Africa Adventure Company
 

Hi - my sister and I are planning a trip to Tanzania/Kenya in September/October of 2008 and are considering using Africa Adventure Company (Mark Nolting). Any comments or advice?

This will be our first trip to Africa and we want it to be done right.

thanks in advance, Ginger

I can tell you in less than a month. I leave a week from Friday. But, from a planning perspective, I had a great experience with Kyle. We changed our itinerary endless times and he was always patient and understanding.

I am a newbie here (first safari coming up in October), but AAC has been mentioned many times here and always seems to be well recommended. Mark Nolting wrote a book ("Africa's Top Wildlife Countries" -- I got my copy at Barnes & Noble) which was my first source of inspiration and information for planning a safari (before I discovered this forum).

We also will be leaving the end of August on a safari planned by AAC...have worked extensively with Saskia/Andre and have been quite pleased with what the have done for us. Will be glad to post comments upon our return. Bob

Conde Nast travel magazine just named AAC one of the best travel agents to use for African vacation. I have no personal experience, but I just read it in the latest issue. I would think that should make you feel better.

We also used AAC for our June 2007 trip to Namibia, Botswana and Vic Falls. We used Melissa and she was very helpful. We really designed a custom trip because I was pretty specific about what I wanted to do and see and they were more than helpful.
Kim

Does anyone know how AAC's prices compare to booking the same itinerary directly thru a local Kenya or Tz operator?

Anyone know who they use as a ground operator in Tz?

Bill

I got a quote from AAC for my trip to Tanzania in March 2008 and they were a lot higher than the quotes from 3 other companies, one from the US and the other two from Tanzania. I booked with Green Footprint, a local operator based in Arusha.

Bill, we are in Canada and did not book through Africa Adventure Company, but we had read "dayoung"'s trip report from Tanzania in Feb. of 2006, where she raved about her guide booked through AAC. We used this same guide for our safari this past February, as both AAC and Great Canadian travel use Rangers as an outfitter. I don't know if AAC uses Rangers exclusively or not, but according to Deb they do have access to 8 or so highly experienced, senior Rangers guides, apparently hand-picked by AAC. Thanks to Deb's recommendation of her guide, we were able to request him through Great Canadian and he is one absolutely fabulous driver/guide! Was the head ranger at CCAfrica but moved to Arusha where his family lives. If the other AAC guides are half as expert as he was (we're already planning a second safari with him) we would be more than satisfied. He was knowledgable in anthropology, geology, archaeology, is an expert tracker, superb driver and, to our delight, a phenomenal birder!
Rangers treated us like royalty from beginning to end, the ground staff were amazing, Mkenda always drives a brand new extended Landcruiser (picnic table and chairs in the back, electric cooler for drinks and snacks), there was extensive followup by Rangers when the safari was over. When I fell ill they went above and beyond the call of duty to assist us in every way. Haven't posted our trip report yet... my husband says it was too perfect and nobody would believe us!

Bill,
My first trip to Tanzania was priced mid. price as compared to a few others.

They used Tanzania photo safari co. which if booked directly is a bit higher. We had a top notch guide and received great in country service.

AAC, however, does have a few problems with customer relations. They're a very large co. and seem to get their wires crossed on occasion. A few (no names mentioned, seem to get testy when one is trying to get answers)

I tried 2x to get a quote for my upcoming Bots.,Zimb. trip and they came in very high. Also, and quite annoyingly, they kept trying to give me something other than what I had requested.

I had to hound them to get a quote. They truly are crossed off my list.

Wow, that sucks, that was the opposite of my experience. They got me the quote quickly and reworked it countless times as I changed my mind. And since we booked our trip, I've called several times with questions or tweaks and Kyle has continued to be wonderful, always coming back with an answer within 24-48 hours - expected because of the time change.

Hi, I got back in June from Tanzania using AAC and we had a great time. Also our first trip to africa. You may email me directly for any specifics
[email protected] but I can say they were experts and very professional working with Ranger Safaris. You might be able to cut them out and go directly to Ranger Safaris. I'd be curious to know the cost. We were well taken care of and received the complimentary bag and hat for our money. It wasn't cheap but on par with other companies. We did do our air elsewhere and it was $800 less than what AAC offered. I viewed the Ranger Safaris (ground operator) site and saw that they represent 90% of camps in which we stayed so you might be able to pay less that way. The real challenge is going to the right area for your time off in order to catch the animals. AAC really nailed this for us with exception of Tarangire. Still, I wouldn't complain.

Did not use ACC but went through Eastern-Southern Safaris. Our safari went off without any problems and the cost was a bit cheaper than other tour companies. They are housed in Niarobi and if you let the company know your budget they will arrange all your accomodations based upon that budget. If interested, let me know and I can give you more information. One suggestion...pay a little extra and book a private safari for just you and your sister. You will be happy that you did.

We returned last night from a two week trip to Tanzania which was booked through African Adventure Company (Louise). Everything was handled expertly except the booking information (our paperwork) for our flight home did not match what was in the computer at the airport. Everything worked out fine (actually, slightly better than anticipated) but it kind of threw us for a loop to know it had been changed at some point (?) without our knowledge... Anyway, I will post our trip report soon. AAC does use Ranger Safaris exclusively, I believe, and we had a FANTASTIC guide/driver named Ephata. I saw many other operators while on safari and heard generally positive things about them except for Roy's.

Sactomama...there's another thread AAC vs. Roys. You might want to post what you heard.

Ginger....Ruth and I just returned from a 26 day trip through Kenya, Tanzania and Rwanda...the Kenya and Tanzania portion were arranged through AAC. We worked with Saskia and Andre. We were exceptionally pleased with the way all of the arrangements went and had no problems during any of the pre-planning portion of the trip. We were also very happy that we did the Kenya portion by flying from camp to camp. Our guide in Tanzania from Ranger Safaris was Omar Seif and he could not have been better...we were with him for 8 days and never once had a problem. Our vehicle was taken care of in an excellent manner, he was exceptionally knowledgeable, spoke wonderful English and truly was one of the highlights of our trip. I highly recommend the two of you doing this by yourselves as we felt we had much more flexibility than some of the other travelers we met. And by the way although we religiously took our Malaria pills we had no problem whatsoever with mosquitos. In regards to wearing dark blues...we saw many people who were wearing dark blue clothes and they were not bothered in the least by Tse Tse flies. Maybe it was just the time of the year that we went but I wouldn't be too concerned about this. Most of the lodges did provide mosquito repellent and we took a couple of bottles which we rarely used. Two of the camps we stayed at were Little Gov. and Tortillas..both were incredible and should not be missed. We now have many many pictures to edit and will try and get some of the better ones posted as soon as possible. If anyone reading this is interested in the Gorilla portion of our trip I would be more than glad to cover that in a seperate note. Good luck to you on your trip it will be somethng you will never forget. Bob

BYoung4u2,

Please expound on the gorillas. You may want to start your whole report in a separate thread. Who was the ground operator for the gorillas? Welcome back. 26 days is a nice long time and for the wonderful places you visited.

Hi Atravelynn...Yes we had a wonderful trip. In regards to our 5 day Gorilla Trek we booked it through Nyagah Mbae R&N Xplorer [email protected])
located in Kenya. The cost for each of us was $2116.00 and included pick up at Kigali, transport to Gorilla Nest hotel where we stayed for 3 nights, 2 gorilla treks and 1 Golden Monkey trek, several tours in the Ruhengeri area, return to Kigali and overnight at the Mille Collines Hotel and transport to the airport for our return to Nairobi. Our local guide company in Kigali was Mercator Assistance and our guide was named Mobuto. Although his English was limited he did take good care of us and one time had to arrange for a new vehicle as the one we originally had broke down. This was done very quickly and we lost very little time. While the Gorilla Nest is very basic it is close to the ranger station where the treks begin. Someone on this site had mentioned asking for an additional blanket when checking in which we were very glad we did. Our first trek actually ended up taking just over 7 hours!! and was mentioned several times the following day by any number of the guides as being one of the longest anyone had taken. We were tracking Group 13 and they just kept moving and we kept following them until we finally caught up with them about 2 pm. Anyway it was all worth it...there are 4 babies in the family and we watched them for actually over an hour climbing all over one another and the hugh Silverback who seemed to be just humoring them! Our Golden Monkey trek was much less strenuous and well worth the morning walk. Although I had heard some negative things about Mille Collines we were very impressed with the hotel and would certainly recommed it (Ruth says that after being out on the "road" for 22 days anything would have looked good). For anyone looking for information concerning the gorilla famalies I got some wonderful information from "safarimama" and would recommend her post "Gorilla Families Rwanda" as great reading. Hope this will be of some use for those planning such a trip....and good luck and happy trekking. Bob and Ruth

Thanks for the gorilla info, BYoung4U2! 7 hours is a long one! On a per hour basis, that makes your gorilla trip less expensive than most.

Lynn,

I could be wrong, but, i think AAC are associated with Peter Allison in some way? He is the one who wrote,"Whatever you do, don't run". His experiences from guiding for WS at Mombo in the early days ...

I could be wrong, though....

Hari