What a private safari actually costs

The short answer

Our six private safaris run from $1,980 to $5,480 per person, for four to ten days. That is roughly $389 to $783 per person per day, with the vehicle and guide exclusive to your group.

The spread is not arbitrary. It comes from four things: how many days, which camps, which season, and whether the route crosses into Kenya. The rest of this page walks through each one so you can read a quote properly instead of guessing at it.

What the published price already includes

Every price on this site is per person sharing, and covers the things that usually appear later as extras on a cheaper quote:

• • All national park and crater fees
• • A private 4x4 Land Cruiser with a pop-up roof
• • An English-speaking safari guide for your group alone
• • Lodges and camps as listed in the itinerary
• • All meals as listed, plus drinking water
• • Airport transfers and government taxes
• • Flying-doctor emergency evacuation cover

What it does not include

Five things sit outside the price, and they are the same five on every quote we send:

• • International flights and visa fees
• • Travel insurance
• • Tips for your guide and camp staff
• • Alcoholic drinks and laundry
• • The Serengeti balloon safari, if you add it

The six trips, by price

These are the current published prices, per person sharing:

• • Ngorongoro Crater Escape — 4 days — $1,980 — Tarangire and a dawn descent onto the crater floor.
• • Tanzania Classic Safari — 7 days — $2,840 — the northern circuit: Tarangire, Serengeti, Ngorongoro.
• • Kenya's Maasai Mara — 6 days — $3,120 — the Mara and Amboseli, guided from Nairobi.
• • Safari & Zanzibar — 10 days — $3,890 — the northern circuit followed by four nights on the coast.
• • Serengeti Migration Safari — 8 days — $4,260 — two nights in the northern Serengeti for the river crossings.
• • Luxury Serengeti & Crater — 7 days — $5,480 — the same route with suite-level camps and a slower rhythm.

What moves the number

Length. A longer trip lowers the per-day cost, because the fixed parts — park fees, vehicle, guide, transfers — spread over more days. Our ten-day trip is the cheapest per day on the list; the four-day escape is the most expensive.

Season. July, August, the first half of October and the Christmas weeks are peak. The same camp can cost meaningfully more in August than in March, and the difference is often larger than the difference between two camp tiers in the same month.

Camp tier. Mid-range tented camps and suite-level lodges are not the same product. Moving from mid-range to luxury on the same route is the single biggest jump in our list: $2,840 to $5,480 for the same seven days.

Country. Kenya's park fees and conservancy fees are charged per night and are higher than Tanzania's in the Mara ecosystem. A short Kenya add-on can cost more per day than the Tanzanian circuit it follows.

How you move. A private vehicle and guide is the default here. Shared game drives are cheaper, but they fix your schedule to other people's and usually mean a larger vehicle.

Why the cheapest quote is rarely the cheapest trip

When two quotes for the same seven days differ by a third, the difference is usually not margin. It is one of these:

• • Park fees excluded and billed on arrival
• • A camp outside the park, adding two hours of driving each way
• • A shared vehicle instead of a private one
• • Fewer meals included, or water billed per bottle
• • No evacuation cover
• • A guide paid per day rather than employed by the operator

How we quote, and what we need from you

Send your dates, how many people are travelling, and a rough budget. We reply within one working day with an itemised proposal: route, camps, nights, what is included, and the total per person. There is no booking fee.

To hold a date we take a 20% deposit. The balance is due 45 days before arrival. Cancellation is free up to 60 days before travel; after that the lodges' own terms apply.

If the first quote is above your budget, say so. We would rather change the season or the camp tier than quietly remove the park fees and surprise you later.

If the budget is tight, change these first

In order of how much they save without damaging the trip: travel in March, April or November rather than August; keep the same route but move one tier down on camps; add a day to lower the per-day cost; and skip the balloon, which is the most expensive single optional extra on the list.

What we would not cut is the private vehicle or the park fees. Both change the trip itself rather than the comfort around it.