65+ years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Friendly, helpful, well organised and committed to providing a great experience.
Great Apes provided us with the experience of a lifetime. Our driver/guide Brian was a great companion for our 10 day safari. He was very knowledgeable about the animals we saw and the places we visited. He was a careful and safe driver and we felt very comfortable driving with him.
The itinerary included all the best that Uganda has to offer but even so we only scratched the surface of what Uganda has to offer. We will certainly visit Uganda again and we won’t hesitate to use Great Apes again. In particular we will ask for Brian to guide us.
20-35 years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
Jim IS a very professionnel driver guide , hé has much knowledge on thé wildlife which IS thrilling.
Good customer service , great knowledge of thé animals with good narrative stories which makes thé trip mémorable . Jim IS very friendly even when going on a safari with kids ,hé engagés thé kids which I found vêry encouraging .
ID
20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Exceeded all expectations
Had the dream 7 day mid-range safari in Kenya and Tanzania, right out of a national geographic documentary. We had close encounters with the Big 5 in Kenya, saw 3 wildebeest crossings in North Serengeti and 10 lions devouring a buffalo in Seonera.
Would like to thank our superb guides. Walter in Kenya for being so upbeat, friendly, knowledgeable and in-tune with the animals. Ali in Tanzania for his deep familiarity of the terrain and expertly taking us to the centre of action at just the right time.
The lodges were all comfortable and clean, with good service. I travelled with my mum as a duo of females and always felt safe from the start to the end of the trip.
20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
He's a kind and attentive tour guide
He's good at explaining the important points and he makes sure u get to see and learn all that is their
35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Fantastic
Being Born in Africa , I was bit sceptical about the whole tour from the beginning and extremely cautious. But after Meeting with the tour agent who Gave Us a thorough debrief of what to come in the coming days, I started to relax we started our tour in Arusha national Park which was a nice slow start to get warmed up , and finished at Ngorongoro Crater from Serengeti for wild life and national park and I can’t wait explain the feeling.
Though it wasn’t as easy as people think, it was very advantageous to Us to have a knowledgeable tour guide who almost had a great knowledge of animal movement and best time to be in some places other than just following the crowd of Jeeps in the Parks. we managed to spot all the Big five during our tour. Some as close as a metre from the car which was a dream come true. The accommodation was equally as good in most of the places though Serena in Lake Manyara was not our choice, I would not recommend for a younger demographic traveler, Four seasons in Serengeti was incredible as well and the hotel in Arusha. All in all I would Highly recommend Habitat Adventures travel. In addition our tour guide has a safety first mindset on the roads and the parks which was very reassuring as some companies had cars driving like crazy and we overtook half of them stuck by the side of the road with breakdowns.
under20 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Helpful and charismatic
Best experience ever at a reliable cost . I had the most amazing safari experience and the service was topnotch with professional and kind tour guide. 10/10 would recommend
US
35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Our Tour Operator Sammy was excellent and very experienced
We had a superb experience with Sammy touring Masai Mara and Amboseli . We were group of 4 friends and Sammy handled everything from reservations of hotels ,restaurants, itineraries. He was very flexible , knowledgeable and made our trip better than we imagined. The best thing we loved about Sammy was that he was very ethical in showing animals at Masai Mara which can easily turn into zoo if animals privacy is not taken into account. He became part of our group by the end. Also I think, we had the best wildlife viewing in a short time. We thoroughly enjoyed our safari with Sammy and would highly recommend him and his company to future travellers.
US
50-65 years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
terrible vehicle
We had worked for months with Soul of Madagascar for this holiday. We had quick and efficient responses from the office employees of Soul of Madagascar. We especially were impressed with Theresia. She was quick and efficient with her responses. We were expecting a wonderful holiday because of Theresia’s thoroughness. She sent us a picture of the Soul of Madagascar rep that was meeting us at the airport and a picture of the vehicle we would be using.
The lodges we requested were reserved by Soul of Madagascar. All were what we expected and met our needs. A few of the lodges exceeded our expectations. Bakuba Lodge was absolutely wonderful. It is a very unique lodge and would recommend this lodge. Bakuba Lodge and Le Soleil de Tsingy were the best lodges we stayed. We would not recommend Radisson Waterfront rooms 19, 20 or 21. They are in the basement. We would not recommend Gaspard Hotel in Ranomafana, the food was not good at all.
Our guide, Joushia, and the original driver, Rivo, were not very punctual. In fact, they were late over 95% of the time. We had to contact Theresia midway through our holiday because of Joushia’s attitude and the vehicle issues we had.
Oh, the vehicle issues we had!! Not one, not two, not even three, but five issues with the original vehicle. Then the second vehicle was a bit better but we still had no working air conditioning and ROACHES in the vehicle. We booked higher end hotels as we expected great service and a quality experience. Because of the service we received from Theresia, we thought we would receive excellent service from everyone at Soul of Madagascar. We also thought we would have had a higher end vehicle because of the higher end hotel choices we had made. Well, that was not the case. We had never experienced such bad service between the guide, driver and the vehicle like this. The best vehicle was the one that transported us to/from the hotel/airport and the one from Bekopaka to Morandava, which was not from Soul of Madagascar. Out of 14 days we have been with a vehicle, we had air condition for 4 days. Two of these days were transfer to/from the International Airport. Taking the total time we spent in a vehicle without air conditioning, it would be over 95% that we had NO air conditioning. We understand things happen. Maybe even twice, but five different things happened with the same vehicle. The first time, on the way to Kirindy Forest, the fan belt broke. It took about 2.5 hours to get back to where the fan belt broke. The next day, driving to Bekopa the air conditioner broke. We had to drive 5 hours on the dirt road with the windows down. It was SO hot and SO dusty. Our luggage, ourselves and everything was DIRTY. I mean DIRTY. Joushia and Rivo did not even seem to care that we were filthy. The next time the vehicle had an issue was on the way to Antsirabe. We stopped once for 15 minutes, then another time for 20 minutes and then an extra hour at lunch because the power steering pipe had a hole. And the air conditioning was not working. We had told Joushia we needed a different vehicle in Antsirabe. But he did NOT listen to us.
We were heading to Ranomafana the day after Antsirabe. We had told Joushia we absolutely wanted to do a night walk in Ranomafana as this was planned on our itinerary. Joushia said we had to insure we were on the road very early to arrive in Ranomafana for the night walk. We opted to not do Antsirabe city tour and the zebu factory to insure we had enough time to get to Ranomafana. We ended up paying the price for not getting a different vehicle in Antsirable as the vehicle broke down on the side of the road. We also noticed the power steering wasn't working, even though we were told everything was fine with the vehicle and of course the air conditioning was not work. That day the fan belt broke again, the same fan belt. We sat at least two hours at the side of the road while the vehicle was repaired. We repeated that we wanted to do one tonight but because of the vehicle breaking down for the fourth time, we could not. Rivo's reply was "This is life in Madagascar." WOW, what customer service is this?!?! We have not seen any other tourist's vehicles broken down on the side of the road. Obviously, it isn't life in Madagascar. We also have not seen any other tourist vehicles with their windows down! So many lies! Joushia lied to us! Finally, we got a different vehicle, but again, it had no air conditioning, and it had roaches crawling on the floor and on us!! This whole situation was unacceptable.
We travel the world as we have visited 95 different countries. Most of these travels has been on induvial tours such as this one. Never have had anything like this. We talked to other tourists while on our holiday in Madagascar; French, Hungarian, Dutch, English, Australian, Canadian, South African and Americans. None have experienced even one issue like we had. All we ever heard from Theresia was “Thank you for understanding”. Well, that is one thing, but it does not make the facts change. If we experienced any small issue on a previous holiday, we would have been compensated for any issues. It would have been a nice gesture, indicating these issues were understood, if a small refund or possibly including meals at several of the hotels. But no compensation was ever made. We paid a lot of money for this holiday and expected great service. Other than Theresia, we did not receive good service from Soul of Madagascar. We felt as if we were a nuisance and not a client.
We had communicated with Theresia during the trip for her to try to understand our situation. Her response was “my apologies” and she was grateful for our understanding. She also stated she did not know about all the issues with the vehicle until we had told her. Joushia did not tell her about the vehicle?? Upon our arrived home, we sent a lengthy email detailing all our issues we experienced on our trip to Theresia. This is her response, “I would like to apologize for the inconvenience you experienced during your trip. As a representative of our agency, I will take all your feedback seriously. I will take the time to carefully observe the people I will work with in the future. Once again, I offer you my most sincere apologies.” Apologies are one thing, but it is as if no one from Soul of Madagascar understood that we paid good money for a tour that was far below satisfactory conditions. We honestly cannot recommend Soul of Madagascar.
HU
35-50 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Flexible organization adapted to our times
Easy communication, reliable organization. The program was well organized and we kept to our tight time frame
HU
35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Fantastic program organization, outstanding competence
It was possible to reliably communicate with the office on all forums. Our tour guide did an outstandingly professional job. We were always right where something happened. He drove quickly and very well, which was very important for us to cover the Serengeti, Ngorogo and Tarangire in three days. We saw all five big game and many other beautiful animals. The accommodations were wonderful. They are also unbeatable in terms of value for money. It was an experience of a lifetime, we will never forget it. Thank you to the company.
