Flash Safaris Review

by Jan van Drooge
(Amsterdam, the Netherlands)

Group: Jaarclub Crenshaw, Utrecht

The highlight of the trip must have been the party with local people on a deserted spot at Zanzibar (of course, there was someone of the lodge who was guiding us. Don't do it alone...)

Safari Company Performance

Magda and Felix of Flash Safaris and Photography Ltd are wonderful people who live for the work they love to do.

Always up to date, flexible, friendly and above all: not too expensive! (we Dutch like that!).

The crew is more than friendly, always good for a joke or a nice story!

Accommodation and Food

We stayed at:

Karama Tented Lodge, Arusha.
Rhotia Valley Lodge, near Manyara.
Tarangire River camp, Tarangire NP.
Shooting Star Lodge (East Coast Zanzibar).

All very well, but Rhotia Valley Lodge was the best!

We always ate "local food" and sometimes even traditional dishes.

Breakfast means a lot of fruit and always some kind of eggs. Lunch boxes are superb (roast chicken, egg, a bag of chips - nice!). Dinners are perfect: always beef, chicken or fish. And sometimes even traditional dishes!

No Haute Cuisine, but tasteful and nutritious!

Safari and Activities

A typical day would be something like this: wake up - always too early. Breakfast with the group. Last stories about last night ("who was the last one to put the lights out?"). Briefing - what's the plan for today. First Safari. Lunch round noon (nice!!!!). Second Safari. Back to the lodge, beer, beer, beer. Shower. Making ready for dinner. Beer round a fire. Round midnight to bed. Setting the clock for 6 a.m...

The wildlife: we saw it all. Too much to mention.

We visited a orphanage home for children whose parents died of AIDS (next to Rhotia Lodge!), we visited a small village with original inhabitants, dove and fished in Zanzibar, made a sailing trip with a dhow, did some partying with local people (great!)

Tips and Advice

Travelling with a group of diverse people, who are used to some kind of luxury... 4 or 5 days safari is more than enough. After that time all wildlife looks the same, every Baobab is just another tree and every road seems longer and longer.

OH! And.. do visit Zanzibar as last!!!

My most useful items? I can give you a political answer: the splitter I used to recharge all my electronic equipment in one time. The less political answer must be my bottle of Whisky, when we ran out of cold beers in the night!!!

Rating

9 out of 10 - there is always room for improvement. And you always want to dream about a day you have that 10!

There was nothing at all to disappoint us!!! (although, sometimes there was not enough cold beer ;-)

Jan and the Jaarclub's Safari Details:

Rating: 9/10

Safari company used: Flash Safaris and Photography Ltd. (make an enquiry)

Parks visited: Arusha NP, Tarangire NP, Ngorongoro Crater, Lake Manyara NP, Zanzibar (east coast) - Tanzania

Date of safari: 9 October for 12 days

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Comments for Flash Safaris Review

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Oct 15, 2012

Flash Safaris are fantastic!
by: Roisin

We traveled with Flash Safari's last May and it was an unforgettable experience! When I started researching the trip i contacted about 30 of the tour operators, I kept going back with more questions as a process of elimination (some were very rude) but Magda came back to all of my questions in a prompt and professional manner every single time.

She give us wonderful advice on where to go, where to stay and what to expect and was absolutely brilliant to deal with. I cannot recommend her enough! When we arrived we were met a representative from Flash at the airport and transferred to our first hotel. Arriving to meet somebody so friendly on our first trip to Africa was fantastic.

Over a week we visited Arusha NP, Lake Manyara, Serengeti & Ngorongoro crater. Our guide was wonderful. He realised on day 1 that being Irish we loved tea so he always had as many cups of tea as we liked for our lunch everyday!! Looking around we quickly realised that other tour groups were just handed their lunch boxes, we on the other hand had a beautiful table cloth, a flask of hot water for our tea, glass cups and our guide always had lunch with us which was so nice as we really got to know him! When in the jeep if I even went to take a photo he would offer to stop straight away and he gave us as much time as we wanted everytime we saw an animal.

He also had an unbelievable eye for spotting the animals, probably his 25 years of experience, the first number of years which he spent as a ranger in the Serengeti national park. When we met other jeeps you could hear the radio screaming where to go next but we didn't even have a radio, our guide just knew exactly where to go which meant we saw everything including 2 black rhinos, 2 leopards and much much more! We stayed in the Serena lodges which were fantastic.

If anyone has any questions about booking with flash I would love to share our experience with you.

Roisin

Aug 23, 2011

Wonderful vacation for mother and daughter
by: Barbara Thompson

On July 9, 2011, my daughter and myself landed at Kilimanjaro Airport. It was the middle of the night. But we were picked up by Good Luck of Flash Safaris. He took us to Magda's home and we spend the night in her guest house. The next morning they fixed us breakfast and took us to the Ilboru Safari Lodge. And for the next 18 days we had the trip of our lives. We were taken on a 7 day safari. With a TERRIFIC Guide by the name of Steve. He was very knowledgable young man. And a pleasure to be around. I am an elderly person and he made sure that both of us were comfortable at all times. We toured Manyara National Park, Serengeti, Ngorongoro Conservation Area and Tarangire National Park. We saw all of the Big Five plus sooo many more. We stayed 3 nights in tented lodges. What an experience We visited a Maasai village and saw inside one of their homes (sticks and cow dung). Visited their school and danced with them. After 7 days on Safari we met back up with Magda and Good Luck. Had dinner with them and some young people from the Netherlands at Magda's. Magda personally took us to an orphanage. We had brought 50 toothbrushes and we left them there. Our trip was planned to see wildlife and culture. So after 11 days of personal attention, Magda sends us off to Zanzibar. There we spend 2 days in Stonetown and two days in Fumba Lodge. WOW!! What a great time. Stonetown is a cross between African culture and Middle East culture. We had the BEST time of our lives on this vacation. The trip was strictly for my daughter and I. Even the safari was just the two of us and a guide. Magda knows how to personally design a very nice tour for 2 or 20. Good Luck, Edward and Steve were great drivers and answered so many of our questions. THANKS TO YOU ALL Barbara Thompson and Leslie Simmons from Oregon, USA

Mar 16, 2011

Wonderful vacation
by: Bart & Annelies

From 23/01/2011 until 10/02/2011

We had a great time with Magda and Felix, the accomodation is wonderful and the people are very friendly and helpful.

Our first park was Arusha NP with a walking safari, great park to begin our journey and the walking safari was very exciting.

The next 7 days we climbed the kilimanjaro using the Machame route, everything was perfectly arranged and it was a unique experience.

Then we began our safari visiting all the good parks: Manyara, Serengiti, Ngorongoro, Tarangire. Our safari was another 8 days and we saw the big five, the migration of the zebras and gnoes. The wildlife and nature are beautiful.

The tour and guide was perfect and we loved every second of it. The lodges are very nice and perfect for resting.

To sum up, it was everything and more we hoped for, we recommend it, you will feel the same.

Hope to see you soon someday.
Bart & Annelies

Jul 16, 2010

Perfect service
by: Mr Bastiaansen, The Netherlands

From 8-29 July 2009 I went to Manyara NP, Serengeti NP, Ngorongoro Crater, Lake Eyasi and Nungwi on Zanzibar with Flash Safaris whom I found on the internet. They were EXCELLENT!! Quick responses on requests, personal attention and care, flexibility, suggestions and advises were spot on! 10 out of 10.

Accommodation - Lake Eyasi: Migunga tented Lodge, Serengeti National Park: Ikoma Tented Lodge, Ngorongoro Crater: Karatu Bougainvillea Safari Lodge, Lake Eyasi: Tindiga Tented Lodge and Nungwi on Zanzibar: Mnarani Beach Hotel (these family rooms were a bit shabby and really could do with some re-decorating).

The food was very good, good range of choice also local food was fine. Normally we had an early breakfast, game drive with packed lunch along the way. Return to camp late afternoon, drinks, dinner and then an early night.

We saw a lot of wildlife, too many to mention e.g. 71 lions in total.

My advice to others are to remember binoculars, and be prepared that safaris are dusty and you get dirty.

Apr 17, 2009

Friendly
by: Peter and Melanie Castenmiller, The Netherlands

We went to Tarangire, Lake Manyara, Serengeti and Ngorongoro Crater with Flash Safaris (Arusha) on 10 February 2009 for 10 days. We heard about them from a friend in the Netherlands.

They are very friendly and hospitable. We stayed for several nights in their guesthouse and meet there other tourists. The guide was very friendly, patient and had much knowledge of the wildlife and the animals. There was nothing we didn't like about them.

Our accommodations were Tarangire Rivercamp (very nice tent and location); Lake Manyara Serena Lodge (we had no beautiful view on the ground-floor; nice swimming pool); Serengeti Serena Lodge (we had a beautiful view from the second floor); Kirawira Tented Lodge (a beautiful tent and view); Gibb's farm (very beautiful lodges) and Kisima Ngeda (very nice tent and location).

The food was good, and most of the time very good. We had liked to have more traditional food. We stand up early and were travelling the whole day through the park spotting animals. We have always a lunch with us from the lodge we have stayed the last night.

We have see al the wild animals, more than once, and very near. The highlight was the cheetah with her five kittens. We also visited several tribes - it was very interesting to meet the people and see how they live.

My advice to others would be to take less. Useful were the clothes protecting you from the sun and the mosquitoes / tsee-tsee fly.

Rating: 9/10 - everything was great, it was like a dream. We come back!

Apr 17, 2009

Saw the big five
by: Hans Hennus, Netherlands

We went on safari with Flash Safaris from 8-16 November 2008, to Arusha, Lake Manyara NP, Serengeti NP and Ngorongoro NP. The accommodations were Migunga Tented Lodge, Ikoma Tented Lodge, Ngorongoro Serena Lodge.

Their service by both staff and guide was outstanding, very personal.

The only thing that didn't meet our expectations were the lunchboxes (a box with chicken, carrot-roll), but I'm told they have been improved as our safari company wasn't happy either.

We saw the big five, baboons, warthogs, hyena's, culminating in a cheetah, catching a baby-impala. Apart from wildlife we also visited an orphanage, several boma's, Iraqwe-tribe which were highlights of our trip.

Go and enjoy!!!! And remember to pack a flash light.

Rating: 9/10

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