Ngorongoro Crater

Hi Edward,

We both agreed that we had to write to you and let you know just how great our trip was!

Echo Beach hotel was fantastic. The owners and all the staff made us feel very welcome and it was the perfect hotel for us. Small, quiet, on the beach, fantastic food, clean rooms and great service. They were extremely helpful in organising trips for us and in particular the diving was very good. We are both keen scuba divers and so having an instructor on-site was really helpful. We did dives from the hotel in their own dive boat as well as a trip to the other side of the island organised and led by the Echo Beach instructor and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.The hotel even managed to organise for me to watch England play in the world cup at a nearby bar!

Next came the Safari in the south (Ngorongoro Crater & Lake Manyara). This was our first safari and so both of these experiences were amazing to us (despite being warned that these areas are closer to zoos than Safaris). A private jeep was definitely worth-while so thanks for the advice with regard to that. Plantation Lodge was lovely too: beautiful rooms, more great food and very helpful staff.

The grand finale was of course the trip to the Northern Serengeti and to Alex Walker’s Serian camp. This was definitely one of if not the best wildlife experiences we’ve ever had on our travels (and having backpacked all over the world – including places such as the Amazon and the Galapagos, hopefully this is saying a lot). The camp is extremely well organised with fancy plumbed “tents”, great food and great service. However, the real reason this camp is so great is of course Alex himself. As well as making every evening meal memorable with his stories and general wildlife knowledge, he clearly cares a great deal about the experience that every one of his guests has. He works as hard as he can with your guides (who are also excellent) to get you to the right places at the right times and to make sure you are enjoying yourself. Consequently, we got to see all of the big five within about 10m from our car. An intimidating site when one of those big five is a massive Rhino.
Of course, ticking off the big five wasn’t even the biggest highlight wildlife-wise – that had to be being in the middle of The Great Migration – and again we have you to thank for convincing us that this was the best idea for us and the best use of our money. I think in fact, our only negative point for the entire trip would be that we wanted more time at this camp. It was that good and every
extra day is definitely worth it.

So, finally, we can fully recommend everything that you organised for us on the trip. Every hotel, trip and even connections were perfect.

And of course that means that we can fully recommend yourself also. Being backpackers and used to organising our own trips, we weren’t really sure what to expect. We are so used to having to sort out
transport and connections ourselves that we found it hard to believe it could all work so smoothly; which it definitely did. Our stay at the Serian camp convinced us we have to return to it when it moves
South and so we will no doubt be requiring your services again in the
future.

Many thanks for all your help and advice and for booking us a fantastic and memorable honeymoon.
J Collis 2011

Hi Julian,

Our trip was amazing!  You would have heard from me sooner, but we were hit by Hurricane Irene the day after we landed and haven’t had electricity for 6 days as a result.  We just got our electricity back last night.  Our return to Connecticut wasn’t much different from Africa!  Good thing we were already used to it!  We loved our trip.  Your advice and recommendations were so fantastic.  I cannot thank you enough!  I wouldn’t change a thing about it.  I can’t wait to plan our next one with you!

The accommodations at both of those places were fantastic.  Our rooms at Borana were above and beyond our expectations just given the size of the rooms, how nice the rooms and bathrooms were, the lovely fires that were lit in each of our rooms every night and then connecting our room with our daughters’ room was an outdoor living room area with a large comfortable couch, great chairs and a fire pit that they also lit for us every night.  The view from the living room and our rooms was the watering hole down below where baboons, elephants, giraffes and lions drank.  After dinner (which was always an incredible experience with superb hosting by Sam and Flick) we would then go to our own “living room” with my parents and daughters and play charades or just hang out.

There was a bar in the living room that was well stocked with things for everyone.  Borana was probably everyone’s favorite, which is saying a lot given that the other places were fantastic.  Ngare Serian was definitely a close second.  The tents and the dining tent were beautiful.  Adrian, Rogine, Joel and all of the others there were so great.  The best game viewing was clearly from Rekero, and their location probably can’t be beat.  All in all, if we were to go back again, we would probably repeat the whole experience just as it was laid out.

Oh, and another enormous highlight to our trip (actually there were quite a few – the Serian entertainment being way up there on that list too) was Giraffe Manor.  I know you thinks it’s a gimmick, but it was also probably one of our most favorite stops – especially for Anna and Lily (and my mom).  That was an absolute highlight and a good way to end the trip.  The Manor is stunning, the food was out of this world and I would call it a must stop if one is going through Kenya (especially with children.)  It probably meant more to me as well because I read the book “Raising Daisy Rothschild.”  It was really expensive, but totally worth it.  My mom wants to go back to Kenya just to go there.  We really loved it.

I’m trying to decide if our next safari will be in South Africa, Botswana or Tanzania……?

Best regards,

K Hooker 2011