35-50 years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
Disappointing ! Even more after It Started in Africa offered to pay me to remove my reviews.
My husband and I selected It Started in Africa as our tour organizer for a 6 day Mount Kilimanjaro hike mainly because of their outstanding reviews and classification on Safaribookings and TripAdvisor. We also chose them because they were very reactive and had a nice website. But our main selection criteria was their ranking on Safaribookings (number 1) and on Trip Advisor (number 10).
The hike itself was satisfying: the guides, cooks and porters were friendly and helpful, BUT our overall experience turned out not to be as good as expected, and there were a lot of “small” details that added together gave us the overall unpleasant feeling that we had somehow been “cheated” by It Started in Africa.
The main issues were:
1. No one was there to meet us when we arrived at Kilimanjaro airport. Sylvia, our tour manager, arrived approximately one hour after our flight had landed and explained that she thought we were arriving on the KLM flight and that she had not been made aware that we were on the Kenya Airways flight. My husband had send Joao all of our flight details, which he had acknowledged receipt of. And even if what Sylvia was telling us was true, she was still 30 minutes late for the KLM flight.
2. The hotel in Arusha (Raha Leo) which was sold to us as part of the package, and included in our contract, was changed at the last minute without us being informed or forewarned. When I checked the rating on Trip Advisor, I realized that the hotel that It Started in Africa put us in (The Torch) had a much lower rating than the hotel that had been sold to us. When reading other traveler reviews posted after our trip (and since then disappeared from Trip Advisor), I realized that we were not the only customers surprised in this way…..
3. As part of the contract, It Started in Africa was supposed to supply us with duvet liners and pillows – we never saw them. The mess tent was tiny and could barely hold our party of 7.
4. My husband was victim of food poisoning and he was so sick that he had to turn back and be evacuated from the mountain. The doctor that we saw when we returned to Joburg confirmed that his disease had nothing to do with altitude sickness but was solely due to food poisoning (most likely the chicken we were served during 3 consecutive days by the It Started in Africa cook). The evacuation until the park gate was organized diligently and professionally by Tanzanian Parks. But once at the gate, the car that It Started in Africa car had sent from Arusha was not there. It was actually our piece of luck, because the It Started in Africa representative in Moshi came to pick us up in order not to keep us waiting and he agreed with us that my husband was in no condition to withstand the 3 hour drive to Arusha. The guides and I had told Sylvia, our tour manager, a number of times over the phone that it made no sense to drive back to Arusha that day, and had requested to stop in Moshi for the night, but she had refused to listen, saying that “she had already booked a room at The Torch in Arusha”. The hotel in Moshi was much nicer than the Torch and we were able to get a good night’s rest.
5. From the beginning of the trip, until the very last day, we were under constant pressure from the chief guides (and from the tour manager on the first day), to leave generous tips to the guides and porters. This gave us the unpleasant feeling that the porters, guides, cooks, etc are so poorly paid by It Started in Africa, that they rely on customers’ tips to keep their staff happy. The documents sent to us before the trip gave clear guidelines about the tipping amounts to be given out and we all know how to read – so why be so insistent during the entire trip? It really made us feel as if we were a bunch of dishonest people who would walk away from our responsibilities, and impacted our relationship with the guides and porters.
6. The number of porters/guides/cooks, etc accompanying us during the trip was never clearly stated to us before the trip. We found out on the first day of the hike that 31 people would be accompanying our group of 7 people. I’m not against employing a large number of people, but I believe that It Started in Africa should have been transparent about this before we signed the contract – as this has an impact on the total amount of the trip (tips are substantial).
7. When we were done with the trip, we were put under a lot of pressure by Sylvia, our tour manager to write good reviews on the spot for them, with them looking over our shoulders. I refused to do it and said I would do it later, as I don’t like being pressured in such a way.
8. Our last night in Arusha was part of the package, and had been paid for and booked through It Started in Africa. When Sylvia told us we would be staying at the Torch again, we refused. Not the rat hole again! Especially considering how weak my husband was. She then suggested Kia Lodge by the airport and warned us that it would be more expensive. We were prepared to pay whatever additional cost there was to pay, as long as the hotel was decent, with water and air conditioning in the rooms. And we also asked if it would be possible for the three guys in our party who were flying out later that day to use our rooms to take a shower. Sylvia promised it all, dropped us off at the hotel reception, and then vanished (very quietly for once). Once she was gone, the hotel manager told us that it would not be possible for our 3 friends to shower (but they were welcome to drink at the bar and eat at the restaurant), and we found that there was no water pressure in our room, making it impossible to shower. And at bedtime, when we turned the air-con on, we found out that it did not work either….. The next morning, there was literally no water at all in the shower! 183 USD for a room with no water and no air-con (supposedly the It Started In Africa special rate, but when I double checked on Trip Advisor, I found the rooms to be sold at 177 USD)….quite pricy, don’t you think?
But here comes the worst part!
When we returned home, I posted a review on Trip Advisor and rated It Started in Africa as "average", considering the problems that we had and the un-kept promises. The next day, Joao, the Happiness Manager, sent me an email with explanations about what happened and offered to pay me 700 USD if I removed my post or upgraded it to Very Good. When I refused, he offered me 1000 USD. After he had my review forcibly removed from Trip Advisor, I posted another review explaining how he tried to bribe me, and I received a 3rd email offering me 2500 USD if I removed my second review. I also noticed that the other average reviews which had been posted on Trip Advisor at around the same time as mine had disappeared. I managed to contact another reviewer who confirmed that he was offered money to remove or upgrade his review.
I then realized why It Started in Africa only had very good and excellent reviews on the internet. It seems that they bribe unhappy customers to remove or change their reviews if they are not 4 or 5 stars. And I cannot help but wonder....how many people were paid in the past? And how many people, like me, selected It Started In Africa mainly because of their track record of excellent and very good reviews and were hugely disappointed? How much money is Joao going to offer me this time, to remove my review from Safaribookings.com? I systematically read travelers' internet reviews before I choose a hotel or a tour organizer. I also believe that it is of utmost importance that travelers who post reviews on these websites do it honestly, as others rely on them to make decisions and chose their tour operator, hotels, restaurants, etc. I could have accepted Joao’s 1000 USD and left it at that, letting other travelers believe that It Started in Africa provides top class service and that they are the best. Maybe they are great for a large number of travelers. But not for me, and I believe that it is unfair to other travelers to keep quiet about what is going on. It Started in Africa’s business practices are unfair and detrimental to all of the tourism industry professionals who work hard and with integrity to please their customers. It Started in Africa need to understand that you cannot hide your flaws forever by bribing customers, and that there are still some people out there who cannot be bought, no matter how much money you offer them. It Started in Africa's cheating attempts turned out to be the most disturbing part of this trip for me. Knowing after hand that others before me may have had a disappointing experience with It Started in Africa, but were paid to remove their reviews, gives me the very unpleasant impression that we were cheated voluntarily by It Started in Africa from the very start.
For this very reason, I would definitely not recommend this Tour operator!
20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Extremely poor coordination
i booked a safari from Bonfire on 8th September, guide and safari van was ok. the coordination and communication from my agent innocent was pathetic. She was not reachable two days before the safari. Driver and vehicle details were not shared until i made 20 calls to various numbers. finally number was shared on saturday 19.00 hrs for sunday morning safari and to my surprise, the mentioned driver never came instead send some other driver.
this is pathetic and frustrating for the monies paid. i will recommend not to choose bonfire because of very poor customer service.
Regards,
Nachiket
35-50 years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
My experience was at bookings very poorly coordinated. I feel I was overcharged not Professional
As a parent I felt cheated. Got a raw deal.The SGR booking was a mess
US
65+ years of age | Experience level: first safari
Marred Vacation Experience
My husband and I planned this trip for about three years; we are retired educators. The trip included two weeks in South Africa(Capetown, Safari, and the remainder of the trip spent in Victoria Falls. The first two weeks of the trip went very smoothly, and we had an excellent experience. Our nightmare began after the Victoria Falls part of the trip. When my husband and I arrived to the Victoria Falls Airport for the return flight to JoBurg for the connecting flight to the USA, South African Air could not process my husbands reservation. We waited for two hours anxious, and stressed to get the reservation corrected. South African Air blamed
Go Touch Down, Go Touch Down blamed South African Air. There were two other individuals in our party and on the same reservation. My husband and I dealt with Go Touch Down; all of the arrangement were made by this travel agency. They readily took our money for this trip, promising a quality experience. When contacted, and asked to refund some of the money,(800.00) they sent us $25.00 which was suppose to cover failure to provide an aisle seat for my husband on the return flight. We were informed by Go Touch Down that South African Air charged for a seat on the Aisle. Needless to say the Vacation was marred, and should not have been. I understand that mishaps occur. I also expect to be made whole when treated poorly. Deon Barnard, President/CEO was useless in helping us. I share this information, so that potential clients will know that should something go wrong, Go Touch Down will not do the right by you. Please contact me if you have questions or wish more information about our experience.
20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
VERY LATE!!
We were told to arrive by 6.30 which we did but we ended up leaving 2 HOURS later!. Honestly that was not at all interesting. Waiting for two hours just because people are late.
Bonfire should have a 30minute caveat/rule.
You arrive later than 30min you forfeit your trip.
Its unfair and RUDE to keep 15 people waiting for 2hours for 1 person.
Very dissapointing. 2stars because of this bad experience.
35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
ATC 57 Day African Adventure
We have just finished ATC 57 Day Cape Town to Nairobi overland trip, and though the staff on the ground for the most part were very good, the actual organisation of the trip certainly does not provide the best value or experience on the market. Parts of the trip were disorganised, very expensive comparative with other companies, meals paid for were not made available, suppliers used by ATC were slipshod in their attention to detail and expensive.
Booking through On The Go Tours we were informed that there was no way that optional excursions could be paid for in advance, we were therefore surprised and annoyed to find that other travellers on our trip using a Dutch Agent had all major excursions included in the price.
Itineraries supplied by different agents for the tour were slightly different and this caused confusion with at least one out of the three trip leaders we had, and meant last minute changes in plan.
Changes in tour leaders, cooks and driver also meant meals paid for were not provided, and we actually had to pay for a meal at the ATC Nairobi campsite that was included in our package. The new tour leader indicated he would investigate this with the office but no further comment was provided by the tour leader or ATC.
Campsites had been changed comparative to the itinerary supplied and due to not camping inside national park game viewing opportunities were lost. If using ATC ensure that any changes in itinerary do not affect the paid for activities.
Equipment used especially on the first two parts of the trip were "well used" to say the least, and in my opinion the cooks knives on the final part were dangerous to use and unhygienic with handles falling apart.
Optional tours with third party supplies were found to be 25% more expensive than other operators offering better value both at Victoria Falls and Swakopmund, which given the amount of business generated by the overland tours was disappointing to learn. If you use ATC I would strongly urge you to shop around at both these places.
Tour teeshirts out of the four ordered from ATC recommended supplies two in Kampala and two in Vic falls, none were provided as agreed with the suppliers representative, which was very disappointing.
We did go to all the places within the itinerary, and much of the trip was enjoyable, however, if we were to repeat this trip we would use alternative companies which offer similar itineraries. Do not be fooled by the cheap upfront price, by the time all optional extras are included it is certainly no cheaper than going with others who include these in the upfront price.
65+ years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Masai Mara 3 day (but only 2)
Simba Oryx lodge and Mara itself are superb. Bonfire are either dishonest or incompetent. We paid for three days safari but, on the third day, the driver just took us home. We also gave the driver park fees to cover the third day. We are following this up with the company so will update this site if we get a refund, apology etc.
Poor communication
I was dealing with one lady by the name Faith Kaluai,first she sends me a quotation valid for a month,I was to get back to her on my travel dates then two days later she sends me a mail and tell me it was subject to availability and sends me another quotation..i call her wanting to make my bookings on the new quotations sent to me but she doesn't pick up my call..she later sends me a whatsapp message asking me what i have decided nearly a week after.surely bonfire how are you supposed to win people's trust if you can't handle your customers properly?
Experience level: first safari
Disappointing. Avoid traveling with Kapolondo Expeditions.
I booked and paid well in advance for a 6 day mid range lodge safari. I ended up on a budget group safari.
On arrival late at night at Kilimanjaro airport I was met (thankfully - after reading a few reviews I had been nervous that nobody would be there!) and we begun our drive to Arusha, only for the safari vehicle to break down almost immediately. 21/2 hours later we crawled in to Arusha. The vehicle continued to have problems throughout the safari.
On Safari none of the accomodation had been booked in advance. I only stayed at 1 hotel that was on my itinerary (and it was empty of guests). Tony seemed to find the cheapest accomodation going on the day.
At one point Tony told me that the lodge I had booked was full so given that the owners of this lodge owned another accomodation in the local area I would go there. In turn I went to the lodge to ask them about their hotel being full. Turns out both were lies. The lodge was by no means full and the lodge did not own another hotel nearby.
We had to wait for several hours at Serengeti National Park and also Tarangire National Park as the company credit card did not have enough funds to cover the entry fees. Tony finally added funds but with a lengthy and irritating delay. Time spent hanging around at the entrance, watching all the other safari vehicles heading in to the parks was not particularly fun!
The only positive for which I am very thankful is that our driver Bruno (freelance driver) took great care to make sure we saw some amazing sights. He was a fabulous driver, knows the parks very well, taught us about the animals and made sure our journey was as magical as possible.
I have since written to Tony asking for a refund for the sub standard accomodation and the time wasting. He's not particularly repsponsive and when he does he makes up things.
I think the bottom line is, the guy doesn't seem to care. The company has such potential to be a very successful business but the way it is currently being managed, I don't believe it will last much longer.
Do yourself a favour and choose one of the many reputable safari companies, to avoid the stress and worry we had to deal with on the journey.
Happy Safari.
CH
20-35 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Unsure solvency of the company - Definitively not a care free safari!
First of all: this review has nothing to do with the beauty of Kenya and Tansania nor our personal tour guides or cooks (they have been super helpful)! Both countries are beautiful and their people have been exceptionally friendly and accommodating!
However, if you want a carefree safari tour in which all bookings/reservations/parking fees are payed in advance (as discussed and payed for) then we suggest to book with a different company. We cannot express how disappointed and frustrated we were in regards to the organizational skills of Kenya Walking Safari's (KWS) management. It caused us many nerves/patience and most of all time during our 10 day safari.
In order to be fair with KWSS we would also like to say the at the end of our tour KWSS compensated us with approx 5% of the tour price for lost time and wrong calculations.
Anyway we would like to explain what happened:
We booked our safari tour in April 2016 for our trip in August 2016. We had extensive contact with KWS which gave us confidence because they were always very responsive and answered all of our many questions. We payed well in advance (a good amount of money!) and expected that all accommodations/services/park fees would be payed/booked for us in time for our arrival.We are very well aware that we can come across unforeseen circumstances and that flexibility is required. However only to a certain extent.
During our tour we encountered four issues which we would like to explain for others in more detail:
The first issue we encountered was during our first lodge in Maasai Mara. Taking KWS's suggestion, we swapped 1 day in our tour due to ongoing animal migration in the region (adding 1 day in Maasai Mara and take 1 day off from our Tanzania tour).This was a good idea because we were able to see the river crossing. However, we didn't receive the same standard room we booked for originally.We wrote KWS a mail to see how to proceed (since there was a clear down grade on our room).They didn't reply to us until the end of our safari tour.
Second issue:after wonderful game drives in Maasai Mara and a great time at Lake Navaisha we headed off for a very long drive (8h) to Amboseli National park. According to our itinerary (which was reconfirmed verbally and on print during our face to face briefing in the Nairobi office) we were booked at the Kibo Lodge (high class safari lodge). We were then surprised to hear from our tour guide that he had just received a text message from the office saying we would be spending 2 nights in the AA lodge instead of Kibo (another down grade as they have different room rates). Apparently Kibo was fully booked due to government officials.We decided to see for ourselves and were more surprised to hear onsite from Kibo lodge that they did have available rooms and no government officials! We of course did not take the room in the AA lodge and insisted on taking a room in Kibo (according to our tour program we had payed for). We then found out from the hotel manager that they no longer accept KWSS clients because the company has outstanding payments. We (including our tour guide) tried to call the KWSS office many times (including the "hotline number") because this was a situation we were not going to accept. We were not able to get the manager of KWSS on the phone and waited 4 long hours until we reached someone from the office.They suggested that we pay the 2 nights ourselves (400$) and we will get a refund. Obviously, after all that we had heard and experienced we were not ready to pay ourselves. Due to the kindness of the Kibo hotel manager and our persisting tour guide we were able to check in at 8.30 pm. KWSS had promised to send the money to Kibo the next day, which they then did the next afternoon.However, low and behold,we encountered another group from KWSS on the second night at Kibo. They had the same problem! Unfortunately they weren't as lucky as we were and had to go to another lodge.
Third issue: after transferring from Kenya to Tanzania,we slept a night in Fanaka lodge to be ready early morning to go to the famous Ngorongoro crater.We were supposed to depart at 8am.However, our tour guide told us that there was a problem because KWSS had again not yet sent the money for our accommodations and park fees for Tanzania. KWSS's Tanzanian business partner, contacted us and suggested we pay 440$ and KWSS will refund us as soon as the money has been wired (apparently there was a technical problem so money transferring was not available). As you may guess, this was not an option for us.KWSS's credibility was non existent. So we called the KWSS office and were surprised that they actually picked up the phone. However this wasn't very helpful and the Tanzanian business partner had to borrow the money from his relative (!) so we could go on with the tour.We waited for almost 3 hrs until we were able to leave.
Fourth issue: after all that had happened, we decided to cross check our past accommodations and realised that KWSS had double calculated the first hotel night in Nairobi. By the way: don't accept a booking at Henessis Hotel.This is a shabby hotel which by far did not meet the standards of our other accommodations. This could have been an honest mistake but we decided to list all the issues we had during our tour for full transparency.
To come to an end: After many emails and involvement of a 3rd party, KWSS management was cooperative and quick in refunding us (after we finished our tour) for wrong hotel accommodations and lost time (several hundred dollars in total).
In short:
- If you want to do a safari tour do it definitively in Tanzania and Kenya - people (incl. tour guides and cooks), nature and food are amazing!
- If you are looking for a carefree package KWS is not the best option
- If you insist and put pressure on KWSS you probably will get refunded for issues, however we believe this only worked for us because we involved a third party