 50-65 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Excellent driver and scenic route
We booked a 7 day safari encompassing Lake Manyara, Tarangire, Serengeti and Ngorongoro. We were absolutely excited about the friendliness and service of the driver Livingstone, as well as the fantastic scenery and wildlife. The lodgings were -with a few exceptions- of high quality, and food was excellent. Misunderstandings about the hotel booking were dealt with swiftly.
DE
Email Gabriela | 35-50 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Budget Safari that can surprise you.
John from Fig Tree Tours can organize anything for you. I chose a 4 day budget Safari but opted for a lodge. You have to know that the budget safaris mix people from several agencies to fill the car. So I ended up in a car with people doing camping Safari, I was the only one who stayed at lodges. They had to reshuffle the accommodations to allow this so I wasn't actually sleeping in the noted lodges but got one that was more luxurious than I expected (Luxury heritage tented lodge). The Rhino lodge is also very nice (a bit older fashion but fabulous food). So I absolutely recommend the lodge Safari, you pay a little bit more but the level of comfort is tremendously higher (the Simba camp e.g. didn't have water when our group arrived in the evening). From the tented lodge in Serengeti you can hear the animals walking and roaring around your big tent without feeling any discomfort. I would go crazy in a little camping tent.
The only thing I didn't like was that you loose time with bringing and picking up the people from the camp when you sleep in lodge at different location. But in overall you are in Africa so time means nothing.
Fig Tree Tours are not operator themselves, they contract a driver to do the tour for them about 2 days before the start of the tour and not all the drivers have the same level of enthusiasm. We had Benson and he was an excellent tracker, we saw all the big five and even some more (lions, leopard, cheetah, jackal, hippos, rhino and even a turtle
IN
Email Mahesh | 35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Amazing experience and service
There best thing about our trip was all our requests were responded to sometimes even going out of the way. It was a week organized trip with an amazing guide.
Email Miles | 65+ years of age | Experience level: first safari
Highly recommend Figtree Tours and Travel for your Tanzania Safari experience
We thoroughly enjoyed our Tanzania Safari experience. We were well cared for, food was tasty and well presented, the guide very knowledgeable and professional and we had great sightings. An amazing experience.....