Our team of local and dedicated professionals
Oreta Adventures and Safari LTD
Mountain, Safari, Beaches & Culture
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Our challenge was to climb both Mount Meru and Mount Kilimanjaro our reward was a 3 day safari. Oreta provided its support, expertise, friendship and enthusiasm. Every member of our party of 5 achieved both summits thanks to Oreta’s wonderful Guides and Porters.
Oreta’s tour consultants, Renalda and Lema, supported us throughout our trip planning, in regular contact by email as we developed our itinerary. Always great advice and prompt replies.
Lema also cared for us on our days in Moshi, arranged the Hotel, transport to and from the airport and local excursions – this made the whole trip completely trouble free.
Meru is a fantastic mountain. At 4566m it provides excellent acclimatisation. The views are spectacular – especially of Kilimanjaro. Wild life is abundant – giraffe, elephant, baboon, monkey, buffalo, zebra. The route is straightforward and the huts are in great condition. It is a great opportunity to get used to high altitude climbing and to get used to your kit.
We chose to climb Kilimanjaro by the Rongai Route. It is the longest ascent and therefore the most successful. It is much quieter than the routes up the south side. It takes you to the foot of Mawenzi Peak and a camp by Mawenzi Tarn which is spectacular. We camped in tents provided by Oreta and ate wonderful Tanzanian food expertly cooked by Ramadani. The final day was hard – VERY hard – but all 5 of us reached the summit at 9 am after 8 hours of climbing and witnessed a wonderful dawn on the way up.
Our Guides, Hebron, Gabriel and Beatus were fantastic. Clearly highly experienced, patient, kind and very safe. Our porters capable, competent, warm and friendly. Oreta is known to pay its porters very well and to support them in gaining qualifications – this was an important factor in our decision to use Oreta.
We planned to see the Ngorogoro Crater Park, but Oreta advised us to visit Tarangeri Park as well. Thank you, Oreta, our closest and best wild life experiences were at Tarangeri and at Arusha Park around Meru.
Oreta Adventures is based in Moshi. It is run by local people and employs local guides and porters. The company is competent, experienced and very safe. I cannot thank them enough.
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Oreta adventures of Kilimanjaro provided me with their best guide, (Gabriel). As an “older” 60 year old Trekker my success wasn’t guaranteed. Gabriel and the crew of Oreta genuinely cared for my well being and I successfully summitted. We had 7 inches of snow dump on us at midnight when heading out on final day. Tough conditions which had other guides following Gabriel as he’s so well respected. Can’t say enough about him. I’ve made some suggestions regarding food provided so that they can outstep the 750 or more guide companies and I hope they adopt some of the suggestions. I also hope that they do follow the guidelines and pay their staff the recommended salary. Finally. Oreta is a trustworthy guide company that will look after your needs well.
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My dad, husband and I just recently returned from a 2-week trip to Tanzania, all organized through Oreta. Let me start out by simply saying how AMAZING Oreta and our trip was!
Lema and Renalda (the owners of Oreta) were extremely responsive from day one and ensured all our questions were answered before we arrived. Oreta Adventures is a locally owned and operated company (meaning 100% of their revenue supports their local economy) and they are part of KPAP – an organization that supports socially responsible Kilimanjaro expeditions (e.g. fair wages for porters). These were two main reasons we chose them and I am so glad we did!
For our Kilimanjaro climb, we chose the 7-day Lemosho route. We had 14 people supporting the three of us all the way: our two amazing guides Beatus and Peter, our outstanding cook ManX (I have never eaten such delicious soups in my life!), and our ever-so-strong and friendly porters Julius (also our waiter who ensured we had whatever we needed), Johnson (our camper who ensured we got the best camp sites by starting out earlier than the rest), Pius, Amadeus, Abel, Erasmus, Godfrey, Yuda, Hatibu, Hamza, and Bamo. Our crew honestly made our trip! We got to know so much about Tanzania, their culture and local customs, and they were the most supportive, friendly crew you could ever ask for! We went during the dry season but got unlucky with the weather whereby it rained or snowed 5 out of 7 days (be sure to bring rain gear and gaiters even if you are going during the dry season!). But, they never stopped smiling and encouraging us all the way! All three of us made it to the summit without any problems thanks to the amazing food and support we received. They are also very safety conscious and every night they checked our oxygen levels and heart rate and had us fill out a quick form to keep track of how we were doing each day. Despite it being much colder and wetter than any of us had anticipated we had a phenomenal time and were able to tick this great achievement off our bucket list!
For our safari, we chose their 5-day trip. At this point in time my mum also joined us, and we had another fellow traveler come along who had just done the Kilimanjaro hike. For the five of us we had our two safari guides Kazi and Dickson and our chef George. Once again, the food was outstanding, and our guides were so knowledgeable and friendly. We saw so many lions and other wildlife up close. At one of our camps the hyenas and zebras even walked right past our tents while we were going to sleep! The only change I would make is that I wish we had spent two nights at each of the camps to make it a little more relaxing after our Kili hike.
We are definitely hoping to come back one day to plan another trip with Oreta – and to hopefully see some of our porters have fulfilled their dream of becoming a guide themselves. Thank you Oreta!
Our team of local and dedicated professionals
Ombeni Lema, commonly known as Lema is the founder and a head supervisor of the company. His dream to run a touring company started when he was pursuing his safari guiding training at Roral Institute of Tourism and Hotel Management back in 2008. After he finished his course, job hunting was not easy and he decided to go on the mountain as a porter for sometimes, the experience which fueled him to re-think and put in action the dream of running a tour company after he learned how porters on the mountain are mistreated. He remembers very well the day he returned from the mountain after spending good ten days on Kilimanjaro, by Lemosho route with severe cold and end paid half of his wages while he had planned for it even before the trip end.
However, a little education he had then did not help him a lot. He had an opportunity to volunteer in one of ‘after trek tipping ceremonies’ by translating Swahili (Tanzania national language) to English for the clients to understand what the guides and porters were saying to them, and English to Swahili language for the porters to understand what clients were saying to them. It was then, one of the mountain guides saw him and asked him to volunteer to his orphanage center. It was very fine for Lema to start during the low season since no mountain trips during the time.
On the course of working at the orphanage center, one of the directors of the center from the United States, Dr. Gregory Higgins realized how kids loved him, and he wanted him to work there for a long time. He knew how Lema was talented and when Lema stopped working at the orphanage center, Dr. Gregory Higgins asked him what he wants to do, and Lema said he wants to go to college.
Lema went to Moshi University College of Cooperative and Business Studies and Dr. Gregory paid for his tuition fee for three years. In the collage, Lema started with a certificate in Accounting and Management course and the remaining two years he went for Diploma in Microfinance Management. The courses and the mountain experience were good enough for Lema to Implement his vision of starting the touring company and today, he is happy to take care of Oreta Adventures’ clients as well as porters.
With porters’ mistreatment on the mountain in his mind, Lema has become a KPAP member and makes sure each Kilimanjaro trip Oreta has must be monitored by a porters from KPAP to make sure that they all treated well on the mountain, carries no more than 20kgs, receive the KPAP recommended wages and they have three meals each day while on mountain.
It is amazing how the passion for nature can grow internally and change a person completely. Renalda went to Majengo primary school when she was a kid. Her secondary school was JK Nyerere for four years. At her secondary school, when she thought about a professional carrier, she believed to be a doctor. Unfortunately, she found her self going for teaching. She got her Bachelor of Art with Education at the University of Dar es Salaam. Before she drops her teaching carrier for secondary schools which she has been doing for past 10 years, she had an opportunity to visit the USA as a Fulbright foreign language teaching assistant at the University of Florida for one year.
When she returned to Tanzania, she had her first safari trip to Tarangire, Serengeti and Ngorongoro crater and since then, she fell in love with nature and beautiful parks the Tanzania country have. After learning for some time, Renalda has become a prominent person in responding to clients enquires and accommodation in general. No doubt that if you write to us, you will meet her through e-mail.
Annyseth Dida a.k.a “Magufuli” joined Oreta in 2017 and since then, he has consistency exceeding the company expectations both in leading the office’s work and ground logistics. With the management skills and business background he has, he has helped the company to excel and no doubt that the company will go with him for many years to come. Anytime your trek or safari going smoothly, it is Didas’ behind it.