Reviews

Hi Leon. Just a brief but heartfelt thank you for a wonderful Holiday. It was brilliant from start to finish. Your patience, expertise and general Bonhomie were greatly appreciated as ever. Steve and Jennifer did a southern and northern circuit Tanzania safari with us in November 2023.

We had a fantastic trip. We loved every minute, and really enjoyed meeting our fellow travellers too. Thanks for your help in organizing it. We can’t wait to use Lawson's again! Dave and his daughter, Fran, joined us on our Tanzania's Northern Circuit safari in 2022. 

This was the trip of a lifetime. I would love to come back and have Lawson’s show me some other parts of Africa-perhaps Namibia. Not sure if I will be able to do it, but I’m already trying to figure out how. Dr Davis did a custom South Africa 'geology and wildlife' safari with us in March 2022.

Dear Leon,

The trip is slowly sinking in. We had a great one. The stage was set by the different habitats Eastern South Africa has to offer, but with your expertise you pulled out an amazing number of birds. Thanks to your knowledge of the calls and songs combined with a very sharp eye we had great success in finding the birds I wanted to see. Thank you for your efforts, it was a tiring but very rewarding 16 days. The tiredness will be forgotten, so all that remains are memories of a great trip (Eastern South Africa Endemics 2021).

• Nov. / Dec. 2025 / 2026: Eastern South Africa Endemics

My family and I (a group of six) just returned from a two week exclusive tour with Lawson’s Custom Safaris out of Nelspruit South Africa. Our trip was fabulous.... Lawson’s helped us with thoughtful and responsive answers to our many initial questions on how to schedule our time in South Africa... Our guide in Kruger was Leon Marais. Not only was he extremely knowledgeable in all kinds of wildlife, but also very personable - accommodating the many and varied requests of our diverse group. To boot, Leon is also an accomplished photographer and was helpful in setting up good scenes and light for the subjects in our photos. Lawson’s is a local South African tour agency that knows Southern Africa very well. We plan to return to the area and will for sure use Lawson’s again. Debra did a custom wildlife photo safari with us in August 2021.

'Rocked it' is an understatement!! I had the time of my life! I can't wait to return. Thank you Leon and Lawson's Safaris for helping me fulfill a life-long dream. Donna did a custom wildlife photo safari with us in August 2021, and we are pleased to have her booked on our Tanzania Wildlife Safari in November 2022.

Wildlife was at and above my expectations. I saw most of the mammals I had hoped to see (except Cheetah) and several that I didn’t expect. As regards birding I saw (mostly with the aid of my guide!) over 250 species on the Lawson’s tour (and nearly 400 in my 4 weeks in South Africa).

We saw an amazing variety of wildlife considering we only spent eight days on safari. It was particularly pleasing to see animals at such close quarters. It gave us a good opportunity to take some great pictures. Overall we thoroughly enjoyed the experience and so would like to rate it 10 on the Lawson Scale.

The quality & viewing were very good, it more than lived up to our expectations. We even enjoyed searching for the elusive lions! The driving in the bush was still very enjoyable & we did get to see a large pride in the end! Dave’s highlight – the leopard in the tree in the Kruger, also enjoyed the different varieties of birds which I wasn’t expecting.
Val’s highlights – mesmerised by the Giraffes, enthralled watching the Vervet Monkeys, the Elephants were so beautiful (but then, all the animals were!) and I simply loved the realization of a long held dream to do a safari.

I would definitely rate Lawson’s as a 10. I had no worries about my stay---being transported from the airport to meet Leon, being assigned a room, being driven around all day, talking about the wildlife with Leon, the opportunity to photograph, the smells, the sounds, the good food was just perfect.

I just wanted to let you know how impressed I was with John and Jason who led our tour for Naturetrek. Their knowledge was great and their attitude was fantastic. Every thought was given to our welfare and enjoyment without them making any great fuss. Their skills were greatly appreciated.

My wife and I recently took a two week safari in South Africa with Lawson’s and to say it exceeded our expectations is an understatement. The company and our guide, Leon, were professional, organized, knowledgeable, attentive and very thorough. We were interested in a trip that combined birding and mammal viewing. Lawson’s put together an itinerary that was perfect and included Mapungubwe National Park, the Kruger National Park and surrounding areas. The number of species of birds and mammals was fantastic. Leon was very knowledgeable about not only birds and mammals but natural history in general. He is a superb spotter and because of that we saw a great many birds and mammals we would not have otherwise. He knew the entire region intimately and took us on small roads to out of the way ponds and areas that held great birds and mammals. We would not hesitate to give Lawson’s the highest recommendation.

Great thanks to Leon for making it such a wonderful trip. He is so professional, punctual, friendly, patient (with non-expert birders), accommodating and fun to be with.

The tour went fantastically well and all of our American guests were very happy with the tour. It went like clockwork from start to finish. This was my 197th tour as a leader, so I know a little about bird tour leading. Your two guides, John and Bert, were very professional, had an encyclopaedic knowledge of the mammals, birds, trees and shrubs and even more important, they were both terrific individuals. I will have no hesitation in using your company again in the future.

It is only now on Sunday that I am enjoying a quiet few moments after our most successful trip to your part of the world, with huge thanks to you for all your help. Also, it was very kind of you to meet us at the airport on our arrival. You don’t know how overjoyed we were to see a kind and friendly face on our arrival at Nelspruit airport. Again, Mavourneen, Valerie and I cannot thank you enough for all the trouble you went to in arranging all our accommodation in the KNP – everything went like clockwork. I have to give a presentation to my local Glamorgan Wildlife Photographic Club where I shall also take the opportunity to promote Lawson’s Birding!!!!

Thanks to Nic’s and Kim’s help, we saw 333 species of birds, many mammals and reptiles, and a lot of very beautiful scenery and plant life. I liked the pacing of the trip and feel that I saw a great amount of wildlife in a short time.

Our guides Leon Marais and John Davies were the best; from finding the birds, to knowing the history of the areas to making sure that we were always comfortable – they were the greatest!

We would like to thank Mavourneen for all the help putting our holiday together. The tour was planned easily /efficiently; and you were prompt and informative especially following the floods in the Limpopo area. Leon Marais was excellent and made the whole trip very enjoyable. It felt more like travelling with a friend. His knowledge really was very good especially in the “Twitchier” portion.

In March 2014 I went on the “Butterflies of South Africa” tour with your company. It was an unforgettable experience and I wanted to express my thanks. I’d like to thank all the people in the office who organised and planned it. I’d like also like to thank our tour guides Bert and John who executed the plan so well. They were two lovely guys who were friendly, approachable, resourceful, and had the most incredible encyclopaedic knowledge of the fauna and flora of the country. Just totally awesome! Honestly I consider myself very fortunate to have met them.

The greatest guides I have ever had… and I have been on many guided trips. What a wonderful combination you made. Thanks again.

It was such a fine trip and you all did such a fine job that I want to thank you one last time for sharing all your expertise and making the experience so enjoyable for the people on my trip.

I cannot thank you and the rest of the team at Lawson’s enough for the wonderful experiences that you gave me over each of our trips. I have many wonderful memories which I will cherish. Without the extra support given to me I would not have been able to take part in this last tour which was without doubt the best ever and exactly the way that I could only have wished. You can be rest assured that I will continue to recommend Lawson’s to all and sundry as the only company to tour South Africa with.

I am writing to congratulate your company for providing a first-rate trip – great guides, excellent accommodations and a really amazing all round adventure.

Thanks again for a fantastic trip. It is definitely one of the best trips we have ever taken anywhere (and we go on a lot of holidays worldwide).