AFRICAN PANGOLIN SAFARIS

Just came back from our 8 day Safari in Tanzania. We started off in Tarangire National park, then went to Ngorogoro Crater, and then into the Serengeti with the Mara River. We saw EVERYTHING -- the big 5, giraffes, zebras, and even the rarest Serval cat. I cannot emphasize this enough: CHOOSING A GOOD GUIDE MATTERS. Here's how things work: your guide drives you around, looks around for animals, tells you where they are, fights their way around other guides to get you the best view, radio's in or messages his buddies if they find sightings of major animals, drives you to your lodge, etc. With Pangolin Safaris, we hand selected our guide through recommendations and we clearly see now why Victor was highly sought after. His experience (20+ years) blew many other guides from other companies out of the water. They were relying on him to tell them where the animals were, following him, getting advice from him. He is clearly a leader in the industry. He had many connections with other drivers and therefore was able to get us up close to so many animals -- oftentimes 15-20 minutes before many other cars got the notification. This allowed us plenty of time to watch lions and leopards and get all the best videos and photos. He pushed us and we pushed him. This made the experience a million times better when we challenge each other to make the most out of every day. When he dropped us off at the lodge, he would ask us what time we wanted to start. Then he would ask us what we wanted to see. Based off of this, he would challenge us to wake up a bit earlier so he can guarantee that we'd see what we wanted. It worked -- without fail. We would challenge him every day by saying "tomorrow we want to see X" and sure enough, without fail, he would summon up all his channels and Safari magic and take us to remote specific areas where we would precisely see X. For example, on our last day, we wanted to see vultures and hyenas EATING. This was very specific because we had practically seen everything else already. So Victor drove us to this location where it seemed no other cars were going. From there, we encountered 4 different instances of Hyenas literally feasting on a meal or running through the field carrying a zebra leg. We saw vultures feasting and then getting taken over by hyenas. He literally gave us exactly what we asked for. We were so impressed we started joking and asking him to show us Santa Clause and a Unicorn next! The last point I want to emphasize on is Safety. The roads between locations are 95% not paved and an experienced driver matters. On the road, we would see cars zoom past us only to see them with flat tires 3-4 miles later. We also saw drivers who had bubbles in their tires and when Victor address it with the driver, he said not to tell his clients because he didn't want them to know. Can you imagine your guide deliberately putting your safety at risk? That is one thing we REALLY appreciated from Victor with Pangolin Safaris. He said he changes his tires and shocks almost every client and has so much experience that he knows what tire pressure and how to maneuver the car to make sure his guests are always safe and can complete their Safari trip without any issues. Overall, Victor with Pangolin Safaris made the entire trip so memorable. He orchestrated everything for us and made us feel so special and safe. We will 100% be recommending this Safari company and driver to all our family and friends. After seeing the other drivers recklessness and inexperience -- we now know how LUCKY we were to be working with Victor and Pangolin Safaris.

Jennifer