Every safari we run is private. No shared seats, no fixed departure you have to fit around.
A private safari means the vehicle belongs to your party for the duration of the trip. Nobody else is in it, nobody else's schedule applies, and the day runs at whatever pace you set. If a leopard comes down out of a tree and you want to stay for an hour, you stay for an hour.
That sounds obvious until you compare it with a seat-in-vehicle safari, where departure times, route and how long you linger at a sighting are all set by the group. Shared safaris are cheaper per person and there's nothing wrong with them, but the difference in how the days feel is significant, and it's the single thing most travellers say afterwards that they were glad they paid for.
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Exclusive use of a four-wheel-drive Land Cruiser with a viewing roof, seating four or seven, and a driver-guide for the whole trip. The same guide from the first morning to the last, which matters more than it sounds. By day three they know whether you want birds or big cats, and whether you prefer to be out at dawn or have a slower breakfast.
Because the vehicle and driver-guide are a fixed cost divided between however many people are in the car, a private safari for two costs much more per person than the same trip for six. Know that before you compare quotes. A low per-person figure often means a shared vehicle. We will show you the figure both ways instead of assuming.
Couples and families almost always. Groups of friends travelling together, where the vehicle is full anyway and exclusivity costs little extra. Photographers, who need control over position and timing. Anyone travelling with children, where a fixed group schedule tends to be the first thing to break.
Private means your own vehicle, your own guide, and nobody else's schedule. In practice that changes more than it sounds.
You decide when the day starts. If you want to be at the gate when it opens and back at camp by ten, you do that. If you want to skip the lunch stop and stay with a leopard for two hours, nobody in the vehicle is looking at their watch.
You decide what the day is about. Photographers can position for light, not for the best view from a middle seat. Birders can stop for a roller. Families can turn round when a child has had enough.
You get every window seat, which on a full-day drive matters more than anyone expects.
And you can change the itinerary while you're in it. If the herds have moved, or the road is washed out, or you simply want another day where you're, a private trip can absorb that. A scheduled group departure can't.
The cost is real: a private vehicle divided between two people is more per head than the same vehicle divided between six. It falls quickly as the group grows, which is why four or six travelling together often pay little more privately than they would in a shared vehicle.
Most of the cost of a safari doesn't vary with the number of people in the vehicle. The vehicle, the fuel and the guide are the same whether two people or six are in it, and those are charged once and divided.
Park entry, accommodation and food do vary per person. Park fees are charged per person per day by TANAPA and the NCAA, and they're the largest fixed component of any northern-circuit trip.
The effect is that the per-person price falls steeply from two travellers to four, and much more gently from four to six. Two people pay the most per head. A family of five is often surprised how close the per-person figure is to a shared departure.
It also means that adding a day is cheaper than adding a park. An extra night in a region you're already in costs accommodation and fees. Adding a new park costs a transfer day as well.
None of this is a reason to squeeze into a vehicle. Six adults in a Land Cruiser for eight days with camera bags is uncomfortable in a way the per-person saving doesn't compensate for. Four is the comfortable maximum for a long trip.
Private does not mean exclusive access. The parks are public and everyone shares the tracks. A good leopard sighting near the Seronera river in August will draw other vehicles whether your trip is private or not.
It does not mean you can drive off-road. That is banned in the Serengeti except in marked areas. A guide who stays on the track at a sighting is following the law, not being unhelpful. In the places off-road driving is allowed, such as parts of the Ndutu area inside the conservation area, it is allowed for everybody.
It does not change the gate rules. You still get six hours on the Ngorongoro crater floor and you still have to be off the floor by six. There is still no night driving in the parks between seven and six, except where it is specifically allowed.
And it does not guarantee you a sighting. It improves your odds, because you can spend your time where the animals are instead of where the schedule says. That is a real advantage. It is not a promise.
Private does buy you control of your own day. On a trip this expensive, that is usually worth the difference.
The main advantage of a private trip is wasted unless you use it, and using it means talking to your guide properly at the start.
Say what you actually want. "We would rather sit with one sighting for an hour than see five things" is the single most useful sentence you can say on day one, and so is its opposite. Guides default to covering ground because most clients want that. They'll happily do the reverse if told.
Say what you don't want. Long drives, midday game drives, early starts every single day. Any of these can be adjusted, and none of them will be if you don't mention it.
Name your priorities. Leopard, birds, photography, the crater rim at sunset, a particular kopje. A guide who knows what you're after will build the days around it.
Ask to change the plan mid-trip. If the herds have moved, or you want another day where you're, a private itinerary can absorb it. You paid for that flexibility.
And ask questions. The difference between a good safari and a great one is usually how much you learned, and that's entirely in your hands.
The standard safari vehicle on the northern circuit is a Land Cruiser with a pop-up roof, lap belts, charging sockets and a cool box. It seats six or seven, and how many of those seats are filled changes the trip a lot.
Two to four people is comfortable with camera bags and room to move between sides of the vehicle at a sighting. Six adults for eight days isn't, and the per-person saving doesn't compensate.
Your guide is also your driver. That is the norm here, and a good one is a naturalist, a mechanic, a negotiator at gates and the person who decides where you'll be in an hour.
Ask for the same guide throughout, not a change at each camp. Continuity counts for a great deal by day four, when they know what you're interested in.
Roof up for game viewing, down while moving between areas. That's a rule, not a preference, and it matters most with children.
Tell the guide on the first morning what you actually want from the trip. It is the single most useful thing you can do with a private booking.
Tell us your dates and we will put something together.
