The Matoke Tours Team
Matoke Tours
- Located In:
-
Netherlands
- Size:
- 20-50 employees (Founded in 2002)
- Member Of:
- ATTA, AUTO, SGR, UTB & UCF
- Tour Types:
- Custom mid-range & luxury tours that can start every day
- Destinations:
- Price Range:
- $300 to $750 per person per day (USD, excl. int'l flights)
Reviews
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Email Carola | 35-50 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Excellent trip!
Many thanks for a totally fantastic trip!
We were SO lucky in seeing all the animals, and we appreciate your bookings of nice combinations of lodges, fantastic driver and guide, Caleb, our new friend. And really good food.
Nice guides / rangers.
All over we had an incredible trip, we do recommend Uganda as a destination to everyone. We cannot wait to go back.
US
Email Cheryl and Tim | 50-65 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Awesome East Africa Trip
After making inquiries with a few companies, we found Matoke Tours offered trips to all the locations we were interested in. Our sales agent, Ilse, was fantastic. After hearing about the places and things we were most interested in doing, she suggested a custom 10-day itinerary for us (4 adults).
We flew into Kigali, Rwanda in order to reduce the travel time to Uganda, our first stop, to do the gorilla trek in Bwindi Impenetrable Forest. After the gorilla trek, we were taken back to Rwanda to fly to Kilimanjaro, where we would start our Safari in Tanzania. Our trip included Tarangire National Park, the Serengeti, and Ngorongoro Crater.
Guides: the rangers in Bwindi Forest, our Uganda driver, Charles, and our guide and driver, Herbert, for all our time in Tanzania, were excellent. Friendly, knowledgeable, and professional - and very good drivers on those rough African roads.
Accommodations: we chose a mid-range level of accommodation for our lodging and every single accommodation was excellent. They felt more like luxury level accommodations instead of mid-range. Our lodge and bush camp in Tarangire and the Serengeti were incredible - beautiful, comfortable, and with the most attentive staff.
Food: meals were always delicious and plentiful
There were a few small glitches early on and we really felt that Matoke, as well as the local vendors and staff providing the services, handled them gracefully and efficiently and ensured that there was no adverse impact on our enjoyment.
All of our communication with Ilse in planning the trip, making payments, keeping us updated on any changes, providing helpful information was effortless. She was always responsive, replying to emails quickly and thoroughly. Matoke also provides travelers with a packet of helpful practical information for each country visited, which was invaluable, covering everything from currency and tipping, to customs and language.
We would happily recommend booking with Matoke.
SE
Email Magnus von Unge | 50-65 years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
Uganda – a wonderful experience
After having visited many of the Southern and East Africa countries we now wanted to visit Uganda. First we consulted some tourist guidebooks and then we got in contact with Harriet at Matoke Tours. She helped us to design a two-week trip for four people aiming for mid-range accommodations. The trip included Munchison Falls NP, Lake Albert, Kibale Forest with chimpanzees, Queen Elizabeth NP, and passed through Bwindi Impenetrable Forest, and ended up at beautiful Lake Bunyoni for a few relaxed days after many miles on bumpy roads. The trip was fabulous, we had a good 4wd vehicle driven by a skilled driver and we visited excellent national parks with exciting animals abundant. The lodges were of mid-range, all very pleasant and all in different styles. We met with a lot of very friendly people. We strongly recommend Matoke Tours and Uganda to anyone interested in exploring new places and wishing to enjoy extremely beautiful nature of Uganda and game driving. An extra bonus was all wonderful fruits and vegetables that we enjoyed during the journey (we almost turned vegetarians during the trip).
US
Email Tineke | 50-65 years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
Uganda and Rwanda private tour with very experienced guide and organization
I found Matoke Tours via a website for a Dutch adventure travel site. I wanted something different than what they offered and found a picture of a Matoke Tour vehicle and decided to go direct. We communicated with the Uganda Matoke office and together designed our private 16 tour including Munchison Falls NP, Kibale Forest (chimpanzees), Queen Elizabeth NP, Bwindi Impenetrable Forest, and Rwanda's Volcano NP. Our guide, Anatoli, was very professional and had very good relationships with all accommodation and adventure/NP staff where ever we went. The tour was very well organized with constant communication between Anatoli and the home office. The accommodations were much better than expected, clean with good food and friendly honest staff (we opted for moderate instead of fancy). Suggested restaurants were excellent. The wildlife viewing was excellent (we had been to 10 other African countries for wildlife viewing before). There were never more than 1 or 2 other safari vehicles when we stopped for lions, etc. During our travels we met others who had gotten stuck with broken down vehicles (more than once) and even a solo traveler whose guide did not show up in the morning to bring her to the Gorilla tracking meeting in Rwanda! If you want to go to a beautiful area with friendly people and want to have everything taken care of so you can enjoy trip without any hassles or negative surprises, please look to Matoke Tours. You will not be disappointed, they will exceed your expectations. Go now, before Uganda becomes overrun with too many tourists! I did not receive any compensation or special treatment for this review.
US
Email Melissa Faith Klar | 50-65 years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
Perfect Midrange trip to Uganda/Tanzania
I am super impressed with Matoke, that is why I am writing about them. I have been a travel consultant and freelance travel writer for over 37 years and have booked with countless operators for my clients and my friends. To start the communication was Outstanding. I worked with Manager Ilse and she was very clear in every thing she stated. She replied immediately and always in great depth with extreme clarity . This is important when you are working with a local operator and especially when there is limited Skype access....I trusted her every word and she was right with everything. The trip I booked was a "midrange" trip and it felt more like a Luxury high range trip. They work on a tiered program, so if you wanted to upgrade you could do it where you wanted to. I also have been to 22 countries in Africa through the last 44 years and I have booked and stayed in luxury, not my choice for a Safari and certainly NOT necessary, give those extra funds to the various NGO's empowering people's lives there.. Maktoke offers such quaint, cozy and clean well run properties, that they scout themselves. Their vehicles are clean, and well maintained. They partner with Easy Travel in Tanzania, a top notch operation in itself. The "Pearl of Africa" is Uganda, and the driving was perfect including offering Chimp and Gorilla tracking that anyone can do even disabled, they need to pay for a chair to be bring up and it is so worth the experience. The prices that most tour companies in the US offer for Africa are double the price. With Maktoke you can book directly and save about half the price, this makes Africa affordable. Also dealing with a Dutch company comes with organization and no stone unturned. Their tiered system of bookings is state of the art for Travel. Only a company that knows all of the properties can offer this. They are now offering trips to the Congo and to Madagascar. I am looking forward to putting my next group together for Madagascar.
DE
Email Astrid Kaiser | 65+ years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
best service, organization, friendly staff, good locations,
I did the three days tour to Bwindi with Matoke Tours, it was great. In advance I always received soon detailed answers, the tour was excellent. Especially because they selected a wonderful location to sleep twice at the Lake Mutanda, so it was not too much far from Bwindi to be in time for the briefing for the Gorilla tracking. during the long trip to the east we stopped always at clean locations.
NL
Email Joost Bijl | 50-65 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Verry helpful! Thinking with us within our budget.
The team of Matoke has helped for the third time with a short trip to Murchinsons Falls.
They reply my emails on short notice and are verry helpfull.
Our stay at Bwano Tembo was confirm what Matoke promised. They very nice Italian food and clean cottages and safari tents
NL
Email Hans en Rogier | 50-65 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Gorilla's and Kidepo: extremes in many ways
We had a spectacular tailor-made trip through Uganda, thanks to the top class service of Matoke (cheers Ilse). In an 8 day span we went to Bwindi to watch the gorilla's (no recommendation necessary) and Kidepo (better kept a secret) by mini bus. It was challenging but worth every second. We saw the whole country, literarily. Dramatic changes of landscape all day, views, smells, sounds. We asked for an enthusiastic, passionate guide who would not be intimidated by our many, many questions. And so we did get a walking encyclopaedia with telescopic eyes who happened to be the nicest companion you could wish for. We want him for ourselves and cannot disclose his name (cheers Geoffrey). Uganda is not a problem free zone in East Africa. Thank you Geoffrey for taking time with us to learn more about the events that took place in Northern Uganda and influenced the communities but also the wildlife in Kidepo. Tourists from abroad should do so.
We'll be back.
Email Marc | 50-65 years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
Well organised
Transport, accommodation, permits to see gorillas, etc. was well organised, we did not have to worry about any logistics. E-mail replies for the reservation were quick and to the point, all was arranged in 1/2 day.
Email Neil | 65+ years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
From my first contact with Ilse they were incredible.
The accommodation at Flame tree village in Kigali and our stay at Lake Mutanda . One of the most beautiful places on earth. The whole experience far excelled expectations. The staff were easy to contact to take care of a few problems in connections. It all went like clockwork . I had researched this trip 5 weeks in Africa for 18 months and Matoke was by far the best value. It was an experience of a life time. If I was to do it again they would be my first call.