ES
20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Good Safari, bad personal treatment
I personally don't recommend this Company to make a safari. I did 4 days safari and they changed my planning because I wanted to do only 3. The person in charge of taking you to the car, get the money and arange everything treated me as if i were only money and he lied to me several times. On the other hand the safari was fine and the driver and the cook were really friendly.
NL
So-so safari
On the plus side, drivers and other tour staff were helpful, kind and eager to share stories and make the trip more personal. Also, the food provided was decent.
Even though our safari experience at Amboseli was enjoyable, there were some issues.
- Chaotic. Upon departure it was revealed that we were joining other groups in Nairobi, from other operators; merging the safari participants became very chaotic, nothing was communicated or planned, many different people were involved and we were kept in the dark. Similarly, upon returning, we had no idea how or with whom we would get home after dropping off the others at the airport as nothing was communicated by the operator.
- Camp. We arrived at 22h (while we departed at 14.30 from our place in Nairobi) in the budget option camp. When we were taken to our tent the lights had been left inside which basically resulted in an unnecessary bug-fest. Then we tried to use the bathroom but there were still feces there which came up when we tried to flush... When we made inquiries someone did come over to 'fix' it but the bathroom floor was covered instead. Then we were left alone for the night, though we were promised a new tent in the morning. While the website promises the best of the budget camp, it was clear there were cottages better than our tents.
- Organisation. The point of the third day was to go for an early morning (6.30am) game drive and then head back to Nairobi. However, when we arrived for breakfast at 6am nothing was prepared and in the end we had to wait exactly and hour. While we had clearly communicated an allergy for eggs, the breakfast consisted of pancakes and omelettes. Furthermore, the car needed fixing and we ended up in the park after 8am instead. Soon after we got a flat tire, resulting in no time left to watch game as we had to leave before our 24hour park permit expired. Lastly on the way back, our driver kept falling asleep behind the wheel.
Despite these issues we had a good time in the Amboseli National park.
50-65 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
This safari company is actually a middleman
Like another review I read I was shortchanged 3 different nights. Julias, who collected part of the money up front, passed me on the second day to another crook named Victor, who took the remainder of the cost of the trip, then managed to put me in 3 different vehicles during the 7 days, put me in an igloo tent instead of a tented camp 2 different nights, put me in a $30 noisey hotel another night and somehow managed to get me to all the stops on different nights than the itinerary showed. And only one night in the Serengeti instead of promised 2. The last night I insisted to the driver to take me to Planet Lodge the last night on a hunch and it was so wonderful there I stayed there an extra night and I just dared them to make me move, which they did not. I had such a wonderful time, mainly due to some drivers that actually cared for my well being, even though I could tell they had to talk to Victor about me going to certain places I was promised, that I only asked Julias to refund me $150 for the 3 nights they cheated me out of a proper place. Two months later he keeps saying he will pay me, but let us face it, if you do not have $150 you don't have a real company. Julias has a fake safari company that just takes part of the fee and passes you on to the crook named Victor who makes most of his money by pocketing the difference in the price of the promised hotel against the crummy place he tries to put you. And feeds you to different vehicles to pocket some extra cash when drivers have extra room. But despite this I met some wonderful people on the trip and great animals . And I promised Julias if he did not pay I would write him up......so here it is. If you are going on your first safari all you have to do is make sure they are in the safari association and then you are safe......I did not know this until I talked to people in Tanzania.
Beware, you get what you pay for
First and foremost if you are looking for the economy version of a safari then WS Safari may be for you. Also be prepared for older Land Rovers, unexpected changes, and uniformed guides. Moses states the vehicles are well maintained and up to date which is far from the truth. Also Moses cares more about making money then customer satisfaction. He added 2 more people mid trip which made the small Land Rover we were in cramped. We were told to be at breakfast by 6am to get an early start but our guide wasp er an hour late due to picking up more guests. No one told us what was going on. Constantly there was a major lack of communication between clients and the safari company. Our guide who was nice but lacked information about parks and wildlife. He also misidentified several species of birds. More often than not the guests spotted the wildlife and had to ask to stop. On the final day we stopped at a tourist junk store and were told that another car would pick 4 of us up. This wasn't a problem but we were never told of this change. Overall we saw wildlife and if you are trying to do a safari on a budget then go for it. But Beware, you get what you pay for!
50-65 years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
Not good
I do not recomend it to anyone. Problem is not in the camp. The probvlem comes, what you contract and what you find there. Mike send me Shiduli Lodge picture, but later spoke about Chisomo River Lodge, and my Family and me finalized in Chisomo Camp.
They are using Kuruger name!!?? I do not know why?? Kruger Park is something Fantastic; but this is an open zoo only.
NNP urgemtly need quick revamp....boring place
I visited NNP december 2015 after more than 5yrs.
1.Surely this place need revamp.Animal orphnage looks du from entrance all way to cages looks same and old.seats , cages,dustbins are old.elephants skelotons shud be replaced and mounted or hanged in attractive housing.this place is lion den and full of smell.
2~There are no animals in safari walk or any kws work to do something to attract them from hidding place to the watching spots.
3-Why shud one pay twice ...orphanage and safari walk....it shud be once.cashier at safariwalk on 27th december asked my kids age thinking i was lyjng that are under 18.....he sounded rude.
All in all this place cannot compete with even orphanges and nations with imported animals.
At one point the lioned roared and kids were afraid but noticed they wanted to be freed from cages since was already 11am.
Kws shud use monies to change this place....it is boring to see animals without someone explaning.....can staff be tasked to take group of 10 -20 around....this will have desired results...know heritage kr animals
DE
20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Bitter aftertaste of being scammed
My wife and me made a 7N/8D safari with KenyaBushExcursions going to Amboseli, Aberdares, Masai Mara, Nakuru and Naivasha in early December 2015. We paid a total of 2780USD.
Overall we made many enjoyable experiences owing to the drivers and the parks themselves, and I really would love to give a better rating. However we have the bitter taste of feeling scammed by KenyaBushExcursions as we did not receive what we paid for in terms of accommodation and transportation – partially due to being dumped on an ultra-low budget safari joining group.
The details
The good:
-Santos was very responsive and accommodating in providing us with a customized itinerary fitting our wishes; pricing seemed OK
-We got to see many animals, we always felt safe and we followed our itinerary (except Aberdares see below)
-Our drivers (Stanley and Jackson) were overall really great guides, very knowledgeable and it was a great time. Especially the drive with Stanley in Amboseli was amazing, Jackson in Masai Mara felt a little bit like working down a checklist (lion check, leopard check, Giraffe check).
The bad:
1.) Scammed by 600USD on accommodation:
5 nights out of 7 nights we slept in cheaper accommodations than what we were quoted
a) In Amboseli we slept 2N in AALodge instead of Kibo Safari Lodge. There is a huge price difference between the two – judge yourself on booking.com of 200USD/ night
b) In Mara we slept 2N in Miti Mingo Eco Camp instead of Rhino. Our specific tent in Miti Mingi was really a dump, dirty and molded (think they also have newer tents though). Though Rhino does not seem hilarious, according to the resort web pages there is a difference of 60 USD/ night
c) In Nakuru we slept in Miale Hotel instead of Lanet Matfam. Lanet is also twice as expensive as Miale.
2.) Overloaded minibus:
For 3 days we were cramped with 10 people in the minibus though we were quoted a maximum of 7 people (so that everybody has a window seat). Believe me that makes a difference if you spend a lot of time on the road and also if you go out for game drives.
Change of accommodation and the overloaded bus were partially caused by us joining on a super-low budget safari by BigTime Safaris for the part of Masai Mara and Nakuru. The other guys only paid 250USD for 3D/2N safari or 400USD for a 4D/3N safari. I understand this is possible only with the cheapest accommodation possible and sitting in an overcrowded bus.
3.) Bad planning around Aberdares/the Ark:
Not having the game drive and rushing through the most expensive hotel in the itinerary was waste of time and money in this itinerary: we couldn’t make a single game drive in the Aberdares as we arrived in the Ark around 5 pm in the evening and already had to leave again at 6 am the next morning to meet the joining group. If we had known that we would have skipped it
4.) Attitude/unprofessionalism:
All of the above wouldn’t have been a drama to me, if Santos would have acknowledged that there were deviations between what we paid and what we received (accommodations!) and if he had provided us with a fair financial adjustment. However, it turned out to be very unprofessional:
a) Santos joined the last day in the car and he provided us with a cost break-down on the itinerary we received, however that was clearly fudged to match again very close to what we paid.
Actually I just noticed later that the devil was in the details, it was inflated in terms of transportation (quoted us 10 days of transportation for being less than 7 days in the car on a 24hour base) and also the quoted park fees were not the amount paid by the driver I know for sure.
b) There were all kind of excuses, such as that he already had to pay tax on the money received, hotel prices were similar (obviously not)…. If I was harsh, I would say that I don’t care, risk of doing business.
c) When they dropped us at the airport it got insulting, I especially remember two phrases “what do you want, you got to see all the parks” and “you are just angry that [the other part of the joining group] paid less than you; you know this is a free market with free prices” –seriously? We simply didn’t get what we paid…
To date, I still wait for a fair offer from Santos, unfortunately no reaction.
20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
A bit disappointing
2 of 3 activities were great but Falcon was terrible to book with
Activity 1 was operated by Falcon and was a guided tour on the Zimbabwe side. This was the biggest waste of money EVER. We paid $100 a head to have some one read us the signs at the front and hurry us along the whole way. What a waste of money!
Activity 2 was a Dinner cruise on the Zimbabwe side which was really nice but Falcon never gave us a booking receipt and so the operators tried to charge us an extra fee which we shouldn't have been charged
Activity 3 was the Livingstone Isalnd/Devil's Pool lunch tour. Amazing experience which we almost missed out on becuase again Falcon never gave us a booking receipt.
Recommend booking with literally anyone else!
35-50 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Park fees nightmare.
Day 1: My husband and I fully paid for a 4 night 5 day safari to Amboseli, Lake Nakuru and Mara.
The park fees was included in the package, but when we arrived at Amboseli our first stop, we were notified that our park fees had not been paid. We therefore had to wait for 30 plus minutes in the heat, while our driver tried to sort out the problem. After multiple unsuccessful attempts to contact out booking agent Peter Ndambuki, we were notified that we had to pay an additional park fees so as to be let into the park!!
Day 2: We were instructed to go by the office enroute to lake Nakuru, to pick up a refund for the park fees we paid on day 1, and additional park fees for Lake Nakuru and Mara trips, this added another one hour plus to our 5 hour plus drive. When we arrived at the office, the money was not ready for pick up and we had to wait for another 30 minutes for the money, despite the fact that the booking agent is the one who scheduled the pick up!! Needless to say, we arrived in Nakuru hungry and tired and only managed to have a very short game drive.
We are waiting to see whether we have a better experience for the next two days, but we don't intend to ever, ever use or recommend this company.
Still out of pocket
We had a good, and bad experience with Tembea. Despite paying 50% of our fee more than 3 months prior to travel, we found we had no bookings for our intended itinerary when we arrived in Tanzania in July this year. They appear to have cash flow problems, and only booked when we arrived with the balance of our fee. Luckily it was not peak travel time, and we were able to get into all but one of our intended lodges. However, in Ruaha, we had to pay again for 2 nights as the money transfer had not arrived from Kenya to Tazania, and we are still USD1000 out of pocket, 4 months later.
The safari, and driver were excellent, but not knowing if accommodation was going to be available as promised was a big disappointment, as was the extra cost. I would be very wary using them again, particularly in peak season.