Escarpment Luxury Lodge — Hotel in Arusha

We went on a 10 day wildlife safari with Lions King Adventures. The tourist was Leonard, he was very nice, very professional and friendly. The entire trip was so wonderful and enjoyable except for dinner Escarpment Luxury Lodge on Dec29,2024. So shameless and unreasonably unfair as if we didn’t pay for the dinner. We arrived at the hotel around 6:00 pm. It was already past 6:15 when registration was completed.||We were told there was a show at 6:30. So we quickly put our luggage into the rooms because we didn't want to be late for the show. We had room #19; our daughter's room was right across from us, maybe #17. When we rushed back to the dining room, there were only two tables of customers sitting in the front, facing the performance stage downstairs. We asked a lanky waitress walking around there if we could sit next to them and she said no. She then asked for our rooms’ numbers and we told her. She said we couldn't have the front ones because all the good tables were reserved. She pointed very carelessly to a table in the far corner, said that that table for us. At the same time, two white guests arrived. She was more than happy to serve them white wine at the front table. We were completely ignored and stood there wondering where to sit. We told her nicely that if we were seated at the table we wouldn't be able to see the show. She told us to sit downstairs in front of the stage and then returned to that table to eat until the show was over. We listened to her. We went down and sat there, waiting and waiting. It was much later than 6:30, almost 7:00. If we had known the schedule would not be on time, we could have showered before the show the way we liked.||Regardless, we thoroughly enjoyed the show. We were asked to dance and sing with the performers on stage. We tipped them for their wonderful show. When we returned to the dining room upstairs, everyone else was sitting at their tables, enjoying their drinks in a relaxed manner. Our table was occupied.||There was no staff to look after us. We saw the same lanky waitress came over and asked her why the table she pointed out to us for our dinner had been taken away by someone else. She said rudely: "Why didn't you put things on the table?" She didn't invite us to sit down and drink in the first place, how did we know she was being mean or meaner? At this point, we noticed that there were no empty tables, they were all taken. We paid the bill already and we weren't welcome? ? ?||Most of the guests are white and Escarpment Luxury dining room staff clearly prefers white people to us yellow people. Is this called racism? Luckily I saw a table full of different suppliers. I asked a male staff if he could clean it and use it as our dining table. The table was not very stable and one leg was relatively short, so I asked the staff to use padding for balance. We finished our "luxury" dinner in no time. This was the only unpleasant and unexpected experience we had on our Tanzania safari. Please imagine if you were traveling in a foreign country and someone treated you badly and rudely meanwhile she tried to please other people like white in front of you. She would actually be sued for human rights...

We stayed at this accommodation for one night in our 10 day safari trip and it was the worst night by far. To start with, the place looked tired and the staff most certainly did not look happy to be there. The mosquito nets don't even cover the bed which defeats the purpose of having them. However, two other incidents during our stay their was really problematic:

i) My parents and I unfortunately found this lodge to be rather racist. When we arrived we were informed there would be a cultural and acrobatic show, which could be watched from the dining room patio. We left our bags in our room and went to the dining room where it was still empty. We were advised by a waitress that we could not sit at any of the tables overlooking the show, and that “our” table was at the very back corner where the show was not visible. We thought maybe tables were assigned by room and didn’t think much of it and proceeded to go down to the field to watch the show – braving the mosquitoes and waiting to have dinner later after the show. However, as we were walking down and from the field, we noticed guests who arrived later, were being offered all the tables at the patio overlooking the field where the show was, and that there was in fact no assigned seating. We finished the show and came back up to the patio to sit at our table, and found that another family was seated at our table. We asked the waitress, and she said along the lines of “oops I forgot you guys were there but it’s your problem – you didn’t leave any of your personal belongings there”. Initially she asked us to come back later to for dinner (it was already 8:15pm), and then eventually with us being upset, they put together a makeshift table that was incredibly wobbly, in the middle of dining buffet traffic. We couldn’t help but notice, we were the only non-white guests there, and the treatment towards us was incredibly different from the other guests. They walked the other guests through the buffet explaining the different foods and menus, offering drinks, etc. They completely ignored and avoided us.

In addition, every single accommodation we stayed at, it was assumed that our guide would join us for dinner. When we first told the waitress there would be 4 of us, as our guide would be joining us, she was very rude and was adamant that our guide wasn’t allowed to join us, that they have their own food. If we wanted him to join, we had pay for him. Her tone and behaviour aside, I found this policy in general puzzling – first, our guide was part of our group and second, that implicated the quality of food available to the guides were very different.

ii) We originally planned to stay two nights but shortened our stay before arriving as we made other plans. I wasn’t sure who to reach out to, so I did try to reach the lodge to inquire about their cancellation policy by social media and email, but never received a response. I tried to speak with a manager on the premises, and she was quite unhelpful overall, and kept insisting that they never received any communication from me, even when I tried to show her the messages I sent.

Overall, very disappointing stay, and would not...

We stayed at this accommodation for one night in our 10 day safari trip and it was the worst night by far. To start with, the place looked tired and the staff most certainly did not look happy to be there. The mosquito nets don't even cover the bed which defeats the purpose of having them. However, two other incidents during our stay their was really problematic:||i) My parents and I unfortunately found this lodge to be rather racist. When we arrived we were informed there would be a cultural and acrobatic show, which could be watched from the dining room patio. We left our bags in our room and went to the dining room where it was still empty. We were advised by a waitress that we could not sit at any of the tables overlooking the show, and that “our” table was at the very back corner where the show was not visible. We thought maybe tables were assigned by room and didn’t think much of it and proceeded to go down to the field to watch the show – braving the mosquitoes and waiting to have dinner later after the show. However, as we were walking down and from the field, we noticed guests who arrived later, were being offered all the tables at the patio overlooking the field where the show was, and that there was in fact no assigned seating. We finished the show and came back up to the patio to sit at our table, and found that another family was seated at our table. We asked the waitress, and she said along the lines of “oops I forgot you guys were there but it’s your problem – you didn’t leave any of your personal belongings there”. Initially she asked us to come back later to for dinner (it was already 8:15pm), and then eventually with us being upset, they put together a makeshift table that was incredibly wobbly, in the middle of dining buffet traffic. We couldn’t help but notice, we were the only non-white guests there, and the treatment towards us was incredibly different from the other guests. They walked the other guests through the buffet explaining the different foods and menus, offering drinks, etc. They completely ignored and avoided us.||In addition, every single accommodation we stayed at, it was assumed that our guide would join us for dinner. When we first told the waitress there would be 4 of us, as our guide would be joining us, she was very rude and was adamant that our guide wasn’t allowed to join us, that they have their own food. If we wanted him to join, we had pay for him. Her tone and behaviour aside, I found this policy in general puzzling – first, our guide was part of our group and second, that implicated the quality of food available to the guides were very different. ||ii) We originally planned to stay two nights but shortened our stay before arriving as we made other plans. I wasn’t sure who to reach out to, so I did try to reach the lodge to inquire about their cancellation policy by social media and email, but never received a response. I tried to speak with a manager on the premises, and she was quite unhelpful overall, and kept insisting that they never received any communication from me, even when I tried to show her the messages I sent. ||Overall, very disappointing stay, and would...