Reviews of trips to Swakopmund & Walvis Bay

"We enjoyed Namibia, especially during Covid times when there are so few people.

One lodge, Ai Aiba was disappointing and felt “low end”- our travel consultant should have suggested a different place.

The other issue was with Etendeka and Tok Tokkie: my wife and I found the description quite misleading: there is nothing Luxury about Tok Tokkie, and it should have been presented as a camping trip with no tent. I believe that Etendeka is similar. Expert Africa should have made it very clear that conditions are very basic and that it can get freezing cold, windy and sandy at night and the bed is a very basic foldable one, and this was not conveyed to us clearly. While Mandulea was also not luxurious, it did have some basic comforts like light, real bed, shower and toilettes which worked well for us.

On the positive side, Onguma and Hoodia exceeded our expectations and were superb." Read full review: 19 nights in Africa; 15 on a Namibia trip

"My family had high expectations for this Namibia trip, but it exceeded all of them! All of the lodges were excellent, staff amazing, and the food delicious.

In terms Covid, all staff wore masks and, from what I understand, were vaccinated.

Lastly, Maruska at Expert Africa went above and beyond to help us plan the trip and ensure it went smooth and safe. She helped us defer from 2020 to 2021, including changing the entire route due to lodge availability. She helped us find a Covid testing site prior to our return and informed about the very last minute entry requirement changes, which we would've missed otherwise. We are now looking forward to booking our future trips with Maruska and Expert Africa!

Suggestions to help us improve our trips or our service:

None, everything was excellent." Read full review: 19 nights in Africa; 14 on a Namibia trip

"It's hard to know where to start. Perfect, amazing, unforgettable.

The personalised advice on the itinerary, accommodation, and activities great from Sabina our local advisor with a true passion for Namibia. Then COVID-19 hit and Sabina was understanding, flexible and made endless changes always with a smile and a laugh. Ultimately it was due to her reactivity, solution orientated approach and ability to adapt and make changes at short notice that we were able to spend an amazing and unforgettable family holiday in an amazing country, indeed were privileged to regularly feel like we had Namibia to ourselves. We were alone on Dune 45 for a good hour.

Sabina was available to reply to all our questions however minor and even helped us with an NEW reservation that we had made directly with the park, she really couldn't do enough to make our holiday amazing.

What a country, we were intimate with wild elephants, lions and a leopard.

For me Expert Africa is the only place to go for a holiday in Africa.

Suggestions to help us improve our trips or our service:

I really struggle to suggest any improvements. The trip was amazing, the service from Sabina and then Chris when COVID made things really complicated was faultless/first class.

The reception at Windhoek from the folk at Wilderness Safaris was a great start to the trip but there is nowhere to rate it on the feedback forms." Read full review: 21 nights in Africa; 17 on a Namibia trip

"Amazing trip" Read full review: 16 nights in Africa; 16 on a Namibia trip

"Our long awaited (and postponed and covid-adjusted) Namibia trip was a very special experience. We are so grateful to Maruska for her help and advice in making some difficult decisions.

We loved the country, the roads (after all the gravel roads we found the tar roads very boring:), the different landscapes and we were very grateful to drive nearly 3000 km without any car trouble, not even a puncture!

We enjoyed the famous dunes, the deserts, the Cape Cross seals, the beautiful town Swakopmund , the rock engravings, the flamingo's at Walvis Bay, the water holes at Etosha, the memorial museum in Windhoek.

What would be our highlight in all of these? Probably the dunes, as that is something so unique to this area. Next Etosha's animals stand out in their numbers, compared to what we are used to in South Africa.
To have over a hundred springbok, zebra, wildebeest together with smaller groups of ostrich, elephant, oryx and giraffe all at one water hole is absolutely amazing.

Thank you Maruska, for sorting out all the accommodation, planning the trip as a whole, making helpful suggestions, postponing all the accommodations and adjusting again to include covid test on the way back. It made all the difference!

Suggestions to help us improve our trips or our service:

No idea, to be honest. Just very happy we were able to travel with your guidance and suggestions.

Also the knowledge that if something went wrong we would be able to receive all the help we might need. That was very reassuring.

Thank you again." Read full review: 15 nights in Africa; 15 on a Namibia trip

"We had an excellent trip to Namibia with the assistance of Expert Africa.

We were fortunate to time our trip right in the middle of COVID waves and found Namibia to be operating largely as normal. Cities such as Swakop were quite strict on safety protocols. The remote camps were a bit more lax. But we found a self drive as a great way to vacation during the pandemic and were lucky to have many of the camps to ourselves with a full staff serving us.

Many thanks to Maruska for her excellent recommendations and her flexibility in dealing with passport issues - she truly went above and beyond. The highlight of our trip was the drive from Swakop up to Damaraland and through the Skeleton Coast park.

Self driving is an absolute must in Namibia!" Read full review: 16 nights in Africa; 13 on a Namibia trip

"Our overall trip experience was excellent. The decision to book the trip with Expert Africa was to a very large degree due to Sabina's advice, responsiveness and enagement to make sure I had all the necessary information and also to answer all my questions. Sabina was very good at providing the various tour options and accommodation combinations and subsequently at organising the whole tour once we had settled for an itinerary.

Sabina was in contact with me and/or available before departure and well as throughout the whole trip to help or provide advice. This was very good as a first traveler to Namibia as we felt that there was always someone available to help us with any unexpected situation. Sabina is very personable and also very good at what she does. I felt 100% comfortable dealing with her and receiving her advice.

The literature, advice and information provided was also comprehensive and very good. The map, itinerary and instructions were also very good and also the logistics and communication with the various lodges. They were all expecting us and checking in and a fast service was never an issue.

In particular the advice regarding the following points was useful:
- Purchase local Super Aweh SIM card at the airport
- Exchange EUR/USD at Maerua Shopping Mall in Windhoek/withdraw cash at Cash Machines along the trip (roughly 100 EUR per day on a self-drive tour to provide for fuel, food, entrance fees and payment for extra activities at the various locations)
- Covid tests in Windhoek (Rennies Travel)
- Payment of the tour quote in USD with Euro credit card (everything worked well with this)

The quality of all the lodges/accommodation was very good, except for Halali as already explained, and I also understand the reasons for it.

Doing a self-drive tour was also a good experience and luckily we did not experience any negative issues on the roads and also not with Herz the car rental company upon returning the car (Isuzu 4x4).

We were also lucky to meet another family with teenagers during out trip, which we coincided with at two locations during our trip, and so this was a very good experience for us and for our kids to get to know other people.

We would be very happy to book again another tour with Expert Africa and with Sabina in particular.

Damaraland Petrified Forest: One minor negative comment...
On the C39 road, a couple of Kms. from the crossing of the D2612 and the C39, on the right hand-side of the road there is a hand written sign for the Petrified Forest, we did not realised this is not the "official" site after driving into the side road a few hundred meters upto a parking and agreeing to pay N$100 per person to a "local community". The locals were very friendly and did show us some pertified trees lying on the ground in addition to some Welwitschias. This was only maximum 20 Minutes visit or so, it was interesting, however, it was clear that this was not the official site. All other archeological/official attractions provide an official fiscal receipt upon payment. We did not make an issue of it, however, were disappointed to be tricked into this site. Because of this experience and the time that we had already spent, later a few Kms. along the road we did not stop to visit the "official" Petrifed Forest." Read full review: 12 nights in Africa; 12 on a Namibia trip

"I have been to >25 countries in Africa. Sabina is the best travel agent I have ever worked with. Just GREAT. THANK YOU!" Read full review: 14 nights in Africa; 14 on a Namibia trip

"We had a fantastic holiday. It was so good to be able to escape the UK for a bit.

Sabina was incredibly helpful and we had a lot of last minute changes due to covid restrictions and various flights been cancelled and a couple of our original places to stay were closed. She dealt with it all in a very professional and helpful way, always getting back to us really quickly and making sure we were up to date with all the latest information.

We felt completely safe the whole time we were on our holiday, and Namibia is clearly dealing with Covid much better than we are back in the UK." Read full review: 17 nights in Africa; 18 on a Namibia trip

"We were able to complete two weeks of a four week trip before having to leave at short notice because of the travel restrictions imposed due to the Coronavirus.

What we saw and did in those two weeks we loved.

Suggestions to help us improve our trips or our service:

Nothing at all. Sabina worked tirelessly to sort out flights for us to get us out of Namibia and back to the UK. The situation was changing every few hours as did the airline timetables and seats were very limited indeed. We absolutely could not have done this ourselves. I should point out that we had booked our flights independently and were not meant to be flying out of Windhoek at all so Expert Africa really did go above and beyond in helping us.

We have used Expert Africa a number of times over the years and always recommeded to friends. This trip absolutely highlighted why !" Read full review: 22 nights in Africa; 13 on a Namibia trip