US
20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
TERRIBLE TOUR
I would first like to say that this was the worst tour company I could have ever taken. The tour guide Audence picked me up and off the bat had an attitude. He didn’t introduce himself, or seem
Enthusiastic at all, as I expect a tour guide to be. The tour
Company
Lies on the itinerary, I was supposed to do a few things that I didn’t get to do on the first day because Audence who was the tour guide thought that it wouldn’t work for him. In turn I didn’t get to do one activity towards the end, and other activities felt rushed because they weren’t done on the first day. I mentioned this issue to Elvis, who is the owner of the
Company but nothing seemed to have changed for the rest of the trip. The tour guide was not informative on any
Of the important sites we visited. He didn’t provide any information, only just pointed out the “names” of them. As we went to these historic sites, I had to google most information.
In addition to this, the company and the owner failed to mention that none of the accommodations provided had air conditioning or a fan. I mentioned this to Elvis and he acted as if he didn’t know, but when I asked the hotel they informed me that this has always been the case for that specific hotel. As we were driving throughout Uganda and Rwanda, I asked Audence many times about stopping to get something to eat, but we drove non stop from place to place.
This tour was a dreadful experience. Having to deal with a guide who had an attitude, and is uninformative shouldn’t be a guide at all. The company lies and should not even be taking any customers.
From the lies, to the unprofessionalism this was by far one of my worst experiences traveling 7 countries in Africa. Uganda and Rwanda are both beautiful countries, but I urge you to choose another tour operator with more reviews than this company has.
35-50 years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
Dream Bandas Uganda is corrupt and took all our money but cancelled tour
Hi team, we would not recommend you book a tour with Dream Bandas Uganda. They made us pay for our tour in full and cancelled one week before the trip even though they knew the tour would not go ahead as they had been sued for illegal gorilla trekking. So they took our money a month in advance even though they knew the tour would not go ahead.
We had flights and hotels booked already so we had to find another tour company. We managed to do a tour with Lulu Safaris Uganda who were absolutely amazing and only made us pay 30% when booking the tour and the full amount when we were actually on the tour. The company was amazing.
Dream Bandas are now avoiding all our calls and haven't refunded us but we can see they still operating.
We hope no-one goes through the same experience we went through.
DE
20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Go there, but with another tour operator!
So there are many things, I don't know where to start:
- pick up at the place in Arusha was 1 hour to late, well that's Africa
- on the first day I haven't been with my safari group, there were two other woman, but they didn't make the same safari I did
- on the second day I met "my" safari group
- we saw a lion like 150m away on a tree, after that the driver couldn't start the motor and he said he wants us to push the car - with the lion not far away. No one felt safe out there and it didn't help anyway, so we got stucked for 2,5h over there
- after that it was quite late (7:30pm) and it's only allowed to drive there until 6pm. So the driver was speeding sooo fast, everyone was really afraid to die. One guy told him so slow down (pole, pole) but he reacted really unprofessional and said he has to hurry because of the rangers. He drove way to fast and brought us into several dangerous situations (water splashed all over the window, he couldn't see where he is driving, while speeding 80km/h in a park where max speed 50km/h
- driver didn't talk a lot to us
- sleeping bags and matresses stinked badly
- bad equipped campsites (no light in the bathroom, no toilet paper, no guardian in the night)
- and the worst thing: I paid way to much for this safari. Dennis charged me more than twice the price the other people from the safari spent for this trip. We had so bad accomodations, dangerous situations and he charged me for a medium price section and not for the low budget one.... I still try to get some money back for this experience
Please find another company! Nature over there is pretty, but this company just makes you feel bad and brings you in dangerous situations.
35-50 years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
The worst nature tour
It was the worst nature tour I have ever experienced in the world.
Departure was an hour late due to the tardiness of the guide.
The guide was grumpy the whole time and didn't explain anything about the animals or the park. He refused to even have a conversation with us. The car was broken down from the start, running at 20 km/h with black smoke and stopping frequently for repairs.
We were forced to cut off our game drive in the middle of the tour to get that car repaired.
My friend was trampled by the car driven by the guide, yet there were no words of apology or concern about his injuries, just a series of lame excuses.
When I reported this to the company, I received no apology or compensation.
20-35 years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
No, we paid for a shared van or a shared safari car only for a small Uber to show up for the safari.
The driver called the boss to pass the information only for the boss to say we are complaining customer yet what we paid for was not giving. Worst experience I would not recommend them to anyone.
The driver was okay atleast he listened but the owner ohhhh no. Worst customer service experience
FR
Very disappointing
PS: This review was originally written in French and translated to English
I was extremely disappointed with the safari experience provided by Karibu. We had booked a three-day safari, but the title was misleading as we were only given a maximum of 10 hours to look for animals. I suggest that they change the name of the safari to better reflect the actual time spent on the safari.
On the first day, we were only in the park for one hour. On the second day, our driver wanted to return at 3 p.m. even though we still had time to search for animals. The driver was also very unfriendly, which spoiled the fabulous experience for us. Raymond, our driver, did not hesitate to remind us that he had long work days, which he compared to ours. He said this was the reason why he had listened to the research. We reminded him that we had paid $700 to keep him on schedule.
We strongly recommend that you move on and choose another provider!
ORIGINAL REVIEW IN FRENCH
Extrêmement déçus de notre safari avec Karibu. Nous avions réservé 3 jours de safari mais cet intitulé est mensonger, sachez que vous n’aurez que 10h tout au plus de recherche d’animaux ! Il serait donc préférable de changer le nom du safari…
Premier jour 1H dans le parc, 2ème jour notre chauffeur a voulu rentrer à 15h alors qu’il nous restait du temps de recherche.. Chauffeur par ailleurs très antipathique qui nous a gâché cette expérience fabuleuse… En effet « Raymond » n’a pas manqué de nous souligner qu’il avait de longues journées de travail (en osant comparer aux nôtres!!!) c’est pourquoi il avait écouté les recherches.
Nous lui avons rappelé que nous avions payé 700 dollars pour qu’il respecte le programme prévu.
Nous vous recommandons vivement de passer votre chemin et choisir un autre prestataire
35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
I believe I was scammed
I wish to advise guests to be careful with the owner of this company, Rose. She is a conwoman. I had a very bad experience with her as she came and paid for her booking at our Hotel by cheque and later advised the bank not to honor the cheque. The amount was $1,890.00 that she conned us. After taking legal actions, she claims that she is the CEO of Asilia Safaris. BE ⚠️
US
65+ years of age | Experience level: first safari
We were defrauded over $6000 US Dollars
We and another couple booked a custom safari package with Safari Lift Africa through Calvin, the owner of the company. Mr Gibson did not apply our last payment to many of the services described in our safari package and we were required to pay again in order to continue with the safari.
More specifically, after we arrived, we learned that Mr Gibson had not paid for our booking at Pom Pom Lodge; our flights to and from Pom Pom on Mack Air; airport transport at Dar es Salaam airport; park entry and concession fees to Victoria Falls, Ngorongoro Crater, and Serengeti Parks; transport from Arusha to Mosha (a 2 hour drive); a hot air balloon ride in the Serengeti, a Masai experience, a Materuni waterfall tour at Kilimanjaro and a Mto Wa Mbu cooking class; and another meal that should have been paid for as part of the package. In addition, the safari vehicle used in Tanzania was rented by Mr Gibson and the vehicle owner had not been paid so we had to pay that rental fee as well as gas in order to continue with the safari. All were promised as part of our safari package.
We made repeated inquiries to Mr. Gibson as did our Tanzanian guide who also did not get paid. As a result, we paid the guide on our departure from the Serengeti to make up for his lost salary since he had done the best he could in a very difficult situation.
Overall each couple paid $6286.55 US dollars for these unpaid services. Interestingly, Mr Gibson promised to “pay us back” (while claiming his company is in bankruptcy). We have never received a dime of reimbursement from Mr. Gibson. As you can imagine, to be left high and dry in the middle of Africa was incredibly stressful. Mr. Gibson’s fraudulent actions ruined what should have been a once on a lifetime experience. We later learned that we were not the first to be defrauded. We talked to someone else who had lost over $5000 on his safari from this company. There are many reputable operators that run wonderful African safaris. Do yourself a favor and use one of them.
CA
50-65 years of age
Joseph the owner/ operator of Kennafrica does not operate his business in a professional manner.
Our group of 6 adults coming from Canada, booked and paid in full for a 5 day safari. The day prior to being picked up from our hotel we phoned, emailed and texted Joseph to confirm our pick-up time. We did not hear from him or anyone else from this company. The next morning we all got up early and waited in the lobby for a couple of hours until we came to the shocking realization that they were not going to show up. We returned to Canada and began reaching out to Joseph regarding getting our money back for the safari that never happened. So far we have received a portion of what we paid to Kennafrica Adventures. Promises were made from Joseph via email to refund us the remaining of the balance 2 weeks ago. We have not received the money nor have we heard from Joseph since the last email where he promised to pay the balance of $1300 US owed to us. We are very disappointed and cannot recommend that anyone book with this safari tour company.
SE
50-65 years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
Non-delivery and bad delivery of promised service
I really cannot recommend this company Tall Masai. My pickup at the airport for which I paid extra was 20 min. too late. My free pick-up from the hotel which was included in the price was 40 min. too late, because they combined it with another paid airport pickup. Be very careful which pick-ups are included in the price and quote they offer.
However, free pick-up from the hotel was included in the quote of Tall Masai, but suddenly Bensson wanted extra money for this.
I selected Tall Masai for an 8 days tour because Bensson indicated in the quote that safari start at 6.30 in the morning. On the first morning, they did not get one customer placed in another accommodation into the care in time, thus, the safari in Masai Mara started at 7.00. Then, the 2WD car got stuck in a mud-hole and we were lucky that there was another car around to pull us out. On the second day at 15.30 the second car broke, they managed to continue to drive slowly on the straight way back to the camp reaching already there around 5pm while the parks closes at 6.30 (and the walki-talki was turned off, thus, not hearing where interesting animals could be to drive to). Hence, the “late afternoon/early evening game drive was no real one” because no walki-talki was used and because they indicated if we stop we might not be able to continue. Thus, we hardly dare to even asked them to drive slower as they already did for taking photos.
The worst thing was in Amboseli where the (fourth or fifth) driver I had indicated already in the evening that the game drive the next morning starts at 8.30 (despite the agreement mentioned above to start at 6.30). Bensson did not intervene despite being reminded about the contract but tried afterward to justify this very late start with some Amboseli entrance fee issues, but he apparently does not understand what it means to agree on terms. But he just promises and then does not deliver.
They also work together with a hotel in Naivasha called Leisure Apex Resort. When I need to get medicine with a five-minute one way car ride, the receptionist told me that he called a driver who does it for 500 Kenyan Shillings in total for both ways. But then he informed me that he has to inform his manager "Sylvia" about this. And afterwards he suddenly informed me that the trip now costs 1000 Kenyan Shillings .... . And when that driver arrived he immediately also claimed 1000 Kenyan Shillings. Guess what happened.... . I cannot recommend to stay there. Even not jam or honey was provided, also not upon request, for the breakfast bread with butter.
Apparently, Tall Masai works together with a bunch of other companies, and you feel like cars are filled up every day newly just to maximize profit. For example, People who have seen for six days Zebras are suddenly confronted with one person of a one-day safari who's main goal it is to find a Zebra (not that easy in our case in Amboseli). Customers in the same van who contracted with one of the other companies (Karibu) said that they were promised that there would be only 6 people in the car during their 7-days tour but occasionally we were 9 people in the car.
I took the 8 days tour with two full days Massai Mara at the beginning. I ended up having the same route two times (main road via the viewing point to Mara River and back). They just put me consecutively on two vans which start in the Mara.
On the vans: they provide 2WD vans also during the rather rainy and muddy season in April. While you get what you pay, it is rather inappropriate in my opinion to offer at all 2WD cars in this weather conditions. And then get stuck in the mud in the first morning and the breaking down of the van on the second day just supports this opinion. In general, I got the impression that 2WD vans tend to stay mainly on the main roads, which reduces the covering range of the safari.
I asked for a financial compensation proposal after the journey, and since then I have not heard for several days from Bensson/Tall Masai.
As mentioned, I really cannot recommend Tall Masai safari, or you should try to at least not to pay the full amount.
I do not understand how a company like Tall Masai with such an opinion about an agreement can be further listed on this webpage.