8-Day Private Luxury Wildebeest Migration Safari Tanzania

Selecting a tour company is a leap of faith: there are hundreds of them offering fairly similar options and the prices range from medium to expensive to exorbitant, how to chose one? Well, we made a list and chose African Polecats on a combination of previous reviews and a competitive offer. James was able to accommodate and provide a series of options in the days we wanted and arranged everything, so we went to Materuni, Safari in the Serengeti, Ngorogoro, trek to the base of the Kilimanjaro, Hunting with the Hadzabe, etc. 11 days in total. The day before the tours, we had a visit from the guides to brief us and recommend clothes or other practicalities (especially important to avoid colours that attract tse-tse flies, do not bring dark blue!). Guides. All our guides were very very good. They were knowledgeable, supportive, funny and very careful with our security. Special shoutout to William, our guide in the Serengeti and Ngorogoro. In some cases, local guides came with us like with the Hazdabe tribe. Mandela was very good and helped us to learn some of the words with clicks and whistles! We did a cycling tour in Mto wa Mbu, which is nice to see different things and an alternative to wildlife. The trek to the basecamp of kilimanjaro was very good, the visit to Materuni waterfalls was good. Wildlife: We managed to see all the animals you can think of (except rhinos or crocs): lions, zebras, hyenas, jackals, giraffes, elephants, wildebeest, gazelles, cheetahs, hippos, vultures and even a leopard (or the spots as it was hidden inside a tree). William knew each and everyone and was very knowledgeable about animal behaviour: he spotted a lion and lioness who were “in honeymoon”, he said, “the moment the female stands, start the video recording” and then, in front of our eyes, the action happened! We saw a pack of lions chasing a gazelle (who escaped) and saw the wildebeest migrating north (not in the Mara river so no crocodiles). Food. The food was amazing! I just do not know how our cook Victor managed to prepare such a high level food as we moved around the campsites. I mean the food was much better than the buffets of our hotel in Zanzibar. And it was always plenty. We saw other groups with lunch boxes with sandwiches. Not us, curries, roast chicken, warm desserts, you name it, delicious. Drinks. We were provided with water bottles, sodas, beer and wine to our hearts’ content along the tours. We were never in want of these. One thing that could be improved is to use re-usable water bottles and a large container to refill these. We saw other tours doing this. Over the 11 days of our tours we must have consumed around 200 water bottles. And whilst all effort is done to recycle them and we did not throw these away, along the roads you can see so many plastic bottles … Tanzania has banned plastic bags, a similar effort could follow to reduce the number of single use plastic water bottles and tour companies can start by using 20 litre containers to refill metal water bottles. Hotels and Campsites. The hotels and campsites were good (Malkia Trees Lodge in Arusha, Fig Tree Lodge, Jungle Pearl, Africa Safari in Mto wa Mbu), and campsites in the Serengeti and Ngorogoro. The campsites are basic, but with showers and toilets that were cleaned mornings and evenings. We have reviewed these separately in case you are interested. One room for improvement would be that for some days the programme was too ambitious, there would be 3 activities and there was no time for all. All our days were packed and there would not have been enough hours to do all the things listed. But small things aside, we had a good time and would recommend African Polecats.