Reviews of safaris to Okonjima Nature Reserve

"WE were very lucky to go to Namibia for the fifth time, we visited some new places and some we now know quite well, most lived up to our expectation, only 2 we were disappointed with. We had some amazing animal experiences and traveled though very varied landscapes. The Namibians are such friendly welcoming and polite people , a joy to be with. They are always so thrilled to learn that we have returned again and again. we met many first time visitors who said they would be back.

The only down side was the car, not the one we ordered and not up to the gravel roads very hard and tiring to drive." Read full review: 30 nights in Africa; 27 on a Namibia trip

"Our trip to Namibia exceeded all our expectations. We were bowled over by the beauty and diversity of the country, its people and all of the nature that we were able to experience.

All of the arrangements made for us by Expert Africa worked smoothly. All of the information provided by them before our trip was excellent.

One thing strikes me that I would like to mention. Namibia is a country of wide contrasts and that is one of its glories. One could spend long time there discovering all of its treasures. However, unfortunately time for the average holiday-maker is limited. We spent mainly two nights in one place and then moved on. Because of the contrast in areas, places and types of accommodation, I found that moving on to the next place brought with it something like culture shock, because I had been so charmed with the last place and took a little time to adjust to the new. This is not a criticism and I would not have changed anything about our itinerary which was excellently planned, it's just an observation." Read full review: 15 nights in Africa; 13 on a Namibia trip

"Namibia is an incredible country and Expert Africa organised everything very well and Martha in particular was there at the end of the phone whenever I had a question, her advice was invaluable.

A few negatives that are worth mentioning but should never stop any one from going are:

The gravel roads can be pretty hairy in a 2WD and had we had the funds, we would have much preferred to be in a 4WD as you feel every single bump in the road (so if you have the money get a 4WD). We had to drive extra slow in order to avoid damage to the car (especially the tyres) and the undercarriage (which is uninsurable) - with the gravel sometimes building up so high it's unavoidable to have a rock or two hit the underneath. The gravel roads can make the journeys tiresome, long and stressful. In sum, it is quite miraculous that there was no major damage to the car and in the end we only had a chip on the windscreen, so actually we are testament to the fact that the journey we did was do-able in a 2WD, it's just really not ideal. I felt like the mental stress the roads put on you should be emphasised more by the guide book and Expert Africa as we weren't quite prepared for how mentally exhausting the journeys would be as we were constantly worried we were going to seriously damage the car. When we hit tar roads again on the way to Windhoek we were elated!

Namibia is still very much in transition from its colonial days and much of the effects of colonialism are still present. Segregation of black and white people is still very much a part of life and almost all of the money / businesses are still in the hands of white Namibians. There's not much to be done about that as a tourist except be mindful of it. I felt I should have researched this before travelling so that it wasn't such an unpleasant surprise, it's very hard not to notice it. We came across blatant instances of racism from locals, especially at Bullsport (from a guest) but this is mostly among the older generation who still refer to Namibia vehemently as South West Africa. I feel silly for not having researched the country's colonial history more fully however i expected it to be just that, history, but considering the effects are still so prevalent, I think it should be emphasised more in the book and by Expert Africa, to younger, more naive travellers, like myself, admittedly. In Swakopmund it was most noticeable. We had some great chats to some black Namibians, who were happy to talk about their views on it and the staff at the Tug were so friendly, inviting and a lot of fun to while away an evening at the bar with.

On a Swakopmund note - the local tourist market in Swakopmund was quite overwhelming, they have some great things there and i bought some souvenirs but when we went we were pretty much the only tourists so all of the sellers were vying for our attention, it was difficult to get out of there, perhaps worth noting in the guide book.

As for the positives:

We were the only ones on the road for miles at some points, this country is still relatively un-visited by tourists so you feel like you're uncovering a hidden gem, everything is so pristine.

The different landscapes, the wildlife, the culture and the people are so amazing, i have never been any where like it. I often say I won't go back to the same place as there's too many other places to see but I might have to make an exception for Namibia. . .maybe when i can afford a 4wd!

It seemed mostly visited by retirees but we couldn't see why, this is the ultimate African road trip, everywhere we went was safe and friendly and it's cheap. The safari was first class, we saw every animal there was to see. Okonjima was fantastic and the landscapes second to none. Namibia has mountains, stunning desert dunes, cities, beaches and flat savannahs that stretch on for thousands of mile, it has everything.

I can't recommend this destination and Expert Africa highly enough, it's just a matter of time before the crowds discover it.

Suggestions to help us improve our trips or our service:

Martha was excellent, helpful, knowledgable and friendly, she helped us tailor our itinerary to our needs and budget, can't recommend her highly enough.

Two small things, there was a mix up at Sossus Dune Lodge where it was written on one of our itineraries that we were on a DBB basis but when we arrived they only had us down as BB so we aren't sure if we ended up paying twice?

The other thing again minor but worth noting, one day I called up to speak to Martha who wasn't available so I chatted to Sabina instead, who was very friendly and informative however, i called up to ask why it was that we couldn't fit Sandwich Harbour into our day seeing the seals and she explained it was because there wasn't enough time, completely fine however she wanted to emphasise the point by informing me some tourists were killed the week before rushing to get to Sandwich Harbour, which was information i probably could have done without having already been a bit nervous about the amount of driving on gravel roads we had to do, a case of too much information!" Read full review: 15 nights in Africa; 13 on a Namibia trip

"Our trip was wonderful, we probably would have liked to have stayed one night less at Nhoma (some of my family would not have agreed with this) and have missed out Huab Lodge. Highlights were Desert Rhino Camp and Mundulea.

Wouldn't have liked to do more driving though, so we missed out most of the country which we will have to visit again. Would have been useful to know rough driving times between camps. I didn't realise the gravel roads were yellow on map until it was too late!

I think would also have preferred to miss out Windhoek completely, Olive Grove was nice but it felt to me as if the holiday hadn't really started until we moved on.

Suggestions to help us improve our trips or our service:

Sabina was so helpful, we went through a few itineraries before I realised what sort of trip we were looking for and she made some great suggestions that I hadn't seen on the website. It was wonderful to correspond and talk to her, she was extremely knowledgeable and efficient and I really did appreciate her." Read full review: 15 nights in Africa; 13 on a Namibia trip

"Namibia is a stunningly beautiful country and from our experience Namibians are universally warm and friendly. We had a fantastic trip and would recommend it to anyone who enjoys active holidays.

With one glitch, (the car being sent to the wrong guesthouse) all the arrangements worked extremely well and the information we were given in advance was very comprehensive and helpful. Nothing important was missing. This will always be one of our most memorable holidays." Read full review: 19 nights in Africa; 17 on a Namibia trip

"Everything other than the mix-up over the booking at Doro Nawas was very good. We felt that the booking issue was dealt with satisfactorily thanks to the efforts of all concerned.

It was the first time our daughter and son-in-law have visited Namibia the they found it thoroughly enjoyable. In particular they were highly impressed with the breathtaking landscape and stunning wildlife." Read full review: 12 nights in Africa; 10 on a Namibia trip

"We love travelling in Namibia. The landscapes, the emptiness, the never ending points of interest and the feeling of being a welcome guest in a happy and well adjusted stable African country makes it a special place. To be able to eat game was a delight after Zambia, but then the German style breakfasts fail to hit the heights of a Zambian breakfast so ... But it's not all about the food!

Thank you Tracy and Expert Africa. You put together a fantastic holiday rather late in the day. It was perfectly paced and suited us absolutely. Whilst the internet may work for some holidays, the local knowledge you combined with a genuine interest in, and understanding of, what we wanted to achieve was invaluable and so much appreciated." Read full review: 20 nights in Africa; 15 on a Namibia trip

"We feel like our holiday in Namibia was really long and that is because we did so many different things in very different areas. And everywhere we went there was another highlight!

The standard of accommodation, the knowledge and enthusiasm of the guides and lodge/camp staff was all fantastic. We had 2 older teenagers this us and there were no complaints about the lack of wifi as they were too enthralled.

What we all noticed was how peaceful it was. No planes, very few cars, not many people. Great scenery, lots of amazing animals and lots and lots of stars!" Read full review: 16 nights in Africa; 16 on a Namibia trip

"We travelled to Namibia mid July 2015 staying in the country for 15 nights. We are a family of four with 16 and 14 year old boys.

It was me that did the planning with lots of time on the Expert Africa web site and discussions with the excellent Sabina and Martha. Reading people's feedback, my expectations for the holiday were very high and they were met and exceeded. All the logistics went without a hitch, travelling around was very easy, the lodges were great, and of course the wildlife, scenery and people fantastic.

We planned our trip to visit Namibia with excellent guidance from Sabina and Martha at Expert Africa. I am sure that their knowledge and experience helped to make it a great holiday for us. You can read our experiences on individual lodges and activities on the relevant pages so the following is more general stuff.

The flights to Namibia do get booked up well in advance for mid July as it is a busy time and of course more expensive the later you get so it is best to plan and book your trip at least 4 months in advance. Accommodation also gets booked up limiting choices.

We originally planned to go clockwise - Naukluft Mountains, Sossusvlei, Swakopmund, Damaland, Etosha, Central Highlands. However due to the accommodation availability we ended up going the other way. In hindsight was this a problem? No we didn't think so. Visiting Okonjima first was fantastic and seeing Cheetah and Leopards close up (10 - 20m) was amazing. Ok they are radio collared so much easier to find (not guaranteed) but so what! We did see 'wild' cheetah in Etosha, but from what I gather this is by no means guaranteed and leopards even less likely. Okonjima was the best place we visited in terms of the accommodation and trips, and we would have preferred to stay there 2 nights.

Being the end of July it was the dry season and winter in Namibia. We are not very keen on high temperatures and the daytime temps were low to high 20's during our visit which along with low humidity was perfect. Of course night time temperatures were pretty cold - 10 deg C? Namibia doesn't do much heating apart from open fires in the communal areas and blankets / hot water bottles in the lodges. However we took the advice provided and packed and wore layers to keep us warm in the evenings and mornings. This was one of the reasons why we opted for lodges rather than a camping trip to Namibia. Obviously it was a more expensive trip though.

We booked our flights independently saving about £600 but this did impact on our holiday in that we were planning on visiting the excellent Okonjima first. However the flight I booked didn't arrive until 1pm which didn't allow enough time to get through immigration, collect the hire car and the 3.5 hrs drive from the airport, therefore we had to stay one night at River Crossing and then only one night at Okonjima and it would have been better to have arrived earlier and had two nights at Okonjima.

We planned to have two nights at most of the places we went to which makes for a more relaxing trip and time to relax as well as the activities, especially as quite a few of the trips involve early morning starts. Our trip included 2,500km of driving so having relaxing days makes this easier.

We found all the Namibians we met very warm, friendly and welcoming. The reception and service at the places we stayed at was great and In a number of lodges, we were greeted with a song as well as drink and hot towel. They were happy to chat, especially the managers and all appeared to be happy. We very much enjoyed the singing that the staff did after dinner at a number of the lodges.

Food - Our boys are not the most adventurous and at most of the places we stayed at there was either a set menu with no choices or a choice of main menu only. However, they ate just about all that was put in front of them! Game steak was a regular feature, and it was excellent! Breakfast usually included a cooked option (usually eggs & bacon) which set the day off well, especially on an early start. Most places had cold drinks, tea, coffee and hot chocolate availabile throughout the day and cake at tea time so we didn't go hungry! House wine was usually good and drinks usually sensibly prices (relative to UK prices).

Obviously it is a sparsely populated country (about 2 million people) in a country 3+ times the size of the UK so there aren't lots of shops you can just stop at and pick up a snack. So you need to plan ahead a bit, order a packed lunch if necessary but there are good shops in the towns.

In Swakopmund we wanted to do the kayaking with seals as well as sand boarding and you can do both on one day - kayaking in the morning and sand boarding in the afternoon. However it typically gets windy in the afternoon and the sand boarding would not be as much fun. So we opted to spend 3 nights in Swakopmund (at the excellent Organic Square apartments) and do kayaking on the 1st morning and sand boarding on the 2nd day which worked out very well, and the weather for both was excellent. Given we had a long drive from Damaraland and to Sesriem either side of Swakopmund, it made sense as well.

My wife didn't fancy sand boarding so went on Tommy's Tour to see the wildlife etc. Although it got excellent reviews her experience was not that good. Although they found and saw interesting animals, the group was too large (30) and his rather old vehicle had problems and did breakdown once so he was stressed about that. The biggest problem was that there wasn't time to ask questions and quite a bit was in German rather than English.

WiFi - Our boys are not surprisingly used to having a decent broadband connection. As just about all the places we stayed at were remote, some very, the connection speed was poor, and in one place there was no WiFi (only via satellite on a PC which was available for public use). Clearly they were frustrated but we thought it wasn't a bad thing and to be honest there'd was lots to do and see!! We did set one of the boys the challenge of making a video of the trip. Given he had plenty of time in the car, this worked well and he did an excellent job making a 26min video set to music and we will enjoy this for years to come!

Driving - The roads are great whether tarmac or gravel and navigation easy. Of the 2,500km a bit over half was on gravel. We had a 2WD Honda CRV which was fine and our 4 suitcases fitted in the boot under the pull over cover (just!). Obviously you can't go as fast on gravel, and some were more rutted than others but generally they were fine and there was little traffic on the road. You can't drive after dark as there is a high risk of hitting animals, and we did see a lot of warthogs and some other large herbivores close to the road so you do need to keep your wits about you! We didn't get any punctures and the Bidvest (Budget) car pick up and drop off at the airport was easy. Many of the journeys were 3+ hours long and two were 5+. To help the time pass, we download some audio books which we played through the cars audio system via an aux lead and this helped the time pass, as well as some spectacular scenery at times. Fuel was cheap but you do need to pay by cash.

Winter means the dry season, and therefore not much vegetation and animals having to visit water holes. All good news for seeing animals, and we had a great time just sitting by water holes watching the animals come and go. At one in Etosha, when we arrived there were 3 lions and then 5 others arrived over the period of an hour, all greeting the others as they met.

Etosha - we stayed at Okaukuejo Camp. On the way we stopped off at Halali which didn't seem as nice, and the flood lit water hole at Okaukuejo really was fantastic, or maybe we were lucky with the animals and their coming and going. The food and accommodation was fine. We were advised to drive ourselves around which worked well, although the advantage of going with a guide is they talk to each other on the radio so you get a better chance of seeing animals, and of course you can learn from them more about the wildlife, park etc. We did a trip into Etosha from Mushara with a guide and then did the rest ourselves which we think worked well.

Trips - We contemplated going on an organised trip with a guide, the advantages being not having to worry about any organisation when out there and having the opportunity to learn from the guide, and for us and the boys to interact with the others in the group - could be good, or not so??!! However the downside was having to go on specific dates (which wasn't easy) and limited to the

Suggestions to help us improve our trips or our service:

I think you did an excellent job, but it would have been nice to have had more detail on how the price was made up rather than just a single figure." Read full review: 15 nights in Africa; 12 on a Namibia trip

"A VERY VARIED AND INTERESTING EXPERIENCE , NAMIBIA MET AND EXCEED ALL OUR EXPECTATIONS IN TERMS OF SCENERY AND WILDLIFE." Read full review: 17 nights in Africa; 17 on a Namibia trip