ES
35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Review about Ngorongoro Crater by Santiago Kenet Sánchez Custodio
Be careful because it's cold in there! Origin of mankind, essential to visit it, despite the fact you won't see so many species as in The Serengeti...
IN
Cost effective, Reliable, Good service
Our guide and driver Mr. Yassir had good knowledge. He was very cooperative, patient and friendly.
RO
35-50 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Good tour operator
I booked a short one-day trip with Nayala. I was travelling alone and I felt safe. I was happy to be able to go alone at a decent price as tour operators usually ask for a minimum of two people. It was overall a good experience.
MY
35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
fast responsive , very helpful, be able to resolve the issue
Overall, it was great experiences with IFS.
Fiona was fast and very quick on responding to all my queries before I signed up with them.
There was a miscommunication regarding the 4X4 jeet but IFS be able to resolved it fast.
During the trip, they also checking with us if everything is alright.
The Driver was owesome, funny guy, we were so luck first day in Masai managed to spot leopard.
KR
35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Review about Bwindi Impenetrable National Park by Douglas M. Holden
Incredible gorilla experience - very expensive, but not a lot of introduction or information. *Ride 4 a Woman is an incredible, active community that supports local women in many ways - truly wonderful.
US
65+ years of age | Experience level: first safari
Very pretty scenery and an abundance of wildlife
Tour guide was Mowalla. Excellent guide, knew the area and where the wildlife was expected to be like back of his hand. Very impressed by the scenery and by the abundance of wildlife. The Tanzania area was much larger than I expected. Took a lot of driving to cover all the areas. I over packed for cooler weather. Pleased to enjoy the winter weather of 70-75 during the day and good sleeping temperatures in the 50s at night. Sounds a little cold at night but with the bed covers was actually pretty nice. Only rained one time and not much on that one rain to effect anything or any part of the Safari tour. People on tour and the tour guides in particular were very conscious of keeping things clean and picked up. Tour guides were also very helpful in notifying other guides when special animals like the lions and leopards were spotted helping others see the animals too. Sometimes the radio chatter was a bit annoying but when you realized the chatter was letting other guides know of spotting the animals it wasn’t so annoying after that.
CH
20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Everybody was always in a good mood and tried their best to give us the best experience.
I went with my family, the entire experience was planned out and we were able to relax and just follow with their program. it was a great experience!
FR
20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
We are amazed by all these animals.
This safari was really great, we did Tarangire one day and Ngorongoro Crater the other day. We were really lucky because we saw a lot of animals, it was so amazing. However, if I can say something, I would say that the guide could give us more informations about what we saw. It was interesting but we would have liked more discussions with him to understand much better all the animals and they way of life.
20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
The tour operator was good and carer person to all tourists
Both communications, all services and value for money together with tour itself were good.
US
35-50 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Extremely responsive and an absolute pleasure to work with!
I debated between a 4 and 5 star but ultimately went with 5.
The 5 stars part -
From the moment I reached out to Nsavi they were so very responsive and kind and warm and thoughtful. The whole planning and booking experience was high end from a service perspective. They helped us through every part of the journey. When we had trouble confirming flights from Kilimanjaro to Kigali, they stepped in and helped with Rwanda Air; when my mom broke her foot on the way to Tarusha we reached out and asked if they could get us a cushioned boot for my mom and when we arrived they had what we needed. The tour operators in Tanzania were thoughtful and extremely engaged. We felt they really wanted to provide a great experience for us. The operator in Kigali was very engaged, friendly, genuine. I truly cannot say enough great things about the people we were with day to day.
The 4 star part -
I wish they set our expectations about the conditions of the lodging, the Tanzania roads, and tipping. We chose the mid-range option for lodging based on reading reviews of the hotel options for both mid-range and high-end. We decided to go mid range because the Google ratings of the hotels were all about the same and the difference in price, for us, did not justify the potential for a better experience. The first hotel in Arusha, rated a 4.1 or 4.2 on Google, was very unpleasant. The sheets and towels were dirty. We were there to literally just sleepover and leave so we didn't ask to change any of that, and honestly, I'm not sure how much better new ones would be (we had 2 rooms and both had similar conditions). The other hotels were nicer but it was also extremely cold in the rooms. The hotel in Kigali did have hot water bottles and a space heater which felt like heaven!!!
We were there in July and based on Accuweather the temp was around low 60s in the evening but felt much much colder. We didn't expect it and weren't properly prepared for that.
The roads in Tanzania are mostly unpaved and extremely bumpy except for the highways. And while you don't think much of it, it's very impactful when you're traveling for hours and hours on those roads and then come back to a very cold unpleasant room. Again - not Nsavi's fault at all! I do wish they prepared us in some way for that. But now you will know :)
Finally, the tipping. Yes, in the tour docs it does give you a general expectation of what to tip. However, everywhere you go and everyone you encounter is expecting or asking for a tip. I wish we brought USD (or Euros) with us. We ended up going to the cash stations to take out money. That's the other thing - it's better for them to receive USD or Euros vs local currency. Again, a stronger "heads up" would have been great.