BE
50-65 years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
Please, do not go on safari with Tembea East Africa Safaris !
We ( a party of 4 ) went on a Tanzanian safari with them out of Arusha.
They seemed reliable, as they were also appearing on Safari Bookings. But what a mistake I made !
When requiring information and quotation, Evangelina, reservations staff, was extremely helpfull and replied by email always within the hour. I did some research, so I gave her the names of hotels / lodges I would stay in ( Arusha - Tarangire - Lake Manyara - Ngorongoro ). She also quoted me the price of this week safari in " all-in formula ". I specifically asked her if this would include all drinks in the lodges ( whether alcoholic or not ) and she replied me yes !
When making the reservation, I had to pay a 60 % deposit. I did this by bank transfer. Damian, the accounting staff, was very eager to get the money, as he wrote me already the next day where the money was. I told him to be patient, since it takes a while before a bank transfer is done between Belgium and Kenya. After 4 days he got the money. Suddenly, he asked Evangelina by email ( with a copy to me ! ) if she granted me the usual discount. Seemed, that by paying the balance 6 months before the trip ( instead of paying cash upon arrival ), I could get a 3 % discount. Of course, this was a trap !!
Upon arrival in Arusha, Mr Issa ( the manager of Tembea ) was there at the hotel in order to collect the balance. He tried to switch my first lodge at Tarangire into a campsite, but I refused.
First day ( a visit of Arusha National Park ) everything went well. Comfortable jeep, excellent driver who gave us a very good explanation with spectacular binoculars. At the end of that day, we made an appointment with him for the next day, when we would leave Arusha together for the one week safari.
Next day... nobody came at the agreed time. More than 2 hours later, a wreck of a jeep arrived, with another driver, who's english was very poor and difficult to understand. He also had binoculars ( when I specifically asked for ) but they did not work !!
With this wreck of a jeep we went on safari. From day one, a warning light was appearing on the dashboard, that the oil level of the brakes was too low. Twice we had a big mechanical problem and had to go to a local garage for a while. The worst mechanical issue was that on the last day, decending from the Ngorongoro Rim to Karatu, we had NO brakes at all for 30 km !! A horrific experience !!
Also, in the contract, they allowed us to go twice into Lake Manyara. But once there, this was refused and only one entry was paid for. The driver would have liked that we would be back in Arusha before lunch, instead of dinner, so to cut our safari by half a day. But this I refused of course.
Besides this, all lodges refused the all-in formula. When I contacted Mr Issa, he said to keep all the receipts and that he'd reimburse me at the end of the trip, back in Arusha. Guess who didn't show up ? He was stopped at the Kenyan border ( he said ) ?!?!
I later on emailed all the receipts to Damian, and he replied me every two weeks, that the refund will be done.
Guess what ? Nothing of all this happened of course !
When asking Mr Issa and Mrs Evangelina some explanations about this trip, no reply came.
They obviously are only after your money. They do not care about customer service at all. They only cheat, lie and mislead you !
Hopefully this will help you to have a wonderfull safari, as Tanzania is amazing !
IT
35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Didn't get what I paid for!
I have booked a three days and two nights private safari to Amboseli National Park.
On our way to Amboseli the car broke down (I understand it happens). We waited for a taxi to take us to the park and then we finally joined a couple who was on a private safari and not so happy to have other people joining their safari.
For me it was my first safari and I ended up seeing a lot of wildlife and the car wasn't even stopping or explaining anything (it wasn't my safari of course).
The next day I had my own plan but since I had no car and no guide (that I very much paid for). I joined the same couple again and I had to comply with their plan. At 8am on the second day I returned to the hotel after a morning drive and until 5pm I had nothing to do! This day I wanted to do a full day game drive but again, no car and no guide and most of all no words from Michael. He didn't try to call me even once (despite he had my kenyan number or he could have contacted the hotel). I wasted a whole day and no apologies were presented nor different activities were planned for me. Simply nothing, just abandoned.
At 5pm Joseph the guide finally arrives after fixing the car and took me on a game drive (1 hour). The drive was awful as we only had 1 hour before the park closed. So we couldn't go deep inside the park.
On our last day we had finally one proper game drive (one out of the 4 we paid for).
Again we contacted Michael and tried to get him to meet us in Nairobi. He agreed and then once in nairobi, of course he was not available.
He apologized over the phone but I wanted a partial refund. I paid a very expensive private safari with a private guide. I didn't get what I paid for at all and then he tried to talk about religion and making excuses.
They don't don't how to deal with customers and I practically paid $540 for a 3 days private safari with 4 game drives (I got one real game drive). As my first safari experience it was awful and it was disrespectful to be treated this way.
SG
35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Not trustworthy!
Bad! Poor execution and under-delivery of what has been agreed and paid for are my two biggest pain-points with Tomodachi. Even if the company had provided as advertised, I would still not recommend it due to poor overall service (last-minute arrangement and changes), lack of tour briefing (we have to ask what's going on all the time) and the tour guides are not helpful. The Managing Director is Joseph Mwema, and co-partner: Jasper Kishari.
PT
Company not good
Dont recomend this company.
They give diferent from wath they sell in the ofice. We pay for 3 days safari and day give 2 days only, thay say yhe 3 day is to return in Arusha web the distancie is 2 hours.
They ate nor correct to in the hotel day sai, wen we bay they day we sleep in lodge in ngorongoro caráter but we sleep in camping.
If you book with them tell to right everithing in the recipt because after they tell we are nor correct.
MX
35-50 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Scam Tour Operator (works close with Arusha Police Department)
My wife and I were booked a 5 day Safari Tour with Felix Kisamo (owner of Unison Safari) from January 1 2017 to January 6 2017.
To everyone reading this reviews "Do not book Unison Safaris" for any reason, is a dangerous tour company runned by a man called Felix Kisamo who works close with the local police department of Arusha to get away with his scams.
He will offer very good prices and promise you the time of your life but once you book with him he starts a "game" of lies asking always for more money.
We were scared for our lives as he picked us up from the airport (he didn't had money even to pay for the gasoline of the car he was driving us with) he told us he had lost all of our money because he kept it at his office which he said was robbed, we demanded him to go straight to the police and the detained him and explained that he has been doing this type of scams for quite some time (the police told us he was not robbed) and that he is full of personal debts and is spending the turists money who book with him to pay them but by doing so he doesn't fulfill what he agrees with tourist as a tour operator (accomodation, guided, park fees, etc.). We spend a whole day at the police station as they tried to make him pay us all the money we had previously paid him (around $3,500 USD) and were only able to get $1,000 USD out of him (after he went with family members collecting money to pay us back), so we had to book with another tour operator having lost $2,500 USD.
We have nothing to gain by writing this other than helping future tourists from being scammed by Mr. Felix, we were also told that many positive reviews you see of him are part of the "scam" as he arranges with people to write them for him to lure more tourist to his scams.
50-65 years of age | Experience level: over 5 safaris
Theives
Do not under any circumstances book with these people. We have been waiting for almost 2 years for compensation......$6000 !!!!!!
35-50 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Was not warned about the terrible road to the Outpost
My car was a two-wheel drive Jag and it took a lot of damage on the rough 4x4 road to the Outpost and I now have to pay almost R20,000 to get it repaired. These costs would have been avoided if I was warned not to attempt to take this road with a normal vehicle but rather to leave the car at Pafuri Gate and get picked up by one of the lodge's vehicles.
20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Can't be trusted. Kenneth Karuhanga is a fraud.
Four months ago we reached out to Ken for a proposal to organize our trip to Tanzania. He is based in Uganda but is also listed as leading tours in Tanzania on your website, and his proposed itinerary and reviews made him seem like a good fit. He said he would be the guide for both our six-day ascent of Kilimanjaro and our five-day safari from Moshi. He asked for a $1000 deposit to cover national park fees and staffing costs, which seemed fair.
One week before the trip Ken told us he needed more money since it was the holiday season and costs were higher. We felt it was unfair to change the budget right before we started traveling, but agreed to move forward with the trip as planned and to pay the extra sum when we arrived.
When we arrived in Moshi and expected to meet Ken, we instead met a woman named Neema Mushi who runs an agency called Licious Travel Adventures (also on your site). She explained that Ken was not coming to Tanzania at all, that her price of the trip was under budget and that Ken had not forwarded any of the deposit money we had sent him.
We spent many evenings frantically trying to reach Ken and recover the deposit money to run our trip as planned, but Ken said he had needed the money for "another project" and couldn't send it right now. He finally sent $175 to Neema, but that didn't cover half of the new price increases she insisted on.
Possibly worst of all we learned that Ken had been pushing Neema lower and lower on her price, while asking us for more and more money. When we asked him what he felt he did to deserve the $825 cut he took for himself, he said something about booking the one hotel we stayed in during our trip.
Our experience with Ken was one of: 1) misleading us to believe that he would be leading the trip; 2) never once mentioning he was reselling our trip to an extreme budget agency; 3) lies about early cost increases of the trip and sticking us with the bill of the actual increases; 4) theft of our deposit money (he still refuses to return it)
20-35 years of age | Experience level: 2-5 safaris
Rude and disinterested tour-guide - don't book with SafariBook Evolution
Myself and my husband have recently returned from a 3 day safari with SafariBook Evolution in Kenya through the Masai Mara to finish off our 4 months spent travelling in Africa. Having spent a lot of time looking on TripAdvisor prior to selecting our company we decided choose SafariBook Evolution due to their cheap prices and despite their occasional dubious reviews however unfortunately this was a bad decision! Our trip was extremely disappointing and we would advise spending a few more dollars and going with a more trust-worthy company.
Our guide was disinterested, extremely rude and spoke limited English. He didn’t talk to the group and spoke about us rudely to other tour company guides. He needed to be pushed to go into the park and was reluctant to do so, cutting our time inside the park short on all occasions.
With regards to the campsite; it was a tented site however was extremely basic; the tents had holes in them, the zips didn’t work, the mosquito nets were dirty and holed, there was limited hot water and no wi-fi despite this being promised.
Alongside this, and probably our most alarming concern was that our guide had a complete disregard of park rules. He frequently drove off the park tracks, towards animals often causing them to run away in fear much to our surprise. This is obviously wholly inappropriate, not only for the obvious harm it causes animals but also for the future conservation of the park and its tracks.
We have been in back and forth emails with the owner Steve however this has been a fruitless task. We would strongly advise spending a few more dollars and going with a company that is much more trust-worthy. Don’t book with Safaribook Evolution!
35-50 years of age | Experience level: first safari
Ripped off by driver!!! Avoid this company!!!
My wife and I went on a safari with Safari Care Ltd several years ago. We had a good experience. The safari was enjoyable and I would definitely recommend that everyone visit this part of the world at some point. However, we had a terrible experience with our driver (a man named Mollel Martin Nguma) and the company after we returned returned home. A couple months after got back, the driver reached out via email to ask if we could extend him a small loan so that he could purchase a truck and start his own safari business. We obliged since he seemed like a hard working individual who did not have a lot of opportunities in Tanzania. But when the loan came due, the driver claimed that he had been the victim of identity fraud. We were initially open to the possibility. But it soon became apparent that his story was all a thinly veiled ruse designed to cover his tracks. In the end, we didn't lose a lot of money. But we were very disappointed with the way that Safari Care handled the matter. It wasn't their problem, they didn't care and this individual is still driving for them. A real company would make sure these sort of things don't happen. Go elsewhere and avoid the headache.