Have you ever taken a guided european tour? or did you just plan everything on your own through a travel agent?
Question by singmetosleep: Have you ever taken a guided european tour? or did you just plan everything on your own through a travel agent?
The advantage of using a tour guide is that there is someone to lead the way, but at the same time I think that takes a bit away from the adventures of traveling.
How was your experience with a guided tour? Did you enjoy it? Did you wish you had more free time to do what you wanted?
How about independent traveling? Do you think its just too hard to plan? Cost more?
Thanks.
Best answer:
Answer by February1
I’ve done both. These days most large metropolitan areas make it very easy to navigate even if you don’t speak the language. There are SO many great guide books available. I prefer the Eyewitness series. They tend to have great maps, pictures and lots of good suggestions for what to see and do. Also, the Rick Steves books are very detailed. Its not difficult to plan a trip on your own. You can access air, train and bus routes via the internet which makes it easy to figure out a plan. Planning on your own gives you a LOT more flexibility.
I sometimes like to stay in hostels when I’m traveling alone because it gives a change to meet up with other travelers and to hang out.
Know better? Leave your own answer in the comments!
I’ve been to Europe many times. Never by guided tours, though. I book air and hotel through places like go-today.com or Expedia, etc. and just go. Sometimes I just book air and one hotel for the first night, then take trains to interesting cities or towns and find a bed and breakfast. It seems that either way is cheaper than the guided tours. But I am pretty independent. I read the guidebooks.
I have taken day tours, like to Versailles, or to the Cotswolds. Those are worth it since they got me to places I couldn’t get to on my own.
I went on a five month tour of Europe two years ago, and I planned the whole thing out on my own (reservations, tickets, rail passes, etc.). It took me a good two months to plan it all out. Man, that was great. Half of the fun is in the planning. Trust yourself and forget tour guides.
Independent travel in Europe is very easy, and costs much less than a tour. Europe has an excellent train system, and most large European cities have really good mass transit (subway or train), so it’s easy to get from place to place, and then to get around once you are in a city. Just get a railpass and a good all-Europe guidebook (like Lonely Planet or Rough Guides), and that’s all you need. You can always take a tour of a specific museum or historical sight that you are interested in – you don’t need to have a tour take you around 24-7 so that you have no control over what you see or how long you spend there. And most tours spend very little time in each place that they visit – if you visit Paris for one day and take pictures of yourself in front of the Eiffel Tower and Arc du Triomphe, you didn’t really experience Paris at all.
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