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My First Experience with Booking.com
Very quickly I came across TanzanIce Farm Lodge, a lodge in Karatu that I had seen advertised many times on the internet for about a month or so prior.
It had VERY good user ratings, but I couldn’t find much else about the lodge online.
Their website didn’t look particularly professional. When I tried to call the numbers listed on it, no one answered the phone.
Hmmm…It wasn’t looking good.
Except…I didn’t have a lot of time left before my trip, AND…I kept seeing a message on the listing that said “Reservation possible without a credit card”.
For many of you reading this, Booking.com is hardly newsworthy.
After all, it is one of the largest travel e-commerce companies in the world.
In my parts of Africa, though, where so much of our world is not mapped online and many online services require tools that many of us don’t have, such as credit cards, using an online booking engine to book accommodation in a dusty little upcountry town, is not an obvious choice.
My plan was simply to find options online, call the properties on the phone for more information and, perhaps only then, make a reservation.
After all, being Tanzanian, I suspected I could get cheaper local rates over the phone, rates that would probably not be publicized online.
Photo Credits: MB-one