[vc_row css=”.vc_custom_1623927211024{padding-top: 5% !important;padding-bottom: 5% !important;}”][vc_column][vc_column_text]Friendly Adventure Safaris is a Tanzanian tour and travel company that specializes in organizing honeymoons, romantic getaways, student vacations and holidays, group safaris, family safaris, charity tours, big five safaris, mountaineering adventure, cultural escapade, and beach holidays. Safaris to the Masai Mara, Serengeti, Uganda, Rwanda, and Congo are also available.
With all of the fantastic safari activities and attractions in the East African area, you may combine numerous safari activities while riding in one of the top safari cars in the country.
Actually, we wouldn’t call ourselves tour companies in Tanzania if we didn’t support safaris in all of East Africa. So, in essence, we would describe ourselves as an all-around inbound destination management firm and tour operator in East Africa. Choosing many safari firms to manage different aspects of your vacation might be a pain at times, especially when it comes to coordination time during transfers. Because they already have your travel schedules, if you utilize a single travel agency, they can easily coordinate your transportation between places.
Our safari guides are not only informed, but also well-spoken, ethical, polite, and cautious.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]
Strongly reccommended on Trip Advisor
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Friendly Gorillas safaris was amazing. The Gorilla tour we had was amazing. Anthony was so prompt when it comes to reply to our inquiries. The selection of lodges and the... read more choice of vehicle was rather impressive.
The extra romantic relaxationin Lake Bunyonyi was the best that can ever happen.
tinnad2019
December 2, 2019
Anthony, the owner was very accommodating & communicative. Tonny was our guide for the 5 days journey- always make sure we were safe and had everything we needed before... read more beginning a new adventure-even when he was not the official guide (every primate excursion includes its own guide, such as a designated park ranger). Our most memorable excursions include chimpanzees and gorillas; we had an amazing and unforgettable time encountering these primates.
Every accommodation was comfortable with excellent service. Uganda has breathtaking landscapes and the nicest people. We had a wonderful trip and highly recommend this company!
LanRicJourneys
February 24, 2022
We hired the company for a 7 days and 6 nights tour in Uganda, including chimpanzees and gorilla tracking. The itinerary was agreed and confirmed by email the second week... read more of February. We paid a total of $6.820,40, canceling more than 40% by bank transfer on March 3rd. I can honestly affirm that it’s not worth doing business with Friendly Gorillas Safaris. I will only give three reasons that I hope will convince other travelers not to contact this company:
1. Permits for gorilla tracking were not acquired on time. A day before the tour started, we even received an itinerary and activities totally different to those agreed: different dates, different hotels and gorilla tracking planned for the day we were supposed to leave Uganda because the company “was not able to get permits for August 4th” (the date we agreed on March!). After complaining bitterly through WhatsApp, we received confirmation on the correct itinerary with gorilla tracking on the 4th. The first days of our tour, the company complied with the initial offer. However, the night before the 4th our guide informed that he got permits for the 6th and that the next day we will “go to Bwindi very early to try to convince the guard to allow us tracking gorillas”. Next morning was a nightmare: our guide trying “to convince the guard”, the rest of the groups excited to live a once in a lifetime experience (some even got the permits the day before!) and us hidden in a corner “so the guard doesn’t see us or raise suspicions”. When all the groups started to leave, our guide informed us that we were allowed to track on the 5th. Given that we had a very early flight the 6th, the gorilla activity was planned to end at 2pm and the travel from Bwindi to Entebbe takes more than 10 hours, we refused and asked our money back. Minutes later, the guide informs us that “the guard has allowed us to track today” but we need to pay $300 to a company that had free spots. Even though the company offered to pay this, the guide only had $100 and we put the remaining $200 (luckily, after the guide insinuated we was going to pay us back in Ugandan Schillings, we received our 200 USD minutes after taking our flight back home). At the end of the day, we were able to track gorillas as promised (we didn’t have time to hire a porter) but we couldn’t live the experience fully due to Friendly Gorillas lack of planning.
2. The company lacks a proper infrastructure. The owner seems to be an entrepreneur with multiple interests. He doesn’t have time to pay attention to the details a professional travel agency needs. Friendly Gorillas Safaris doesn’t even have its own guides: they hired as needed. This explains the last-minute arrangement of our tour (the first night, the hotel said there was no reservation under our name, or the company’s..... fortunately, they had a single room available, when we paid a double). When asked about the pending balance, they gave an incorrect amount and I needed to tell them it was actually more! The owner acts as “travel consultant” but he barely knows commuting times or proper hotels and need to ask to guides recognized by the governmental office.
3. Even though Friendly Gorillas Safaris apologized for their many mistakes (the guide was annoying, forcing us to take pictures of things we were not interested, dangerously stopping in the road, making us having matooke when we didn’t want to), it doesn’t compensate the terrible experience we had in Uganda. They offer a discount in future trips, as if we were interested in hiring them again! Apologizing and promising to be better next time is not enough for us. I advice other travelers to select another company to visit Uganda. And keep track on the different names they may used (verify that on their Facebook page).
Fabrizio_ec
August 30, 2019
Last time we visited Uganda using the services of Friendly was splendid - this was in 2019. We decided to come back to Uganda and add Tanzania to our itinerary....... read more Friendly Gorillas was so understanding and made our East African stay great. I never wanted to disappoint my friends as they already believed in me and indeed the friendly team stood to their words and made me right!
The gorilla encounter was as amazing as ever. I can never get tired of watching gorillas. I guess i will still come back and visit them
markmA9578WM
August 13, 2021
What a trip of a lifetime this was! We’ve been on the 9 Day Uganda Adventure tour and I cannot praise it enough! We had the best of accommodations, the... read more food was delicious everywhere we went and every day was a different adventure in itself. We got to see the chimpanzees and gorillas from up close in their natural habitat, of course and been on amazing safaris that made us get a true taste of Africa and Uganda in particular. Many thanks to Anthony for the great organization of the tour and for his availability and swiftness in replying to my inquiries! Not the least, special shout out to Chris (one of the best guides I’ve met so far) – excellent driver, super accommodating with our requests, knowledgeable and responsible at all times. I highly recommend this tour and Chris most of all!
alinacuculea
September 3, 2019
Tony, our driver and tour guide, was absolutely wonderful. Not only is he a kind high-character person, he is very knowledgeable about Uganda and really took the time to answer... read more all of our questions. Tony took the time to go the extra mile to ensure our entire trip was special, and to show us his culture and beautiful country. Every minute, from when arrived early to pick us up to when he helped us with our luggage at the airport at the end of our trip, we felt completely taken care of by Tony. Friendly Gorilla Safaris was wonderful, from Anthony promptly responding to all of our emails and questions, to Tony making our trip great. Definitely recommend them!
The Gorilla hike was absolutely amazing and a once in a lifetime experience, I could not recommend it enough! You have to do this tour and you have to ask for Tony to make it even more wonderful.
A couple tips:
- Ensure that the hotel is close to where your permitted hike is located. I did not know that there are 5 locations where you can hike to see the Gorillas, depending on where your permit is for. Double check that the hotel you stay at is convenient to your permit hike site. Our hotel was the Rushaga Gorilla Havens Lodge, which was absolutely Wonderful and you can check out my review of them, and they are close to one of the hiking sites but it turned out that our permit was for another location so we had a 2 hour drive in the morning to get to our permit hiking site. It made for an especially early morning and a closer hotel to our hike would have been nice. Though the Rushaga really was wonderful.
- If there is a way to choose where you hike and what group of gorillas to see then you should 100% ask for the Nyakagezi group. That is the group we visited, and it was Amazing. The hike was only about 1.5 hour to see the family of gorillas which had 3 silverbacks and 2 babies. The rangers we were with were all lovely. They were so helpful to ensure we got amazing views and photos of the gorillas, and they answered all of our questions. We felt completely safe with them and had a wonderful time.
Once in a lifetime trip with our awesome tour guide Tony, definitely recommend it!!
CM2909
January 11, 2020
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