I am taking the family on an African safari this summer and considering renting a nice long lens for my DSLR. Looks like there are lots of options out there, anyone have any experiences with this?

Fair number of people do it, glass is expensive. If they have an insurance option, I'd recommend that.

What platform are you shooting from (Canon, Nikon, etc.)? What lenses are you looking at?

Nikon full frame SLR. Have a good 200mm lens, considering something longer for outdoor animal photography.

I think Lensrentals.com is the best of the best. Not cheap, but you can buy insurance for theft and damage when you sign up to rent.

Also - how long of a lens are we talking? and what DSLR are you using? The reason I ask is because a 100-400 f/5.6 may be something you'd just buy for the trip, while a 600 f/4 would cost you $12,000 and you'd be better off renting.

i just did a safari this past october and bought a used AF-P NIKKOR 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6E ED VR on ebay. it was fantastic for the safari, then sold it back on ebay after trip. Actually made 15 bucks off the whole deal.

I’ve been to Africa multiple times and bring several lenses for my Nikon DSLR.
I would highly recommend the 200-500mm lens if you can afford it and don’t mind the weight.

quote:

Originally posted by smlsig:
I’ve been to Africa multiple times and bring several lenses for my Nikon DSLR.
I would highly recommend the 200-500mm lens if you can afford it and don’t mind the weight.

I bought a refurbished Nikon 200-500 VR lens for my 2019 Africa trip and rented a second D7100 body to put it on. (Lens changes in the field are not recommended.) I got terrific results with that setup. (My original D7100 wears the Nikon 18-200 VR2 lens.)

The Nikon 200-500 lens is very popular and gives excellent results. It's heavy, but really works.

flashguy

I've done business with LensRentals.com quite a bit. Used them to test drive my D750 and Tamron 15-30mm f/2.8 when I was deciding on upgrades.

Reasonable prices, good people. The fact that they're 20 minutes from the house is a bonus.

As others have said, the Nikon 200-500 5.6 VR is a good lens. My mother uses it for wildlife photography.

I use the 80-200 2.8 ED for sports photography. When I wanted extra reach, I borrowed my mother's lens, tried it and liked it. But I eventually went with a 2x teleconverter.

The teleconverter did multiple things; it saved me quite a bit of money over buying a second lens and it saved me quite a bit of space over carrying a second lens. The teleconverter gets me 160-400, which was plenty for my purposes. And the size was way easier to use than the 200-500.

I can’t speak to specific bodies or lenses… As my son is actually the photographer.

What he does for big trips is he goes and rents about $50,000 worth of gear. Shoots all his photos and returns the equipment. He does this at least once a year.

New Years on Mt. Rainer was a frequent destination for him and friends … long ago …