DK
35-50 years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
Professionel, friendly and all together a very good experience
We had wonderful day in Nairobi. We saw the giraffes and the girls got their first kiss... after that kazuti beads and Kitengela glass. Saw zebras on the way as well. Exelent driver, Evans and comfortable car that even had chargers for Phoenix and cameras. What a pitty we didn’t have time to go to Mara
35-50 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Great and personal service
Jumbari provided a truly personal and attentive service for our family's trip to Botswana. Well-organised and hiccup free!
US
Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Safari Expertise & Detailed Planning
Our family has been fortunate to travel to a lot of amazing places, but the Tanzanian safari we took in December was our all-time favorite vacation. We traveled as a family of five: parents and three big kids ages 16-21.The Tanzania Choice Safari owners are an American wife and her Tanzanian husband, who combine an in-depth knowledge of their beautiful country with detail-oriented planning. Brenda and I went back and forth to work out the itinerary, as I explained our interests, until she came up with exactly the activities & types of lodging we wanted. I think that picking the right tour company was definitely key to getting the most enjoyment possible out of our time there.
We flew to Addis Ababa, then to Kilimanjaro Airport, which put us much closer to the parks than Dar es Salaam. We were pleased to find out that large Boeing and Airbus planes fly into Kilimanjaro; if you’re inclined to fly on little planes you can even land in the game parks! Our wonderful guide, Leslie, met us at the airport and we hit the road. We made a quick stop to meet Brenda, Kakasii and their younger kids before we started driving towards the park. They're very warm and they checked in with us during the trip to make sure everything was meeting our expectation. Exceeding our expectations is a more accurate description.
Ngorongoro Crater is known for its incredible density of wildlife, so I didn’t understand why it is located in a conservation area, rather than in a national park. Leslie explained the distinction is that the native Maasai have been allowed to remain with their herd animals in conservation areas, while they were forced to move from the lands that were designated as national parks. I won’t spend a lot of time writing about the wildlife we saw in Ngorongoro Conservation Area or Serengeti National Park, but in four days we were able to see everything we hoped to see and more. Leslie had an incredible knowledge of the animals. And we knew he was correct, because he'd point out an animal/bird and identify it for us, then show us the listing in one of the reference books in the vehicle. One of our fondest memories was watching a dung beetle rolling his ball of dung down the road, repeatedly getting carried away by the momentum and being run over by it, but not quitting. That might be a metaphor for life.
Transportation: Almost every tour group in the parks were in a modified Toyota Land Cruiser. It was plenty of room for our family of five & our duffel/gym bags. They have pop-up roofs that allow you to stand up and take photos. Tanzania Choice Safari provided a power strip in their cruiser to charge our electronics and had an electric cooler for bottled water. We also put other items in it, such as chocolate!
Food: The food at the lodges was quite good. Leslie would pick up boxed lunches for us each day, which we would enjoy at a picnic area in the park. Lunch usually included chicken with a variety of sides and a drink. Vegetarian options seemed pretty common, but vegans would have a difficult time. Leslie would also prepare thermoses with coffee & tea for later in the day. Also, he would put a cloth down on the table at picnic sites. It's a small thing, but it gave us a clean surface for our lunch boxes - we didn't see the other companies showing that kind of attention to detail.
Lodging: The tent lodges were pretty luxurious, including beds with linens, hot showers, flush toilets, mosquito nets, and other amenities. Wi-Fi was available in the common areas of every place we stayed. In the parks most of the staff are Maasai who live in the local area. Everyone who works in the tourism industry there was unfailingly friendly.
Medicine: Our clinic helpfully reviewed our shot records to let us know if we required any immunizations before our trip, then gave us prescriptions of Malarone to prevent malaria. We made sure to bring lots of Deep Woods Off and sunscreen with us, in addition to an assortment of over-the-counter medicines. We hardly saw any mosquitos, but that varies by season and luck. We didn't get sick at all on the trip.
In short, this was a once in a lifetime vacation. We're so thankful that we put our trip in the hands of Tanzania Choice Safaris!
IN
35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
We had a mind blowing and lifetime experience and our guide Jose was one of the best Sagar guide
A lot depends on the guide and his knowledge and experience. We were fortunate that our guide Mr Jose was with us and he gave us an extraordinary game drive experience which we will never forget. We could see live hunting by lions from close range. An exceptional trip marked with the expertise of planning and coordination between various places of travel and road trips. We highly recommend Jabulani tours
DK
65+ years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
Review about Serengeti National Park by Lise Pedersen
More animals than birds!
DK
65+ years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
Review about Ngorongoro Crater by Lise Pedersen
Superb! Not so many birds, excpt for the vultures!
DK
65+ years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
Review about Ndutu by Lise Pedersen
Fantastic area - we loved all the migrating animals - and the leopard (up to now only missing of the "big five"!)
DK
65+ years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
Review about Gombe National Park by Lise Pedersen
We came to Gombe for the chimps - and we saw them very close already the first day - and on day 2 we were just in the middle of them! An awesome experience - not to forget again! One of the highlights of our tour!
We did not meet very many birds here!
20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
amazing !!!!
We stayed at Lalibela private game reserve - tree tops. What a truly wonderful experience. From the second we arrived every member of staff was fantastic. We were welcomed with a welcome drink and shown around, i mean woah just woah the location was beautiful and the accommodation was better than expected (i was expecting alot). food and drinks were plentiful and very dietary accommodating. our tour guide was a lovely lady named sarah, who was basically an animal whisperer, she was so knowledgable and tried her hardest to find every animal we wished to see. Lailbela is full of animals and loads of babies !!! would recommend a thousand times over !!! thanks
DK
65+ years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
A terrific combination of experiencing very remote as well as very often visited places of Tanzania
Even the leopard was there! Lots of elephants and lions very close - lions also resting in the trees, wildebeests giving birth just in front of us, a large group of rhinos - at distance, large groups of zebras, wildebeests and gazelles "on the run"/migrating, lots of hippos, looking like stones in a mud hole - and suddenly emerging from the mud with a big yawn ….. We have seen and met much more wildlife and birds than expexcted - Mountain areas, waterfalls, wonderful sceneries as well in the mountains as on the grassland. The weather much better than expected, although we also tried heavy rain, lightning and thunder (at night!)! Very different national parks - good choices!
And almost all accommodations far beyond expectation - only in two of 11-12 places we stayed in, we had a few - minor - comments, all basic things was very well functionin! The food was usually very fine - or at least reasonable, but we often had a long service time!! Transportation: A superb driver, but the poor man had a LOT of work with the maintenance/repair of the rather old and "tired" safari car, safety equipment not really existing? OK.! He did a really good job and was very helpful and serviceminded! We had far more than "value for money"!! THANKS!