Roika Tarangire Tented Lodge

Very poor

2.0

− Menagment of that lodge don't telling clients that is extra payment for National Park. They don't give any information on their account and during the booking. Disappointing and feeling that somebody is stilling money from Your pocket.

Amazing stay, I recommend it

9.0

Amazing hospitality and care from the Maasai family. We felt at home.

DO NOT BOOK! A bogus listing by a tour agency that misrepresents an otherwise legitimate lodge

3.0

The lodge is a luxurious "camp" site in a Wildlife Management Area that would probably be fine to visit if booked indirectly through a tour operator. Unfortunately it seems to have affiliated with a scammy of agency in Arusha which misinforms customers about its actual location.

− The listing is something of a scam, in that the lodge is actually located about 15km inside a Wildlife Management Area, NOT at the entrance to the Tarangire park as indicate in the Booking.com map. Much worse is that the WMA cannot be entered without paying additional fees, which are quite high for foreigners; in our case it added $75 to the booking cost ($30 per person, $15 for a vehicle, per day). None of this was disclosed in advance, and in fact the listing seems designed to mislead visitors by showing the lodge as if it were located outside the park and says nothing about these additional WMA fees. Most problematic was that upon arrival we were detained at the WMA gate by the park staff, whom the Roika online team had not bothered to inform of our booking. We were detained again upon leaving since the people at the gate had nobody on staff who knew how to process the $75 entrance fee. In all this time, the Roika management did not answer their phone or check WhatsApp messages. They did not respond to phone calls from the WMA gate staff, nor did they respond to phone calls from their own staff at the lodge during the evening we stayed there. We collectively lost 2 precious hours on our trip due to these problems caused by the totally irresponsible management of the Roika hotel's internet booking staff.

30 USD per person per day must be added to the hotel rate for entering the hotel area. The hotel

5.0

The location is great, easy access to Tarangire National Park.

− Since we were traveling independently, we booked the hotels ourselves. At the time of booking, there was no comment from the hotel that in order to enter the hotel area you have to pay an entrance fee of 30 American dollars per person per day. Not even after approving the booking. Although this cost is paid to the National Park Reserve and is not directly related to the hotel, it was not possible to enter the hotel without this payment. !!!The total amount was 200USD and in addition to the Tarangire National Park entrance fee!!! When we complained to the reception manager, we received a careless answer: "it's just money". Payment at the gate can only be done in cash in Tanzanian shillings. Since we asked to pay in dollars or by credit card, we were sent to the reservation office, a two-hour drive away, just to pay it. The hotel did not help us in any way in the matter. Food in general and lunch box in particular, which was very poor comparing to other hotels with the same rate.

Payment issues

6.0

They did not have our booking(pre paid) which is understandable somewhat because they are out in the middle of no where, but there was no attempt on the staffs part to help fix the problem. we ended up leaving 1.5 hours later than we wanted and paid with a Card(got a refund from Hotels.com). the hotel needs to have better service. The refund from hotels.com was easy and service on there side great.

Guest review

2.0

We checked in and the following morning as we are ready to go for our safari game drive, Henry (manager) and another lady told us that they did not receive our reservation and requested for us to make payments in cash.In the midst of this, I found out while searching through my email that someone from The property has indeed received my reservation as their staff named Frederick replied to one of the query which I’ve sent through Expedia app. Refused to let us leave until we settled the payment. This went on for about 1.5 hrs, depleting the time we have left for today as we r on a tight schedule. We ended up paying in cash as soon as we got a confirmation from Expedia that they are going to refund our initial payments/ excess of what we are paying for in cash (as my initial payment rate is lower than rate quoted by hotel). Their ability to resolve the issue was extremely slow and unprofessional. Room wise, we would rate them 1 Star. The fan provided to us is faulty and it made a lot of noise when it’s running. The fan had duct tape on to hold it together but it was vibrating the wooden floor. The generator only runs til 10pm and the fan will not work beyond that. The air is rather still here so this is a big minus for us. The room is old and tired and some simple basic maintenance or upkeep could have made a significant difference.