Experience with Europe Tour companies

[Luvtoride]

My wife and I are planning to take our 13 year old granddaughter to Europe next year. We are exploring tours of Italy during her Spring break week in April.
We found a great tour during the dates of her vacation using Globus tours. We haven’t used them but they look to be a good company. Any experience using them? Any other companies we should consider. We did look into Perillo, Road Scholar and a couple of others but the dates and costs don’t work.
Thanks.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Talent312]

We used a subsidiary, Cosmos, for an 8-day Swiss Rail tour a few years ago...
We were quite happy with the results, so I'd think Globus would be fine.
We could've done it ourselves, but add-ons and luggage handling was nice.

 

[beejaybee]

I would investigate companies with tours designed for families! These include activities that appeal to young folk.
Using Google there seem to be many options available. E.G. https://www.dragonflytours.net/italian-tour/family-friendly
And include your granddaughter in the choosing of twhatever tour and company you decide upon.

 

[fillde]

Brian. We used Globus when we toured Sicily and Malta. I would use them again. Tour guides are excellent. Hotels are fine. The included breakfast are good. The only negatives were the dinners included in the tour at some restaurants.
I would recommend if you want to spend more time at a certain tourist spot, to stay and taxi/uber back to your hotel instead of getting back on bus if your hotel is close by. Sometimes 2 to 4 hours at a location is not enough.

 

[WinniWoman]

We are using Odysseys Unlimited for our upcoming Italy tour in a few weeks. They are small group tours: 12-24 people max.

The one we are doing is Sicily and Southern Italy, but they have lots of other choices that cover all areas of Italy.

What I like is that we do not have to change hotels a lot. We stay in one for 5 days and tour out from there. Then we have 2 nights each in two other towns and then we stay in another hotel for 5 more nights and again tour out from there.

Also a nice amount of free time built in. And lots of meals included, but also lots of opportunities for meals on our own.

 

[ScoopKona]

Italy is far-and-away the easiest country I've ever visited. It is easier to travel around Italy than it is in the US. (Not just by a little. By a long, long kilometer.) Any country which wants to improve their visitor experience should go to Italy for awhile and see how it's done.

You can possibly save a lot of time, hassle and serious money just by asking your granddaughter what she wants to see/do in Italy. If you're lucky, she has a couple things in mind. Maybe Pompeii. Maybe Rome. Maybe Florence. Maybe Venice.

You're only going to be able to see a couple places in the span of a week, so you're probably not in need of anything other than airfare, a few train tickets and a couple hotel stays. If you're very lucky, her answer is Rome and you can spend the entire week there. I'm not even a christian and I could cheerfully spend four full days at the Vatican. (If you're not lucky, her ideas are all over the map. And then it's tempering expectations time.)

 

[Luvtoride]

Italy is far-and-away the easiest country I've ever visited. It is easier to travel around Italy than it is in the US. (Not just by a little. By a long, long kilometer.) Any country which wants to improve their visitor experience should go to Italy for awhile and see how it's done.

You can possibly save a lot of time, hassle and serious money just by asking your granddaughter what she wants to see/do in Italy. If you're lucky, she has a couple things in mind. Maybe Pompeii. Maybe Rome. Maybe Florence. Maybe Venice.
.)

Or probably Milan for the shopping ie. House of Gucci. LOL. We were in Italy 2 years ago and I agree with getting around the country. We took trains between cities and it was a pleasure.
The tour we are considering with Globus covers primarily Rome, Florence, and the Amalfi coast area, which are all places she will enjoy.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Luvtoride]

We are using Odysseys Unlimited for our upcoming Italy tour in a few weeks. They are small group tours: 12-24 people max.

The one we are doing is Sicily and Southern Italy, but they have lots of other choices that cover all areas of Italy.

What I like is that we do not have to change hotels a lot. We stay in one for 5 days and tour out from there. Then we have 2 nights each in two other towns and then we stay in another hotel for 5 more nights and again tour out from there.

Also a nice amount of free time built in. And lots of meals included, but also lots of opportunities for meals on our own.

Winni, we would love to use Odyssey ( I have their catalog and have reviewed their tours) and I’m sure we will in the future. We are tied into our granddaughter’s Spring Break week and many tour companies have limited tours during that week in April. The Globus tour worked out perfectly with her break time.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[Passepartout]

My wife and I are planning to take our 13 year old granddaughter to Europe next year. We are exploring tours of Italy during her Spring break week in April.

Brian, I don't know what your experience is so far in European travel, and/or what you are looking to instill min your GD, Either way, I heartily approve. As Scoop said, Italy is super easy. You REALLY don't need a 'big bus' tour company. The only thing they'll provide is the logistics of 'where will we sleep, where will we eat, and how will we get around?' Otherwise, you will just be 'force-fed' all the tourist traps. You'll enjoy it and feel that you got your money's worth. You can see as much and likely save a bunch by booking the flights and a chain hotel a couple blocks from the train station. Get a Rick Steves, or Lonely Planet' guide and follow it.

Our first 'together' trip to what we called at the time, 'Eastern (now Central) Europe' was with Grand Circle Travel. They arranged the bus, the lodging and 'some' of the meals. Through Vienna, Prague, Bratislava, Budapest, Krakow and Warsaw, our guide gave us a half-day overview, then showed us how to use the excellent public transport, and turned us loose. That experience gave us confidence to go all over the world independently, and feel comfortable that we can deal with just about any situation that arises.

I hope that you and your GD can have as much enjoyment and fulfillment as we have.

Jim

 

[ScoopKona]

Or probably Milan for the shopping ie. House of Gucci. LOL. We were in Italy 2 years ago and I agree with getting around the country. We took trains between cities and it was a pleasure.
The tour we are considering with Globus covers primarily Rome, Florence, and the Amalfi coast area, which are all places she will enjoy.

Cinque Terre to Pisa to Florence is the world's easiest train trip. Florence to Rome is just as simple. Fly in and out of Rome and then out-and-back to the Amalfi Coast by train through Tuscany.

The best part about DIYing this instead of a tour is that means more time talking with your granddaughter and not listening to a tour guide.

I dunno about Milan. Sure, the shopping. But those handbags cost the same as a decent car these days. I lived on the outskirts of the city as a kid. I like the place immensely. But a week is already not enough time and shoehorning Milan/Como/Venice/etc. just means seeing Italy on a dead run.

My strategy for Italy is to list what we'd like to see, print a map of the country, and then use a sharpie to group these places. Cross out the outliers and then we're in hub-and-spoke travel mode, which means only having to book one hotel and unpack once.

 

[JudyH]

I agree with scoop. But if you are not comfortable with winging it, a group is a good idea. However your granddaughter could be the only youngster on the trip.
I went with Globus in 2018 to Austria and Switzerland. It was all pretty nice. They do arrange a few extra tours or meals that are not included in your base price. Your choice to participate or not.
That part actually annoyed me because it came as a surprise mid tour. Neither Tauck or Road Scholar ever did that. Other group members seemed to have traveled with Globus before and knew about it.

 

[Passepartout]

Or probably Milan for the shopping ie. House of Gucci. LOL.

If going to Milan, BE SURE to have the timed tickets to see da Vinci's 'Last Supper' You have to book them from outside Italy. Here's one link. https://www.viator.com/Milan-touris...kets&msclkid=32744476716f15a4a160228246bee25d There may be better ones you can use. We flew into Milan, trained from Malpensa, had our hour with 'The Last Supper' then went back to the airport to fly home. It was memorable.

 

[Luvtoride]

I was kinda kidding about adding Milan…if I left it up to my granddaughter. We flew in and out of Milan 2 years ago on La Compagnie and it was well worth it.
On the previous trip, we did use local tour guides who tailored our tours to what we requested. We could consider doing a similar trip again, but I would prefer using a small group tour with one of these specialized tour companies.
I would have preferred doing a Road Scholar Grandparents or family trip but they do no run them during spring break vacations, only in the summer.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[ScoopKona]

I agree with scoop. But if you are not comfortable with winging it,

I'm not even suggesting winging it. (Although if someone is going to wing it, Italy is the country to do so in. I can only think of a couple cities I wouldn't enjoy spending a full day. )

We don't know "where" yet. But let's go with Rome to Cinque Terre and back. That's only two hotels -- one in Tuscany (I'd go with Montelupo Fiorentino -- a suburb of Florence) and one in Rome. Book those (two adjoining rooms), reserve train tickets, and google some trattorias. And in the case of teenagers, Tavola Caldas in Rome. Buy museum tickets online. Trip sorted. Roughly $4,000 for the entire trip, plus airfare. And this is "staying in nice places and eating at good trattorias." Not backpacking.

I'm willing to bet the tour is going to be a wee bit more than that.

 

[4TimeAway]

You can also buy hire guides by the day or join a group for peak places.

We did this at the Vatican it was 10/10 enough time, not having to wait in line for tickets or begin sold out. Just meet the group and engage.

with Pompeii, and it was 9/10. Structed time then when it was over we just walked around.

 

[stmartinfan]

We often plan our own trips to European destinations, but did a small group tour of Italy with Insight tours two years ago. One of the advantages we saw was their prearranged admittance times to several of the major museums and the Vatican, along with specialized guides who joined us for our visit to those sites. it was lovely to be able to bypass all the lines waiting for admission and to get great info on what we were seeing. Our goal for that trip was to visit some of the best known sites and that tour made it easy and efficient. If our goal had been to relax in less known, quieter cities, we wouldn't have done the group tour, but for our objective it worked well.

 

[isisdave]

DSIL has been on two tours with Gate 1 and enjoyed those.