Zambia: reviews from our travellers

"This is our fourth trip to Zambia staying at Robin Pope camps and the experience just keeps on getting better & better! Everything ran smoothly from the moment I contacted Freddie to our return flight home. (Even the Emirates emergency cancellation was well managed). The Tour Africa staff at Lusaka airport were there waiting for us at the beginning of our trip and available to help when we flew home. They provided a great service.

The staff at Robin Pope Safaris are fantastic - they looked after us so well. I only hope that the new owners fully appreciate what a good job they are all doing and that they are able to retain such experienced and professional staff. We hope to return next year.

Thank you Expert Africa for making it all possible.

Suggestions to help us improve our trips or our service:

A full set of wildlife guide books would be useful at Nkwali - there are a few - but birds, insects and reptiles were missing." Read full review: 15 nights in Africa; 13 on a Zambia safari

"Great trip, everything went so well. No glitches.

The connections and transfers were all seamless. Chobe River crossings between Zambia and Botswana was easy.

Suggestions to help us improve our trips or our service:

We are so impressed with the trip Lucy put together for us. Even though we just saw a small corner of Africa it was truely amazing.

Lucy really listened to what we wanted to do and made it all happen" Read full review: 6 nights in Africa; 3 on a Botswana safari

"Expert Africa does it again! Claire is fantastic about listening to what you want and delivering. Our trip went smoothly.

The only complaint is that I never feel it is long enough--I could happily spent a month in the bush. I loved 4 nights at each camp. Shorter stays means that you are constantly packing and moving. The next trip I will look at hiring private air charters rather than using commercial flights between safari camps -- for the extra cost, I think it would be worthwhile.

Freddie Sutton took over during Claire's absence and did a fine job getting all the information to us.

Suggestions to help us improve our trips or our service:

keep doing what you are doing!" Read full review: 18 nights in Africa; 10 on a Zambia safari

"Megan arranged a wonderful safari for us in Botswana. She listened carefully to our needs and hopes. With her first hand experience of the country she put to a most enjoyable programme with a variety of camps. She was very friendly and extremely efficient replying speedily to our emails.

From our arrival in Maul tour departure from Livingstone the package, including all Border crossings, flowed seamlessly and without difficulty. The various guides who met us organised tickets and visas speedily.

With hindsight two camps were close together but we appreciate that availability and distance may have been a limiting factor. A camp further up into the the delta would have allowed us to compare the wet areas with the dry areas.

In short a great experience. Thank you." Read full review: 12 nights in Africa; 10 on a Botswana safari

"Overall we had a fantastic time once again in Zambia. It is a truly beautiful country.

There is so much to see, experience and do, we can't wait to return.

Suggestions to help us improve our trips or our service:

Expert Africa always provide us with an excellent service. We appreciate the effort that goes into making our trips so special.

Amanda Bond was extremely helpful and efficient and all our travel arrangements worked like clock work." Read full review: 15 nights in Africa; 13 on a Zambia safari

"6 days on the Zambezi and in South Luangwa were among the most enjoyable and memorable of my lifetime.

I cannot wait to go back!" Read full review: 6 nights in Africa; 6 on a Zambia safari

"I bought this trip for my wife's 60th birthday and it was an inspired choice. We usually back-pack so this was exceptionally easy - especially the transfer at the Botswana - Zambia border. Note that the driver told me that I couldn't get a KAZA visa at this border crossing, mentioned in the very good Bradt guide you provided. This was not correct and we were issued one when I enquired. Great choice of lodgings and really loved Okajima, River Dance and Garden Lodge.

Josh clearly explained to me the type of trip we were booked on, particularly that we were not including some of the major game parks, so we were very clear on what we would be experiencing and he sent me a new map free of charge when we found a minor mistake on the first one.

I'm impressed with the service by both Expert Africa and your local agents. Your instructions/information are excellent.

Minor points are raised where applicable in the accommodation reviews, but they in no way spoilt our trip.

Suggestions to help us improve our trips or our service:

Other than the points raised above, no." Read full review: 14 nights in Africa; 8 on a Namibia trip

"Well planned and good preliminaries by Lucy Copson..
We have already recommended you!!!!" Read full review: 12 nights in Africa; 6 on a Botswana safari

"Our trip was fantastic. We spent 10 days in all in Zambia, with a day visit to Botswana. In that time we stayed at 3 lodges, visited the falls, did a helicopter ride, the zipline, the train museum, a rhino walk, Mosi-oa-Tunya park, Chobe park, boat trips and nature walks. Although we did a lot, we also had a lot of time to relax so felt recharged by the end of the trip.

The selection of lodges we stayed at were excellent with outstanding service and hospitality. Nothing was too much trouble.

When we did have a hiccup with a trip to Chobe (the transfer vehicle car broke down so was late and we didn't know we needed children's birth certificates to enter Botswana), Amanda at Expert Africa worked tirelessly to resolve the problems to the best of her ability outside of office hours. She responded instantly to my emails and called me to talk through our options.

We enjoyed every minute of our trip and really recommend Zambia as a great holiday destination for adventurers and families.



Our Response:

We were very sorry to hear of the issue with this traveller’s day trip to Chobe National Park – and were grateful to Waterberry for their assistance in rearranging the trip to Chobe after an initial problem when the driver broke down.

When we offer trips to Botswana we advise of the situation with minors entering the country, but as this trip entered from Zambia this was missed, and we’re sorry for the inconvenience caused to these travellers. We have now updated our Zambia literature to advise any travellers crossing over the border into Botswana to be aware of the current visa requirements when travelling with children. We were happy to offer recompense to the family for the inconvenience by way of covering the costs for some extra activities whilst they were in Livingstone.

Issues like this happen rarely, but when they do, it’s important to us to make sure that the impact to travellers’ trips is as minimal as possible, whether this is within or outside of office hours. We do appreciate the feedback from this family, and are glad that the rest of their trip was such an enjoyable experience." Read full review: 10 nights in Africa; 7 on a Zambia safari

"This was my first visit to South Luangwa in the green season after many visits in the dry, and I didn't quite know what to expect from the game viewing. The cats were thin on the ground compared to dry season, but the superb wild dog sightings more than compensated for this. There was plenty of other game to be seen too, with just as many elephants, puku and impala as usual. Giraffe and kudu were far fewer than usual as apparently they don't like the boggy conditions so head for drier ground, although we were seeing more giraffe towards the end of the trip as conditions got drier.

The birding too was excellent, and interesting to see all the migrants and birds in their breeding plumage.

It was amazing to see the change in the landscape and this was most apparent from the trip up to Nsefu and travelling along the river by boat.

Robin Pope Safaris continue to impress with their levels of service with a very flexible approach to make sure every guest is happy. I was given a vehicle to myself most of the time and my guide was more than happy to be flexible about game drive timings." Read full review: 15 nights in Africa; 13 on a Zambia safari