We travelled with Brendan to Ireland–they are part of Trafalgar, so my comments about optional excursions applies to them as well. We chose CIE over Brendan for Scotland because when you figured in the optional tours, Brendan/Trafalgar was more expensive than CIE.
My mom has been on 13 OAT trips so she must like them. South Africa, Tunisia, and Morocco are some of her favorites. She likes the smallish group size–I think she said 14 travelers or so. It sounds like hotels are nice but not five star. I can ask her any questions you want so let me know.
You’re right! I think they’re all owned by the same company.
That’s a lot of OAT tours! I’ve heard good things about them!
How small? When I was heading to Portugal a couple of years ago (or supposed to anyway–the trip got cancelled due to covid), my friend who is a travel agent recommended Blue-Road Touring. Groups are small–like 15-18 people and they tend to include some off-the-beaten-trail sites on their tours.
Tours cover most of Europe (eastern and western), Scandinavia, Britain/Scotland/ireland.
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Just got back from a Rick Steves My Way tour. We had to carry our luggage, but as independent travelers are used to that. All the hotels had elevators, were well-located in the center of towns/cities, and all had blessed AC. None of the hotels were fancy, which is also to our liking. Our last hotel in Nice was rated a few stars higher, with an extensive breakfast, but in my opinion lost some of the charm of the smaller, family run hotels.
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We’ve done a few RS tours over the years and have been very happy with the size of the group and the quality of the guides (both the one that accompanies your tour group and the local guides they hire as supplements such as for a museum tour). We haven’t done any My Way tours. The people that take RS tours have self-selected to not need a lot of hand-holding; RS prompts this in part by not providing flights or airport transfers, the infamous carry-your-own-bags, and by often starting in a smaller town rather than a major city (for example one France tour we took started in Rouen, not Paris, and it was up to you to get there although they did suggest ways). We’ve only taken shoulder season tours (Sept or later) where the crowd tends to run older and children are back in school. I imagine during the summer they have more kids on the tours.
I’ve never taken an OAT tour but I’m soured on the company because when Covid struck they tried not to give people refunds for cancelled tours, although finally I think they did. Rick Steves, by contrast, promptly refunded everyone for cancelled tours. I figure I’m voting with my pocketbook.
I’ve heard good things about Road Scholars although we haven’t taken a tour thru them yet. We are considering it for next year since they have a larger variety of tours than RS. One thing that gives me a slight pause is that I’ve heard they don’t run their own tours but instead contract out the actual operation to vendors.
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Rick Steves considers his company, along with Collette and Insight Vacations to be mid-range. We’ve take two Insight tours (Country Roads of Bavaria and Country Roads of France) and really liked them. The coach and the hotels are very nice, but the biggest plus is that hotels are usually located in the city-center. This enables us to do things on our own, skipping most of the optional tours/dinners, and allowing us to eat at Michelin rated restaurants. They handle all the luggage and there is less walking than Rick Steves. They allow up to 40 on each tour, but we’ve only had 27 and 29 on each trip. They have a more expensive Luxury Gold category, with fewer people.
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I will say that on both of our Collette tours, our ‘city’ hotels in Calgary and Reyjkavik were right in city center, which allowed us to walk easily to stuff we wanted to see. Brendan/Trafalgar, OTOH, in Dublin, placed us in the embassy neighborhood, nice area for sure, but at least a mile from central Dublin.
We study itineraries with Google Maps open in another window, checking out where the hotels are relative to places we’d like to spend our free time visiting.
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Please consider taking the Treasures of the Balkans tour from Insight as well. It was eye-opening to see what life was like inside Tito’s Yugoslavia. I wouldn’t mind taking this tour again.
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I heard Rick Steves interviewed for a podcast. During Covid, he paid his employees 66% of salary. (I am assuming that means they kept their health benefits too.) Said he made a lot money in the travel business, and he was glad they could do that. It did make me more likely to look into RS tours, though I think there might be more walking than my husband would want.
To me it’s not a huge deal whether luggage is handled for us. We travel with carry-on plus backpack, not a big deal (as long as there is an elevator… though we’d survive for a floor or too of stairs). On an Ireland trip with Celtic Tours in 2002, they picked up our bags. But we had to have them outside our door at 6:30am on most days. Sometimes that was a bit of a pain.
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My husband and I aren’t huge tour people. But if we did a tour, we’d probably do a Rick Steves My Way tour. We don’t mind having to carry our luggage or walking up a couple of flights of stairs, or doing a lot of walking during the day. That may change as we get older though…
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I like the idea of the My way tours. Unfortunately, they are sold out for this year but I am planning on looking at it for next year.
Update- Husband decided that the OAT trips were longer than he wanted for this year so we went with Rick Steves and are doing Paris and France in October! I can’t wait.
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Are you doing the My Way France? It’s fabulous!
I wanted to but they were sold out. So this is a regular tour but we plan to do a My Way tour next year. I am thinking of the Alpine tour.
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I’m sure the regular one will be great. The guides are really excellent and hotels located so well. I want to do the My Way Alpine trip too, now to convince my husband (he hates tours 
).
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