Dream Bandas Uganda Reservations team
Dream Bandas Uganda
- Located In:
- Size:
- 5-10 employees (Founded in 2015)
- Member Of:
- USAGA, UTB & UWA
- Tour Types:
- Custom budget & mid-range tours that can start every day
- Destinations:
- Price Range:
- $70 to $550 per person per day (USD, excl. int'l flights)
Reviews
US
Email Zarina | 20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Enthusiastic, safe and reliable.
This tour with Dream Bandas Uganda was a great experience. The monkeys we saw (Golden monkeys, chimpanzees and gorillas) was a once in a lifetime experience. If you are even slightly interested, we highly recommend!! The walk to the chimpanzee hike took us through the beautiful Banda village hidden away in the jungle between two mountains. The golden monkeys were gorgeous creatures and numbered well over one hundred! And in such close proximity - they would walk right past you. And of course, the gorillas were breathtaking and again, so close! We saw a family with a silverback, several mothers and a rambunctious baby that was very interested in becoming friends with our group. The guides at each location were knowledgeable and enthusaistic and we felt very safe throughout the entire experience. Our driver, Edgar, made the long drives between locations relaxing and comfortable. He provided us with information about the places we went by and was a great companion on the trip. We would highly recommend this tour! When you do go to see the monkeys and continue to support the local conservation efforts, be sure to also speak with the wonderful people in the local communities. Meeting the people of Rwanda and Uganda and learning about their lives and cultures was a wonderful addition to our trip! We definitely will come back in the future and hopefully tour again with Dream Bandas Uganda.
NZ
Email Lizzie | 35-50 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Victor was an awesome car kareoke buddy, knowledgeable, and took great photos for me.
Dream Bandas tailored the tour to my limited time available and helped me to rent a camera which I really appreciated. Victor was awesome! He overcame logistics issues with patience and calmness, and bent over backwards to make sure the tour was a success. I learned many interesting things about Uganda, Rwanda, gorillas and golden monkeys, and made a fantastic new friend and karoeke buddy by the end of the trip.
US
Email sharitah | 20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Exceptional
Our 3 days trip to Murchsion falls N/p was mind blowing, got a chance to see the most powerful waterfalls , and the big 5 animals. A visit to Ziwa Rhino sanctuary was another awesome Experience.
Our guide Jackson was very informed and a good resource…. Highly recommend Dream bandas Uganda
Email Anthony | 65+ years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Adam was friendly and courteous and knowledgeable, he was focused on providing a memorable tour.
I found Dream Bandas to be a thoroughly professional and reliable company. The arrangements in place in the national park meant that we were assured of a successful encounter with a family of gorillas, and in our case, our trek into the jungle was actually quite short.
Email Jon Cayzer | 50-65 years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
Dream Bandas Uganda looked after us superbly, and made our lifetime dream to see the gorillas.
October 01 2023 was one of the most moving and memorable days of our life as we trekked past volcanoes, mountains and every kind of flora and fauna - including duikers, blue monkeys, butterflies of every colour, orchids & bamboo - to see the mountain gorillas. We spent a hour with a group of 13 gorillas in the Impenetrable Forest. A silverback came face to face, with me & another gently moved me out of the way! We were that close. It was like being in paradise. Thank you, and thank you, Henry and Abdul for helping us realise a lifelong dream. It was superb value for money and were collected on time from our hotel in Kigali. If you can only do one bucket list item, please do this with trip.
IT
Email Gianni | 20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Fraud, stole 200€ from me. Police is involved.
I booked a hike in Bwindi, he quoted me $450. We agreed that I would pay a deposit of 200€ and then the rest would be “paid on the day of the hike”. Too bad the guy the company sent who was supposed to pay the park fees/guide didn’t actually have enough money and he only had cash (UWA does not accept cash). The guy there told me he would refund me the deposit after the hike, as I had to pay the entire sum myself on the spot despite the early booking. His boss then refused to refund me the deposit, claiming that I told him we were “EAC citizens”, even if I have the messages showing I told him we were “EAC residents”. He also claims we didn’t pay the full amount, which is true but we again we had agreed I would pay the rest ”the day of the hike”. And regardless, even if I had paid him everything in advance, we would have not been able to do the hike anyways because he made a mistake thinking we were “EAC citizens” instead of “EAC residents” and the guy he sent only had cash and UWA does not accept cash. I filed a police report and the Ugandan police said they will arrest him, let’s see.
Other than completely incompetent, he’s also dishonest and a brazen liar.
P.S: I told him I was ready to pay his services (meaning help on WhatsApp how the hike worked and the fact that a guy showed up at the hotel and went with us to the UWA HQ) regardless of all the mistakes, but he simply decided to take the 200€ that were supposed to pay the park fees/guide while he did not pay a single cent. This is malicious fraud, simple as that.
Reply from Dream Bandas Uganda
Posted on Oct 4, 2023Hello Gianni,
Thanks for you feedback but we regret to inform you that your review is misleading and full of lies.
First, Living in East Africa does not make you an expert in planning Uganda trips and therefore you should have trusted our recommendations and listened to our advice before going ahead to make these losses.
In the first conversations we had you clearly indicated that you had a group of 5 EAC Residents and 2 Non Residents. The hike fee for residents is $40 and non-residents is $50 which would cost a total of $300 and we quoted $450(427 Euros) to cater for the activity booking including park entrance and agency commission, you paid a deposit of Euros 200 and you accepted to pay the balance on the day of the trek directly to our guide such that you may sit back and wait to your trek.
Without consulting us at office, you deliberately chose to pay Uganda Wildlife Officials at the Information Centre a total of $570 and blocked our company representative from doing his job.
Questions;
1. Why on earth would you pay $570 for 7 people if divided meant each person costed $81.4 instead of paying Euros 227? Balance which meant it would be $64 per person?
2. It is no excuse that our representative had cash and not paid. I would like to bring to your attention that we have a mobile money system that would get this payment done in no minute if you had complied and made your full payment as agreed. Can you please clarify on whether we requested you to complete paying before trip and why you refused to pay at the hotel where you had internet to use the payment link we shared and opted to pay at the information Centre?
3. Why did you insist to pay by yourself although our representative advised you not to do so?
And the end of the day you threatened us to ruin our company reputation and maliciously damage our brand using you position and connections in Rwanda if not refunded.
As a company, we have clear guidelines in our cancellation and refund policy and in this case you violated each of them and blocked us from executing our services. This is a vice that has been noticed from some group leader who fraudulently obtain money from their colleagues and for some reason try to block their friends from directly contacting the agency they are traveling with.
We would like the warm all travelers with friends in Africa to always go ahead and contact the agency other than paying to their friends who get a lot of money from them and tend to run these tours cheaply by themselves.
NZ
Email Sid Wales | 20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Dedicated to a great experiance
Dream Bandas was a great option for me to visit Bwindi Impenetrable Forest from Kigali in just a day. My driver was on time, had great knowledge of Rwanda, Uganda, and the National park, and even bought me Ugandan snacks to taste. Everything at the borders and park gates went smoothly and the guide in the park itself was friendly and knowledgeable
SI
Email Lena | 35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Dominic — the best guide! :)
Short and brief: Dominic is the best travel guide ever! (Said by the people who usually prefer to travel without the guides. :))
US
Email Peace | 20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Great experience
Me and my family loved our vacation.
the trip was fun tour guides were very friendly the sites were amazing including Murchison falls I would do it again
DE
Email Josh | 20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Super friendly, super fun
Abdul picked me up early in Kigali and we chatted for hours on our journey to Bwindi. He was very knowledgeable about the national park but also about Uganda and Rwanda generally.
At the park, he was able to get me a COVID mask as I hadn't brought one, and kept me updated along the way with what we were doing.
The tour itself was great, I got to see gorillas up close - a truly once in a lifetime experience.
Communication in advance was with Henry and he was able to answer all my questions and keep me informed.
All in all, they did a great job and I would definitely recommend them to anyone looking to do a tour in the region.