TOURS BY NORM

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In September 2005 I was on an Amadeus Waterways cruise from Bucharest to Budapest on the MS Artistry (lovely ship, with great staterooms, although the food was just OK.) Do not take this trip in reverse. Cities get better and better as you leave Romania, but going the other way you would be depressed going home. I also took a week traveling to Vienna, Bratislava and Prague. I did this trip on my own using TripAdvisor.com to find hotel rooms in Prague and Vienna. The reviews by past guests were right on.

In October 2005 I took a Friendly Planet tour to Borneo. I found out that Friendly Planet and Smartours are sister companies, the group in Borneo turned out to be a mixture of those booking with Smartours and Friendly Planet. It looks like Smartours is $100 cheaper if you use a Credit Card. Either way the price was great. The tour was a bit large, 30 people, much more than I am used to. Although large this was a GREAT group of people to travel with. My only problem with the size of the group was in the museums, where only the first 10 heard what was going on. Overall it was an interesting itinerary with excellent hotels. I was told by others that have traveled with Smartours that they always stay in very good hotels/resorts. On one off day, a group of us ventured out on our own and booked a tour/flight to Brunei. I would highly recommend this visit, even if it takes you away from a day at the beach. My trip evaluation recommended that they include this trip rather than two separate half days in Kota Kinabalu (KK) and keep the day off to explore the beach ( I heard the modified diving bell was great).

As soon as I returned from Borneo, I started thinking about our next trip. Usually I go skiing in the Rockies, but I thought I would take a peek at VacationToGo.com and see if there were any short cruises in mid-February. I looked at a few to the Bahamas, and then the western Caribbean. And then I spotted a cruise to the Galapagos Islands. I also looked at their related site Tourvacationstogo.com. I love these two sites for researching what is available. What I dislike about the company is that the reservation agents know almost nothing about cruises or tours. They seem to cut and paste FAQ’s even if they don’t apply to your question. What happened is I started to do my own research via Google on what I thought was the best tour deal and went directly to the operator’s web site. I are now booked via General Tours to the Galapagos and Quito. What made this even better is that they give AARP members (should I admit I am a member? you only have to be 50) a significant discount. I might have to look at some other General Tours in the future too, they seem to have looks of options, from escorted to planned independent trips, with local guides when needed.

In May 2006 I took an Oceania Cruise from Barcelona to Lisbon, hitting 5 new countries, 3 on the North coast of Africa. To many on the cruise it was a small ship, with only 600 passengers. To me it was a little too big, I like the 125 passenger size ships. The facilities were great with large state rooms. The food was very good, although not as great as expected. The one thing I didn’t like was the vastly overpriced shore excursions. For this cruise I booked through VacationToGo.com, even though I had to ask to change agents. As I mentioned, this is a great site to search for cruises. You can search by date, port (start, middle or end), cruise line or specific ship or last minute specials. The price I got was equal or lower than any other site that I came across on the web.

December 2007 I worked with Serena Hotels to put together a wedding trip to Kenya and Tanzania. It was a fabulous trip. See our itinerary here.

If you would like me to assist you in planning a trip, send me an e-mail and I will try to search out an exotic place that meets your needs, factoring in your thirst for adventure, cost and timing.