Okay, so you've picked your country (hopefully, if not you can read more about that here.). Now it's time to pick a company for your trek. For the sake of this article, we will talk about our research for companies in Rwanda.
So we are going to Rwanda! Now what? Picking your specific tour company is another obstacle to research before you are ready to go. Our suggestion is to make a list of what is important to you and then start reaching out for quotes. Set up phone calls to speak with a representative directly; it should give you a better feeling for what the company offers and the type of people that work for them.
The number one priority for us was making sure we were going with a local group. If you don’t feel like doing the research yourself, we can’t recommend Treks2Rwanda enough.
Rather than contracting out guides for specific safaris, T2R employs a handful of local guides they personally know and train. Also, they will never book outside of their capacity. If a guide isn’t available, you will need to look at different dates for your safari.
On top of only employing local guides, T2R’s parent company, Access2Tanzania has a wonderful social mission, ProjectZawadi, a non-profit organization aimed to provide educational opportunities to orphaned and vulnerable children in Tanzania. They are currently working on expanding their mission to Rwanda.
Your guide can make or break your experience and to say that our guide, Tim, and our driver, Cyrus, made our experience would be the understatement of the year. They were incredible and we owe our beautiful memories made during our three day adventure to them (and of course, the gorillas).