The Encompass experience
Planning an African safari is unlike booking a European summer holiday or an island escape to the Maldives.
This is a vast, complex continent where every choice matters. The difference between a good safari and one that stays with you for life often comes down to a single decision made months, sometimes years, before you even board the plane.
For more than sixteen years, we’ve made it our focus to ensure that the decision is the right one.
This is what it looks like to travel with us.
STEP ONE
The conversation that starts everything
It begins with a simple conversation.
No forms, no brochures, no sales pitch. It’s just a genuine exchange with someone who knows Africa intimately.
We call it your safari briefing, though it feels far more like a chance to dream out loud. Share what you’ve always wanted to see, feel and experience in Africa. We listen carefully, and nothing is forgotten.
This is where your journey takes shape, and it’s a complimentary, no-obligation conversation that sets everything in motion.
Start your conversation
STEP TWO
Your personal Africa specialist
One person, your person and for the entire journey. Backed by a talented team.
From the moment we connect, you will have a dedicated Africa specialist who owns your journey from first call to final flight. We’re not a call centre, not a rotating team. One person who knows your story, remembers your preferences and is genuinely invested in getting this right. Plus, you then have the support of our talented team and the five-star guest service you will quickly grow accustomed to.
Our team brings over 85 combined years of living, guiding and designing journeys across Africa. When your specialist recommends something, it is because they have stood there, asked the hard questions and decided it is worthy of you.
Then the magic begins. Your specialist takes time to design and curate a collection of images, videos and inspiration. This is like a carefully designed window into what’s possible and built entirely around your brief. It’s designed to inspire and to make the possibilities feel real rather than theoretical.
While you explore the collection, we’re already in conversation with camps, conservancies and guides checking availability, asking questions that matter and assembling the pieces of something that is building something genuinely and specifically yours.
Every client receives up to two complimentary proposals. If something needs refining, it is done because getting it right takes priority over getting it done quickly.
STEP THREE
Your itinerary, built from scratch
No templates, no packages and no compromises.
We start with a blank sheet of paper and your dreams.
Every destination, every camp and lodge, every experience and activity has been handpicked for you specifically, not pulled from a database, not assembled by an algorithm. We draw on relationships built over decades with the finest properties, guides and partners across the continent.
We will share options (remember the Choose Your Own Adventure books?), talk through the thinking behind each one, and refine the itinerary until every detail feels exactly right for you. You can be as involved or as hands-off as you like. Either way, nothing is confirmed until you are completely satisfied.
When you’re ready to press GO, it’s a 30% deposit securing your land arrangements and your journey becomes officially, excitingly real! Are you ready?
STEP FOUR
The details effortlessly handled
Everything comes together and you leave the complexity to us.
Flights, transfers, visa guidance and pre-departure documentation… every element is seamlessly managed. Dietary requirements are shared with each lodge, every connection is confirmed, and you’ll always know exactly who is meeting you and when.
We anticipate what matters and take care of it, often before you’ve even thought to ask, with a few thoughtful surprises along the way.
Before you depart, you’ll receive a beautifully designed digital itinerary with every detail at your fingertips: stays, transfers, experiences and key contacts. Consider it both your guide for the journey and a keepsake for years to come.
All that’s left for you to do is look forward to what lies ahead.
STEP FIVE
With you every step
Our support doesn’t end at departure
You have 24/7 access to your specialist, our directors and a trusted network of on-the-ground partners in the countries you’re visiting. This means people who know the destination and logistics intimately.
If plans need to shift, we handle it seamlessly. If an extraordinary opportunity arises, we make sure you don’t miss it.
Africa is dynamic, wild and wonderfully unpredictable. With the right people behind you, you’re free to embrace every moment with complete confidence.
STEP SIX
Welcome home
Your journey may end, but our relationship doesn’t.
When you return, we’ll be in touch not with a survey link, but for a genuine conversation, just as it began. We want to hear what moved you, what surprised you and what stayed with you long after you left. These insights matter. They shape how we refine our journeys, strengthen our partnerships and continue to raise the standard. As we often say behind the scenes, we’re only as good as our last safari, which is why every journey we curate matters.
More often than not, it’s also the beginning of planning your next African adventure.
Making a difference one safari at a time
Africa has a way of getting into people.
Once it does, once you have watched the sun rise over the Serengeti or sat in silence in the presence of a mountain gorilla or felt the particular stillness of the bush at dusk, ordinary travel rarely satisfies in quite the same way again.
We have built Encompass Africa around that truth. And we would love to share it with you.