Organised Tours

"Should I Travel With A Tour Group?"

Tours come in all shapes and sizes. Some can last up to 100 days and take you for hundreds of miles while others can be as little as 4 days. Similarly many tour organisers can offer the same trips with different levels of luxury but I recommend going basic and getting your hands dirty. You can either use a tour for the entire duration of your travelling experience or incorporate several into your experience. The choice is yours.

Why Travel With A Tour?

People: Travelling as a tour, especially if you are a solo backpacker, is a great way to make new friends and share travel experiences. You can learn a lot from other people you meet as they can offer advice on destinations you may be visiting later on. You may even find that the group dynamics are so good you carry on travelling together after the set tour has ended. It is definitely not uncommon for several solo backpackers to join up and continue on together.

Local Knowledge: The tour leader will have excellent local knowledge for all stops on their route that can really enhance your trip. A good leader will be able to recommend the best activities and places to go to make the experience the best possible. They will be able to take you to the best food outlets, advise you on local scams and where to get the cheapest drink. If you travel outside of a tour then you could easily miss out on some hidden gems.

Safe and Secure Travel: Tour leaders will only go to safe locations which have been checked out by the company. The leader will have travelled the route many times and will be able to give you excellent advice on how to stay safe and what to not to avoid getting scammed. The safe and secure environment in what initially attracts many first time backpackers or even experienced ones who would not feel safe in a particular destination.

Target What Makes You Tick: Many tour operators offer several variations on the same tours. For example, if you want to stay out in the jungle of Thailand in a wooden hut or have a stay in a nearby hotel, a tour company will usually allow you to do the tour either way. Similarly, if you want to interact with the locals more and absorb the culture then tours exist specifically to do that. There are all types of tours on offer tailored to what you want to do for the same travel routes.

Disadvantages Of Tours

Less Flexible: Unfortunately whilst on a tour you are confined to a predefined route and you cannot extend your stay in one area or lessen it in another. However you do get a lot of activity choices available when you arrive allowing a degree of customisation. Tours usually make excursions optional, allowing you to stay near to the accommodation rather than doing the set activities. If you are not sure of which activities you may like to partake in, then choose a tour which you only pay for transport and accommodation leaving activities optional and pay as you go.

Expensive: Organised tours are more expensive than doing it by yourself. You can choose to have no activities included in the price with some tour organisers and only pay for the ones you wish to do as mentioned in the previous point. It is best to shop around for a tour that suits you to get the balance you desire. You may also be obliged to pay local taxes on top of your booking (see further down for details).

People: The people you meet could be a disadvantage; it is luck of the draw. If you are going on a long guided tour and end up with people you do not get along with then it will not be very enjoyable and so it may be suitable to stick to a shorter tour in case of this eventuality. However, many backpackers are fairly outgoing and decent people so you would be unlucky to have a poor group. Most tours indicate the number of people in the tour. A nice size for a tour is 8 - 10 people as anything more can be overwhelming but any less may worsen your experience; it depends on the type of person you are.


Where Should I Do A Tour

The most common places for people to travel as part of a tour are the areas in which they feel the least safe. More of ten than not these are Asia and South America. As I mentioned before, tour groups can offer safety and security as the tour leader is well trained and has excellent local knowledge. These two continents also have the most differenet cultures to the Western world and so local knowledge can help you learn more and understand the ways other cultures operate. South America and Asia probably offer the most routes from the greatest number of tour companies too so this is also why they are so popular. Asia is especially popular with European travellers as their currency is very strong against theirs making everything very cheap.

Organised tours are not quite as popular in Australasia or North America because they have much better transport links and backpackers find it must easier to travel. This is not to say that tours are not popular in these regions because as describe in a section above, tour guides offer much more than just travel from A to B. Also being not so cheap to live on these continents can deter backpackers from the tours in seek of cheaper travel options.

Europe also presents many interesting routes to travellers as there are so many cultures in this relatively small continent. European tours seem to be more popular with Americans as there are many sites to be seen without too much long distance travel once they have arrived.

Tour Operators

Intrepid

Intrepid are a very good tour operator covering all the continents. The have several styles of trip including: original, basix, comfort, family, and active. Basix and comfort are two grades of luxury for usually the same trip. Basix offers lower accommodation, no activities included and larger group sizes to keep the price lower, while comfort offers the other end of the spectrum. All trips differ in pricing and length from a week up to 100 days. Intrepid are a very reputable company in this field.

ResponsibleTravel.com

A company specialising in low cost travel for backpackers and independent travellers. The cover all continents and offer trips of varying length and original routes. With plenty of options and trips targeting specific activities such as viewing the northern lights in Finland or seeing polar bears in Alaska, there is a trip for everyone ready to be added onto your experience.

TucanTravel.com

This company offers tours to Asia, South America, Europe and the Middle East of varying lengths and offer different routes for other depending on activities you wish to partake in.

www.explore.co.uk

Similar to the three other options above, explore.com is worth a browse to try and get a competitive deal on a tour.

Local Taxes

Local taxes may be added on to the price of the tour but will be mentioned before you book. The taxes are usually paid in cash to the tour leader on the first day and are used to pay for transport not included in the price. For example, if a day trip requires a short boat trip across a river then the local tax money would be used to pay or if you cross a border on a trip and there is a departure tax, this may be covered to. It is basically for parts of the trip that cannot be paid for in advance or are sometimes not necessary perhaps depending on the season.





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