Wayfairer Travel Reviews

"Thanks to the Wayfairer team we had a great family trip in Tanzania. One week safari and one week beach on Pemba! Everything was organized perfectly so we could relax and enjoy beautiful Africa! Wayfairer absolutely know what they are doing! Two thumbs up! Arne from Switzerland"

Helpful Report

Hi Arne, thanks for your lovely feedback and for sharing your amazing pictures. We are glad to hear you had a great time with your family and that you are satisfied with the service provided by Wayfairer Travel. We hope we can assist you again in future. Carmen.

"From finding us the perfect itinerary for our holiday to Kenya to liaising with us before we travelled to checking in with us via emails whilst we were away - we can only say how impressed we were with the personal service provided. We will definitely use them again and would recommend them them to anyone travelling to Africa."

Helpful Report

Hi, thanks for your lovely feedback. We are glad to hear you had a fantastic holiday and that you were pleased with the service provided by Wayfairer Travel. We pride ourselves on tailoring your experience to you to ensure you have a memorable holiday. We hope we can assist you again in future and send you off on another amazing holiday. Carmen.

"Wayfairer Travel put together a high quality, exciting custom trip for us to include 2 different safari lodges in private game reserves bordering the Kruger and a beach holiday in Mozambique. The holiday took full account of our expressed preferences and offered significantly better value than quotes that we received from some other larger and better known travel companies for similar holidays. In the event the whole holiday was superb. The accommodations and safari game viewing were first class as were the service standards experienced throughout. All of the transfers organized by Wayfairer went very smoothly and without any hitches. The Concierge service element that had been recently introduced by Wayfairer enabled queries to be dealt with quickly before departure and during the trip itself."

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Hi Tony, thanks for your lovely review. We are very glad to hear your holiday and experience with Wayfairer Travel exceeded your expectations. Here at Wayfairer Travel we pride ourselves for tailoring our itineraries to the needs of our clients and we are also pleased to hear that you found it extremely easy communicating with us thanks to the introduction of the Concierge service.
We hope to hear back from you in the future to help you organise another fantastic trip! Carmen.

"It was a top trip. The SarunI mara lodge was excellent with the very friendly staff, the exquisite food and the safari guide, who showed us everything possible. Thank you!"

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Hi Erika,
Thanks for your lovely review. We are glad to hear you are pleased with the service received and overall experience.
We look forward to hearing back from you for any future travel plans. Carmen.

"Our trip was incredible. THANK YOU!! We had the time of our lives! We did Safari at the Selous Game Reserve in Tanzania and then went for beach relaxation in Zanzibar. All the transfers ran smoothly, the accommodation was all perfect and food and service was fantastic. We will certainly be using Wayfairer Travel again for our next adventure. Thank you."

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Thank you so much Natasha for your fantastic review. We are happy to hear you had a fantastic time.
We look forward to hearing back from you and to supporting you with any future travel plans.

Carmen

"My husband and I have recently returned from our honeymoon to Tanzania and Zanzibar and cannot recommended Wayfairer Travel enough! From start to finish, their service and help was second to none and the trip they designed for us, was above and beyond our expectations. Thank you Wayfairer Travel :) Alice and James"

Helpful Report

Thanks for your feedback Alice. We are very pleased to hear about your fantastic honeymoon and overall satisfaction with the service provided by Wayfairer Travel. Do not hesitate to get in touch again with us for any future plans.

Carmen

"First off, I want to say that the two people who impacted my trip the most were Mirenyo (Mirenyo Lucas Kivuyo) and Modi (Izina Mshana), my two guides. If you are booking through Wayfairer or Fair travel, they are both worth requesting as they were an amazing team and made the experience unforgettable. I could not say enough good things about them! Now for some more specific details about my trip though, but more about them later! I happened upon Wayfairer/Fair travel through the Responsible Travel website. They provided me with three recommendations and I was most impressed by Wayfairer, who were very up front about their mission to provide treks by fairly treated employees (guides, cooks, porters). From doing the math (costs including salaries of each employee, daily park pass, tents, food, ancillary team costs, etc), it is very clear that many companies do not treat their employees fairly. The easiest place for money to come from seems to be the bottom of the food chain or the porters. Many of these companies then rely on tips to survive, which is not a reliable way to run a business. Wayfairer/Fair Travel actually creates their employee salaries with a tip already factored in. However after spending 8 days with my group, I still wanted to leave a small tip of $280 or $20 per person (which was about one extra day of work for most of the team). While I was very excited to have booked with a company that reflected such a socially and environmentally-sustainable philosophy, there were several instances that Wayfairer's lack of communication made me nervous. Occasionally, their email response times were long or I had received a generic email about payment that went into my spam folder, with no follow-up. Furthermore, while Tom did send us a general packing list several weeks before the trip, it would have been a lot more beneficial if a phone call had been scheduled to go over the details of what he (or the Fair Travel crew) would suggest bringing on the trip. While the provided packing list listed things as required, recommended or optional, it was still very hard to navigate. How many days should I expect it to be cold, how many layers will I be wearing (at camp and while hiking), how many people are happy they brought hand warmers? Some of these questions I would not have even thought of until afterwards, but it would have been nice if Wayfairer had anticipated them and provided more guidance. Another area where I feel Wayfairer could improve on would be better guidance on the different types of medication that are usually taken while on the mountain. While I do understand that Wayfairer cannot give firm recommendations since they are neither doctors or know a person’s medical history--in truth, medication is a very important part of the climb. Although it may not be required, enough people are taking it to make your clients want to be aware of it. Wayfairer only recommended we consult with a doctor, but Wayfairer should be the experts because to be honest, doctors are not (and I am a doctor!). For most doctors in the US, their training on altitude sickness will be comprised of a brief review of acetazolamide (Diamox) which they are taught can be helpful for altitude sickness. They will not know anything more about the research, more recent literature or even dosages. Wayfairer should know the most recent research and be able to tell me “Research suggests acetazolamide/steroids/NSAIDs may be helpful for altitude sickness, typically given in doses of ____. However, as I am not a medical professional, I am not able to prescribe any of these to you or give you precise recommendations”. As I am a doctor, I reviewed the literature on both acetazolamide and steroids (dexamethasone/prednisone) as they relate to altitude sickness. My sister and I both took 250mg of acetazolamide twice daily as well as ibuprofen three times per day (as suggested to be helpful for inflammation by more recent research). On summit night, we both took a 1 mg/kg pulse dose of prednisone. While no one person can say whether this medication got us to the top without any problems, we did make it with my sister only getting a mild headache as we reached the summit. As for the entire crew that traveled with us up the mountain, they were absolutely amazing. Mirenyo and Modi were our head and assistant guides and they were the perfect team. Mirenyo was personable, incredibly engaging, funny, and added a boost of positive energy when my sister and I were starting to feel sluggish or tired. Modi was more reserved, but very sweet, helpful, and conscientious. They were the perfect balance. They helped each other out and were the primary reason we made it to the top for sunrise. During the summiting hike, my sister and I were struggling to stay motivated to make it to the top, but we were so grateful that Mirenyo kept pushing us to not give up. By the end of the trip, my sister and I felt very connected to our entire team. Unfortunately, all week I was experiencing mild diarrhea (in retrospect traveler’s diarrhea that abated immediately after 1 dose of azithromycin) that I had been controlling with Immodium (loperamide). After hiking 6 hours to the summit, 3 back to base camp and 4 to our final camp, I think I was not able to recuperate my losses and I woke up the next morning feeling terrible. The remaining 4 hours down the mountain was almost harder than the summit. I was taken to the health center where I spent 6 hours getting fluids and a few tests. It was then I realized I had hiked down with a fever, which was 102 F in the hospital (39.9 C). This is where the Fair Travel team really came in. Both off the ground people from Fair Travel spent all afternoon at the hospital with my sister and I to make sure we were taken care of, which was incredible. While it was not the best way to end the hike, it made for a good story and really solidified my deep respect for Fair Travel. In conclusion, I am most happy to have chosen Wayfairer because it allowed me to work with Fair Travel. While I have no true regrets about going with Wayfairer, I would recommend booking directly through Fair Travel for a Mount Kilimanjaro trip. While Tom was nice and very much believed in the mission of the company, he seemed to be more of a middle man in the operation. Fair Travel was the primary actor that organized the entire trip, the rentals and the guides. The entire team were Fair Travel employees. I feel so grateful and lucky to have had this experience climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro with my sister. And also for reaching the top! I cannot say that either one of us trained particularly hard for the experience, but we are both in good baseline shape (she is a marathon runner and I do primarily interval training). That is not to say it was easy, I think we were mostly lucky. We climbed in parallel to someone who does Iron Mans and he said Kilimanjaro was even harder!! To be fair though, we found only summit night to be incredibly hard. The rest of the time you are forced to hike extremely slowly for acclimatization purposes, but I think this really helps to make it a more doable trek. I never got sore or felt like it was too intense. In the end, I would recommend, book and sing Fair Travel’s praises forever."

Helpful Report

Hi Catherine,

Thank you for your review and I’m really pleased you had a successful summit and that you were well looked after by our local suppliers.

I really appreciate the feedback regarding response time and I’m sorry that made you feel nervous. I’m delighted to say that in the last two months we have bought on Carmen in the role of Luxury Travel Concierge for our clients. Carmen now is on hand to answer prompt responses on all aspects of the holiday as well as take care of restaurant reservations, airport lounges and any tiny detail to make our clients' holidays perfect.

In terms of working relationship between an agent and a local supplier: this is totally normal and how the industry works. Fair Travel benefit hugely from a consistent relationship with ourselves, built over many years, where we provide them with business and they look after our guests on the mountain beautifully, as you experienced.

Thanks again for your review and I’m pleased you will have fond memories of your climb.

Tom

"Great service by a very friendly and knowledgeable company/ staff. The holiday to Kenya and Zanzibar was better than ever imagined and would highly recomend! The holiday was for our honeymoon and was made extra special in lots of different ways, which was appreciated! Highly recomend using Wayfairer!!"

Helpful Report

Many thanks for your lovely feedback Jack. We are glad to hear that the service provided by Wayfairer Travel in organising your honeymoon exceeded your expectations.
We look forward to hearing back from you for any future plans.

Carmen

"Perfect planning, perfect execution of our vacation, can absolutely recommend this agency to others!"

Helpful Report

Thanks for your feedback Elena, we are glad to hear you had a fantastic trip.
Please do not hesitate to contact us for any future plans and we will be happy to help!

Carmen

"We had a great family holiday in Tanzania and really enjoyed the three different places we visited. Tom listened to what we like to do as a family and pulled together a great trip. We enjoyed it all, the safari in the Selous, Chole Mjini and our visit to Zanzibar. My personal highlight was diving in the Mjini Marine Reserve though and getting to know the beautiful area around Chole."

Helpful Report

Thanks for your lovely review Victoria. Here at Wayfairer Travel we pride ourselves for tailoring our itineraries to the needs of the client and we are pleased to hear this elevated the quality of your holiday.
We would be happy to help you for any future plans.

Carmen

"Superbly arranged holiday by Wayfairer Travel. Your knowledge and experience of Tanzania meant that you picked superb and very different locations for us, all of which complimented each other but gave vastly different experiences. By booking through you it meant we never had to think about any travel arrangements outside getting to our local airport!! Would recommend anyone booking this type of holiday to book through you"

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Thank you for your great review Elaine. I'm really pleased that you had such a superb holiday and we would be thrilled to help you with any future travel plans.

Tom

"I was referred by the Responsible Travel Company to several travel agents, but Wayfairer were the only one who really listened to what I wanted, went away and come back quickly with a fantastic itinerary. I outlined my budget, where I wanted to spend more/less, how long I had, what I liked and what I was thinking of, and Thea put together a perfect trip to Tanzania for safari and then onto Zanzibar for the beach. All the flights, pick up from the airport, numerous local transfers and a couple of day trips were included for me, so I really didn't have to do anything! It was all presented to me in a beautiful little booklet with all the detail. These days, when you can lose weeks trawling the internet, it is well worth having someone who knows the areas and the hotels, has contacts in the region and can do it all for you, much better than you ever could do yourself. Thea kept in contact throughout including whilst we were away, and we knew we had backup if there were any problems. She didn't make me feel silly about asking lots of questions. She even organised a few surprises for my birthday when my friends contacted her and asked her to help. The service from Wayfairer was superb throughout and I'd definitely recommend them to anyone."

1 Helpful Report

Thank you so much for such a complimentary review! It was a pleasure to organise such a special trip for you and to work closely with your friend to make your trip that extra special for your birthday. Please don't hesitate to contact us again about any future travel plans and we will be delighted to help.

Thea

"Wayfairer organised a trip to Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam for our family of five (ages 51 to 12) across 10 venues over three weeks. The itinerary was imaginative and varied, the guides were excellent, the transport and accommodation were perfect. We took a chance and trusted the activity, venue and hotel recommendations of Harry from Wayfairer and we were not disappointed. The hotel was not without its glitches but even these were ironed out with professionalism and efficiency without ever losing focus on our requirements. A great holiday was underpinned by a first class service."

Helpful Report

Thank you for this great review Ronan. I'm delighted that you enjoyed the variety and imagination in your itinerary: these are elements we're really proud of here at Wayfairer. I'm also really pleased that you enjoyed the service we offer and that we were able to deal efficiently with the hotel issues encountered. Please do get in touch with us again for any future holiday plans as we would be thrilled to plan another great holiday for your family.

Harry

"Our Wayfairer holiday to Northern Tanzania and Zanzibar was fabulous! We loved every part of it! The flights via Dubai were good and this will become easier when Emirates move the Fly Dubai flights into their terminal at the airport. We had a short delay on the way out which made our timings a bit tight. The way back was fine, plenty of time for our transfer at Dubai. Rivertrees Country Inn at Arusha was excellent for a recovery day, we regretted not taking an extra day in Arusha and would definitely do that another time. Food was great here, we rested up for the day and it was very comfortable. Esto from Asilia met us day 2, he was wonderful throughout. Our first day at Lake Manyara was a good entry point - we got very close to elephants, monkeys and baboons. The tree walkway was interesting, and good to get out of the car. Endoro Lodge was comfortable and the service was good. We left here late morning the next day for Ngorogoro - which was spectacular. The walk on the rim with the ranger was fabulous, he really was able to help us to understand the area and to see more of the flora. We got quite close to some zebra on our walk. Ang’Ata camp was very comfortable, the tent was great. The only thing is that it is cold - you are 2400m up, we were just about ok clothes wise, but would advise people to bring some gloves and a hat - at dinner guests were wrapped in blankets. It was fabulous to get back to the tent to find a hot water bottle in the bed for each of us. Food was great again. The crater was, as promised, breathtaking. We saw our first lions here and rhinos in the distance. The fourth of the ‘big 5’ came to see us in the camp later, a large male buffalo having a laze in the grass. The camp took our security and safety very seriously which was impressive. The drive to the Serengeti was full of changing landscapes. We stopped off for an hour or so at Oldupai/Olduvai, this was a change of focus away from game drives and allowed us to see a significant paleoanthropological site and museum; it would have been a real shame to miss this and it didn’t take time out of our game viewing day, as we did a game drive on the way to Kati Kati camp. The camp was very comfortable, hot showers offered morning and evening. It was much warmer down here, but still chilly in the morning and evening. Food was great here, they ran a good system for lunches where they had a lunch buffet and packed what you wanted (good to cut out waste). We saw the last of the ‘big 5’ - lucky enough to see leopards (two leopards in two trees a male and a female). Lots of elephants, lions, giraffes, a cheetah, antelopes, gazelles, water bucks, buffaloes. We saw a pride of lions with their kill from night before. We met a rhino ranger towards the south of the park, this was interesting and brings into focus the challenges of protecting these beasts. The flight from Seronera via Arusha to Zanzibar was uneventful. We had cut down on our luggage and only had the 15kg each - nobody weighed it!! We could have afforded a bit more stuff for Ngorogoro!! I guess the point here is not to take the mickey, nobody will mind if you’re a little over, but turn up with obviously too much they might get upset!! Stonetown was a shock to the system, but fabulous. Busy, crumbling, bustling. We walked around without any problems, we almost had to have a word with ourselves to remind ourselves not to treat this place like London!! There were people trying to get us to go into their shops, but no one really put any effort into pressuring us!! There are some fabulous places to eat and these are really good value. We wandered, visited the hammam, the slave market and the fort. The House of Wonders is closed for renovation and we ran out of time and energy for the museum. Kholle House hotel is beautiful and comfortable, breakfasts were good and it was very close to everything. To be fair, in Stonetown, everything is close to everything! On the drive to the beach we did a Spice tour - this was interesting. Pongwe Beach was wonderful! We did very little for the five days we had there. Staff were fabulous (could’nt do enough for you), the room was lovely, the beach was glorious, the meals excellent. Would definitely recommend a few days here at the end of a busy itinerary. I really enjoyed seeing the bush babies in the bar - they come to get fruit every evening. All in all a great holiday, we have loads of photos which we need to sort through, had great experiences and wonderful memories. Wayfairer, Tom specifically, have been fantastic and arranged an amazing itinerary for us, and while it wasn’t cheap it was, most certainly, excellent value for money. Everything worked seamlessly. Would recommend them as providing something personal to us which worked like clockwork. What a fabulous country Tanzania is, we would definitely go back."

Helpful Report

Jo! Thank you so much for this wonderful review with so much detail in there. We really do appreciate it and I am so pleased for you that your holiday was such a fantastic success. Please do feel free to get in touch with any future holiday plans as we would be delighted to help.

Tom

"We were referred to Wayfairer Travel via Rosie's Responsible Travel when I enquired about agents who could help us plan a trip to South Africa for our family of four (including two teenagers). I contacted Tom at Wayfairer in addition to a couple of other recommended agents with our ideas for the trip and Tom came back with a good plan at a reasonable price, and when I contacted him regarding some amendments and the fact that we would need the price to come down a little he immediately came back with a revised plan. This response is why we chose Wayfairer and we were not disappointed. Tom arranged the flights, accommodation and car hire for our trip which was over a two week period beginning in Cape Town and self-driving down the garden route to finish at a game reserve near Port Elizabeth. The flight prices seemed competitive and we were blown away by the accommodation that Tom arranged for us. We stayed mostly in small boutique style hotels that were elegant and contemporary, although still warm and friendly, some of which had the most fantastic views (nothing like watching whales in the bay whilst eating your breakfast!). We also stayed on an ostrich farm which added a real element of interest and history and again, was incredibly welcoming with fantastic views over the terrain. Whilst our safari lodge was a very different style of accommodation, being an old 1900's lodge with rather temperamental plumbing and gaps around the windows, the rooms were a good size, the homely atmosphere wonderful and the food fantastic - we soon forgot about any minor irritations and felt very much at home. And the game reserve itself (and drives) was absolutely out of this world - the most memorable part of our trip. Whilst Tom did offer to source the various other activities we were interested in booking (whale watching, hiking up table mountain, Robben Island tour, etc) we did find it more competitive to book these ourselves and perhaps my only negative comment would be that on occasion Tom took a while to come back to us when tuning the finer details of our trip, but to be fair the company was moving offices during this time and he did apologise. The information that came with our final itinerary was very useful and relevant to our visit to South Africa with some great travel tips for that area. All in all I would definitely recommend Tom at Wayfairer Travel when booking a holiday to South Africa."

Helpful Report

Thank you for this fantastic review Janine. We really appreciate the level of detail you've gone in to and it is great to hear that you had such a fantastic holiday in South Africa. Please don't hesitate to contact us again about any future travel plans and we will be delighted to help.

Tom

"I just wanted to say thanks for putting together a memorable trip for Lorna, Jack and me - we loved all of it and it was a perfect holiday for Lorna’s 50th birthday year. The lodges were really friendly places and very helpful to deal with a wheelchair user as a guest - Kitela was a lot of fun and the Four Seasons surpassed our very high expectations, it is just spectacular! Oh and they laid on a herd of elephants for us as we entered the lodge :) All the best with your business, hope to be in touch in the future to plan another trip,"

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Thank you for your fantastic review Steve. I'm delighted that the holiday was such a success and we look forward to helping you with your future holiday plans.

Tom

"Tom at Wayfairer planned our perfect honeymoon for us. He was quick at initially responding and understood exactly what we wanted for our honeymoon. His suggestions and plans were always sensible and helpful and he kept in touch with us from start to finish. We wanted to do a safari and he organised an unforgettable trip to the Masai Mara. Everything went smoothly without a single glitch thanks to all his hard work so we were able to completely switch off, relax and enjoy our honeymoon. We stayed for two nights at Saruni Wild, a luxury rented lodge in the heart of the Masai Mara. I’ll never forget falling asleep to the sound of lions hunting! Our luxury tent was incredible and we even had hot showers on demand, a rarity in the thick of it on the Mara! Our last two nights were spent at Saruni Mara with wonderful views of the Mara planes and it was hands down the best “hotel” I have ever stayed in. To top it off the staff were so kind and went above and beyond to make our trip special. Our three course lunches and dinner every day were delicious and it was no chore for them that my husband is gluten intolerant. The guides are extremely knowledgeable, we got up close and personal to dozens of wild animals and we felt very safe in their hands and appreciated their respect for the wildlife. One of our favourite things was sundowners with the lions and breakfast with the hippos. Tom also organised a hot air balloon ride over the Masai Mara and it completely blew us both away, it was phenomenal. I cried leaving Kenya because I was heart broken to be leaving such a wonderful place after the amazing time we had and it was all down to Toms hard work and planning. He really did create the perfect honeymoon for us in every aspect and we will be forever thankful!"

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Thank you so much for this wonderful review Hayley. I'm absolutely delighted that you had such a magical experience in Kenya on your honeymoon. Wishing you all the very best in married life.

Tom

"Overall the quality of service, location and general organisation was outstanding. It was nice to meet and dine with other guests and Saruni personnel, which added to the experience. Everyone was very kind and welcoming. The trips between lodges were also seamless. Wayfairer organised all of this at extremely short notice (2 days)!"

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Thank you so much for the great review and I am so pleased we managed to send you away on such an amazing holiday despite the last minute nature. Hopefully we can take you off on further Wayfairer holidays in the future.

Thea

"Wayfairer were given a huge challenge to arrange a 5 week holiday for us in South Africa with some very specific places we wanted to visit. They were prepared to listen to our demands and also to advise on many things that we were unsure about. We stayed in 14 different places all together and the accommodation arranged for us was perfect. The car hire was also arranged for us and our itinerary planned in detail with maps and detailed driving instructions given. Essentially, for a long complicated holiday we did not experience any problems and Wayfairer obviously played a key role in this with their prior arrangements. This allowed us to focus on enjoying the whole holiday, which is one of the best we have ever had! Thank you Wayfairer!"

Helpful Report

Thank you so much for the brilliant review and I'm so happy we managed to create this wonderful itinerary for you! It was great to hear all about your different locations and the amazing experiences you had. I can't wait to help organise the next adventure.

Leonie

"They provided a first class experience, which was personalised, of the right quality and they were ready and accessible to support us from day one to the end of the holiday. During the planning of our holiday they proved to be knowledgeable, responsive, understanding and ultimately very competitive compared to other agencies. The information pack they provided was detailed, helpful and meant we were well prepared for our trip. Whilst we were away they were always on hand to respond to questions and to the minor hiccups that we encountered (which were not of their making). Bottom line, they took the stress out of the holiday and made it much more enjoyable for us. Their service is simply excellent; we are lucky to have travelled the world and this is the best support we have encountered."

Helpful Report

Thank you so much for such a wonderful review and beautiful photo. It was a pleasure to design and assist with such a special trip and I hope that we can send you on further travels in the future.

Thea

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