Reviews of safaris to Etosha National Park

"Unbelievable! Great trip - and good to go way we did - ie start with Bagatelle heading south and then west. In this way we appreciated what each place had to offer - in terms of location, animals, etc. If we had started at Okonjima - well - all others would not compare well.

The animals at Etosha would also overshadow the animals at the other lodges - eg tracking desert elephants at Doro Nawas was great - but if we had already seen the herd of 20 at the waterhole each night in Etosha - it would have lost some of the attraction and adventure. Each place was unique - so thank you - it was not like we were comparing one 5* place to another one...
Animals were sort of unque at each to a point eg loads of deer types at Bagatelle, Ostriches at Hoodia & the desert, desert elephants and Doro, all various things at Etendeka, everything at Etosha, chill out - dik diks, warhogs and snakes( !!) at Mushara and the cats at Okonjima.

Suggestions:
*Car - ours was not happy on the gravel roads and did not cope with the D road - better to have a larger, more suitable car. warn all re the dust - you could not see what colour the car was when we returned it.......or our clothes!!!
*Laundry : good to have every 5 days included in package. So dusty there - we collected loads and ended up hand washing through some things by day 11. But we were also in Jo'berg for 4 days before Namibia and cape Town 4 days after Namibia.
*If in one place for the night - maybe let us know their activity list so we can get to the place in time and not miss activities?

But - cannot fault you - truly brilliant holiday which we all loved!!

Marusha - hope you have a healthy baby girl now and many thanks for pulling this together for us,

thanks,

Lynne, Rob, Sam & Matt" Read full review: 15 nights in Africa; 15 on a Namibia trip

"It was a great holiday and very well put together. The properties we stayed at were all great and any questions we had were dealt with in a timely manner." Read full review: 19 nights in Africa; 14 on a Namibia trip

"This is our fourth visit to Namibia and the best yet. All people we met throughout our visit were extremely friendly and welcoming." Read full review: 15 nights in Africa; 13 on a Namibia trip

"A wonderful experience with wonderful memories.

Breathtaking from beginning to end, especially in terms of nature and wildlife but also very nice places to stay (mostly). The only 'down' side I can think of is the cost, as this was indeed by far the most expensive holiday we've ever booked... but no regrets! Next time I would however do the trip in the opposite direction (as was the plan originally -I know-, but couldn't be achieved because of booking restraints) and leave the highlights (etosha and okonjima) 'til the end.

Thanks for the good planning and organization and the help throughout!" Read full review: 12 nights in Africa; 12 on a Namibia trip

"A dream holiday. Would like to do revisit most of the places." Read full review: 22 nights in Africa; 16 on a Namibia trip

"Namibia. 14 days was the absolute minimum time for the trip- would have really liked a couple of extra days to reduce a bit of driving. (Our choice I know). We found all the places in Namibia delightful/interesting to stay in- all different but great fun with their own charms. THe roads overall are not bad- many are sealed with long, straight stretches. Many of the unsealed ones were fine too but there were three really bad ones-luckily not too long.Certainly wouldn't put us off returning for another visit.

The meet and greet Wilderness Safari team at Windhoek airport were very helpful, efficient and patient, and we appreciated their little lounge to use while waiting.

We did have a truly great memorable trip with too many highlights to single any out. Felt totally safe. The people are charming and the ethos about tourism is impressive.

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Cant comment on the brochure as dont think I ever saw one. Found the feedback form a bit tedious to fill in so hope it is helpful.

But we did have a really great trip and have been recommending Expert Africa to anyone interested in travel to Africa from New Zealand" Read full review: 24 nights in Africa; 14 on a Namibia trip

"We loved the people, landscapes and animal viewing, every Namibian we met were absolutely lovely, it is a wonderful country, although we wish it wasn't quite so cold at night!" Read full review: 21 nights in Africa; 20 on a Namibia trip

"This was everything we could have hoped for and more.

Namibia is a very special place - vast, deserted, so varied in landscape, full of beautiful options.

At the end of our 17 days, our family of 5 adults each ran through their own highlight. We had 5 different versions such was the richness of this holiday.

Best one ever / Tanzania had topped the list before but Namibia offers so much more!

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Very satisfied with expert Africa and have already recommended." Read full review: 16 nights in Africa; 16 on a Namibia trip

"Amazing! Whilst we have travelled around the world, this was meant to be the trip of a lifetime and it was. It is a holiday we will long remember. We have always wanted to go on safari and see elephants, lions and other wildlife in their natural habitat, but it was also special in terms of the fantastic scenery, friendly people and some of the amazing places we stayed. A great way to mark a special birthday! Thank you." Read full review: 14 nights in Africa; 14 on a Namibia trip

"We spent 16 days in Namibia in June - July 2017. We had chosen Namibia because the £/ rand exchange rate was attractive whereas other countries quoted holidays in US $s which made them more expensive. Also the country was a good and safe one for self-driving. I found the good, straight, empty roads a pleasure to drive on compared with UK. We stayed in 10 different locations during our trip and three places stood out so far as bird and animal sighting was concerned: Okauhuejo, Nkasa Lupala and Ndhovu. Why?

The Okaukuejo water-hole provides a magnificent arena from which to view birds and animals. The floodlit night viewing of two male rhinos fighting was something I never thought to see and will treasure for the rest of my life. In comparison some years ago I took two trips to Tanzania and they produced one distant viewing of a rhino. Sadly two have been killed in Etosha recently and one day there will be none. Okaukuejo Lodge itself is rightly very popular, big and busy. Checking in was slow as there were a number of people queuing ahead of me who thought they had reserved accommodation,but who discovered too late that their internet reservations had been ineffective. I was grateful to Wilderness Safaris that I had no such problems. The key is to posses a reservation number!

Nkasa Lupala on the River Kwando was interesting for the variety of birds and animals. It was here that we finally saw some lions. The night drives are also well worth doing. One night drive produced amongst other animals two civets; one wild cat, a porcupine and some spring hares. I was glad I hired hired a 4x4 because I was able to drive straight to this Lodge & this saved time, money and hassle. The route there is fairly well signed from Sangwali to Nkasa Lupala and takes about 35 minutes to drive. The lodge itself needed some TLC - not everything was working in our tent. Ndhovu has in Michael someone with the sharpest eyes on the River Kavango. We had three boat trips with him and each one was an adventure in to wild Africa. In addition the lodge is very efficiently run by Horst, Peter and Bola. It is within a 10 minute drive of the Mahango Game Park - the best place in this area to see birds and animals.

We also stayed at River Dance Lodge where the admirable owners have put huge amounts of effort in to the design and building of the lodge and also in to staff training. The results show. However the boatman on the river trip we took knew less about birds than myself and and the Mahango Game Reserve is just under an hour's drive from here. Ndhovu therefore offered better in my view. We spent one night at Taranga Safari Lodge on the way out of the Caprivi Strip. We would not stay there again - the sole attraction was the small bird viewing. Roy's Camp would have probably offered a more evenly spaced stopping place on the way back to Windhoek.

The Frans Indongo Lodge and Okonjima Camp are both very comfortable and well managed places and we admired the design of Frans Indongo in particular. However both these places have had animals imported and one has the sense that these are 'safari parks' rather than the real Africa. This may appeal to many but the slightly canned effect was not quite what we wanted.

At the start of the trip we had stayed at the Hilltop Guest House in Windhoek. This took some finding and I was grateful I had bought a map map of Windhoek to help us do this. Once we were there we were very well cared for and the owner gave us the good advice to dine at the Social. We had an excellent meal there.Also we were grateful we did not have to drive far that first day since we had not slept much on the overnight flight from London. We stocked up on lunch type food and water at the Eros Centre below the Guest House before leaving Windhoek next morning.

We were supposed to be met by Wilderness Tours on our arrival at Windhoek Airport but found no one. However we spotted a Wilderness lounge in Arrivals and someone inside. He proved to be a great help. We were able to buy a mobile chip from the MTC rep at the airport for £3 for 150 minutes. Expert Africa had arranged for us to hire a 4x4 from Bidvest. However without the help of Wilderness tours we would have struggled to take over the vehicle as the Bidvest man did not appear to know much about the vehicle. It was a very basic Ford 4x4. Nevertheless it served us well although its gear-box was a bit like stirring porridge. Also I forgot to ask the size of the fuel tanks and the hand-book surprisingly did not not reveal this information!

Later I reckoned it was about 100 liters and the fuel gauge appeared to report the combined usage rather than just the second tank! The return of the car posed no problems and Bidvest were happy to sign Expert Africa's form at the back of their hand-book.

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No comments - but many thanks for arranging an excellent trip with no problems! Quite an achievement." Read full review: 15 nights in Africa; 15 on a Namibia trip