Guided Group Tour & Trip Reviews

It was a magical tour! The only reason I took away a star was because of a couple of hotels that were not up to the Globus standard I've come to expect. Christina McElmeel, our director, is my new hero. I still hear her in my head, and I actually miss her. Loved her for her sense of humor, respected her for her in-depth knowledge.

The experience my daughter had was amazing she had the trip of a lifetime . The only downside was one of the hosting Hotels had bedbugs and the group had to be moved

My son wanted better food ( not microwaved) on first and second night. He would have liked slightly later wake up times for time change adjustments. He said it would have been nice to know dinner plans before they were freed for lunch, so he wouldn't duplicate meals.

He loved the food (except microwave nights). He loved being able to see the major attraction, like the Coliseum and the gondola ride. He liked his trip leader Laura.

The trip was good, but the accommodations in France were woeful. I also feel that they tried to cram too much in to the trip which meant that certain aspects were missed, such as SEEING the Eiffel Tower but not actually GOING UP the tower. Also, one day of the trip was lost to an marathon, when that day could have been used to go to Versailles instead of wasting the time.

Excellent tour guide, and bus driver was prompt and knowledgeable. I liked the itinerary on the app. Seemed fairly well organized but as a parent, I didn't know details such as what hotel they were staying at. But, I did have the tour guide's email and phone number and the emergency number.

I gave 4 stars because the return day, the bus driver, which was a different driver than before, arrived 45 minutes late to the hotel and so when they arrived at the airport, the group had missed their flight. I didn't receive any information or updates from EF Tours or the tour guide. No updates on the app on the itinerary. It seemed that it was up to my son to communicate with me. After he received word that they were going to a hotel, my son didn't respond until the next day as he was sleeping/recovering. I finally messaged another parent who gave me the updated information. I didn't hear back from the tour guide or the teacher until the next day for flight information.

Great experience for the boys and girls. The only issue was the flight delays and lost luggage out of Toronto. Air Canada lack of customer service, they did not offer them food vouchers when planes were delay 4 hours on the way out and 6 hours on the way home.
They never put their luggage on the plane from Toronto to Philadelphia. The lost baggage system at the airport was down so we had to call it in the next day. After 6 hours on hold, I was able to report the lost luggage. No communication from them for 5 days and then luggage was dropped of on door step at 2am per my ring video with no advanced notice.
I would recommend not using Air Canada anymore until you they get their issues under control.

The overall trip was great. The challenges are: 1. having to ride a bus long hours back and forth from a hotel near the airport into London or Paris 2. there was not always a guide during visits so we were left to roam around on our own. I would have appreciated a guide at each site to have a better experience and understanding. 3. some sites we were given LOTS of extra time - way too much and others were much too short for all that was available to do 4. there should be some prior learning opportunities about the sites/locations to be visited. that would help all make more connections. 5. there should be some standard practices for communication - just yelling "be quiet" doesn't work well with kids or adults.

I was overall extremely pleased. The guide, Mario and the driver, Edgar, we're absolutely wonderful!!! There were a couple of questionable hotel choices. I enjoyed each and every activity, but I think the experiences would have been better had the group been capped at 15 or 20.

Although my son’s group had no glitches in their trip, the other portion of the group was stranded in Denver for two days waiting for a flight to Berlin. On the return trip a different group of students were stranded in Prague for five days waiting for a flight back to the US.
Deposited those problems, the trip was fabulous, and I believe my son benefited from the experience of seeing the locations of historical importance, such as Auschwitz.

My son had a wonderful time despite some issues with the hotels not having the rooms they were promised. Kids had to share beds and use cots/sofa beds to accommodate them. The meals that were chosen for dinner could have been more true to the location. One dinner was at a roadside shop/Wawa type location because the bus driver was required to take a break from driving.
Otherwise the kids enjoyed they places they visited, their tour guide and eachother.

Our Literature of England Tour was fantastic. If I had to criticize an aspect of the trip it would be the imbalance of time to explore compared to time "racing through" a sightseeing tour or sitting on a bus. We had what seemed like moments in York, Grasmere, Ambleside, and Bowness when those would have been places to linger. We also didn't get to spend enough time in Haworth. Aside from feeling rushed, we saw a lot of amazing sites and had wonderful experience. The highlight might have been watching Henry VIII performed at the Globe Theatre on our last night. It was magical.

The tour was well-planned, our tour director was excellent, and the local guides were top-notch. They made sure everything was seamless. The only thing that would've been better was a little more variety of types of attractions we could see and more free time interspersed in the day.

This was an amazing action-packed tour of Italy! We saw so much in so little time. It was well paced and very informational. We saw so many must-see destinations from the Colosseum to the Leaning Tower of Pisa to the canals of Venice and the treasures of Florence. Furthermore, some of the most treasured moments were in the quiet obscure towns that some of our hotels were located in.

A couple of side notes, our tour director was great! Very enthusiastic, accommodating and receptive to our needs! Our flight experiences included delays and delayed luggage, none of which dampened our journey! Our hotels were quite lovely and/or in great locations. I feel like this trip can really use a nature day or some sort of downtime embedded in the middle somewhere for everyone to kind of recuperate and absorb (especially during the summer months when we were in 90 degree weather every day) I also wish that we would have had a bit more time in some places to relax and embrace (the Colosseum and Vatican) and perhaps less time other places like the big cities (to be fair, I can only handle so much of big cities).

In the end, we were all extremely grateful for the epic experience! We saw so many places that so many people only dream of seeing! But the end of the trip, we were also really ready to come home!

I do recommend the two day extension to Perugia and Assisi. I felt like this was more relaxed and kids had some time to unwind. Perugia was one of our favorite experiences! (If you hit it at the right time, there’s an antique market in the streets. :)

The trip felt a bit rushed and not enough time was given at various stops. The included meals were not good. The excursions which included meals were overpriced and not a good value. There needs to be a stop at Loch Ness either at the small village or the castle ruin site.
We were told that the Holyrood palace was closed and not available for a visit by the guide. This was included in the tour. We went there after the end of the morning tour with the guide and found the palace open for visitors!

The quality of the accommodations received was not worth the price paid. Many of the food choices arranged were not eaten by majority of the group in some of the lunch/dinner establishments chosen. In fact, I was violently I’ll from dinner one night and into the next day. The first leg of our trip was so hot in France that there was NO AIR CONDITIONING in the hotel or eateries and the bus driver had many students / parents just sitting in the hot bus without any air on while we waited to leave. Miserable is how I can explain the half of our trip. The parents often joked that EF stood for, Everything is Frugal! The tour director made up for all of the uncomfortable and minimum accommodations we received.