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I have. While the tour was fine I believe that I overpaid. I would suggest using them for tour ideas and then either contacting the vendor directly or doing some research on your own to see how much of a premium you are paying.
I have. While the tour was fine I believe that I overpaid. I would suggest using them for tour ideas and then either contacting the vendor directly or doing some research on your own to see how much of a premium you are paying.
As others have said, they're a tour consolidator and you'll end up paying more booking with them. If you review the tours carefully you'll be able to find the name of the tour company and then contact the tour company directly from there.
I found my tour company from Fodor travel forum / mini blog written by a Canadian budget traveler. If you ever go to Lisbon and want to do a day trip in a small group tour, check out Cool Tour Lisbon. They'll go with as little as 1 person and as many as 8 people, with hotel pick up and drop off.
As others have said, they're a tour consolidator and you'll end up paying more booking with them. If you review the tours carefully you'll be able to find the name of the tour company and then contact the tour company directly from there.
I found my tour company from Fodor travel forum / mini blog written by a Canadian budget traveler. If you ever go to Lisbon and want to do a day trip in a small group tour, check out Cool Tour Lisbon. They'll go with as little as 1 person and as many as 8 people, with hotel pick up and drop off.
I have used Viator for some tours in Europe. I may use it again to tour Ireland in about a year. However, in the last few years my wife and I are mostly doing in on our own with the help of a Rick Steve's tour book and, generally, a rental car. Parking can be a challenge in Europe. However, if planned carefully parking is doable. The metro in London, Paris, and Rome will get you to most places. In some cities--like Lisbon--taxis are a great bargain. I found Munich to be a very walkable city if you stay near the central train station. Taxis, local buses, and just walking worked well for us in Barcelona. The museums we wanted to see in Madrid were all within walking distance of our hotel. Walking and public transportation worked well for us in Berlin and Amsterdam.
Its complicated though. If you want to get away from the main cities a tour may be a good option. For example, we wanted to see Stonehenge, Bath, and Windsor Castle in the UK. A tour was definitely our best option. I would have driven to Neuschwanstein Castle in Germany, but all the tickets were sold out for castle tours. However, tickets were available on a bus tour that we booked. The tour also took us to Linderhof Palace and Oberammergau. The old city of Toledo in Spain is a "must see" if you go to Madrid. We could have driven rental car, but took a guided bus tour instead.
Whether Viator is a good deal or not generally depends on the people. If you have never been to Europe before and don't want to rent a car it can be a good option.
Last edited by markg91359; 09-04-2018 at 07:56 AM..
Location: We_tside PNW (Columbia Gorge) / CO / SA TX / Thailand
34,705 posts, read 58,031,425 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by NDak15
Care to share where some of those better services are located?
as mentioned... go to the source (Preferred).
Viator and their pimps (visitor centers) make it sound 'exclusively' available from Viator, but that was incorrect in every case that I got burnt (NZ). The actual tour company had far more options and lower prices. (These were all boat / ship / ferry trips in my case, several in NZ National Parks / Milford / Doubtful Sound) https://www.milford-sound.co.nz/ https://www.viator.com/New-Zealand-t...r-Tours/d24-g3
My wife pre-booked a day tour with Viator for our upcoming trip. Today our credit card company called to see if we had made airline reservations using the card. “No” we didn’t, however the bank agent indicated our credit card information was thus compromised. After thinking about “where” and “when” we used the credit card last – Viator Tours was the only company for several weeks that we had given the information to over the phone call. The phone center is located out of the country. We don’t use the credit card online for purchases however we did verbally give the card info to a Viator agent over the phone. We’ve used Viator in the past and never had trouble like this before.
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