Cultural Photography Tours & Trips in England, France and Ireland

The tour itself is a very good overview, and we did spend time at places. First off, you need to know that this is a Spanish company, and if you only speak English, you will be at a disadvantage. The first day, we were there early to do the London bus tour. The guide who we spoke to very briefly, loaded all the Spanish people first--yes, he actually announced that, and then started on the English. He made our group of 5 (one being a young child) wait until last and then told us he had no room on the bus for us. He told us we could use a Hop On, Hop Off Bus, and send the bill to them, which would be refunded weeks later. So, we missed this entire part of the tour, which of course we had paid for. Thankfully, we had come in a couple days early so were able to tour some ourselves, but it was very unprofessional to not have room for the paying customers, and then it wasn't even first come, first served! Poor planning at best. That being said, the rest of the tour was very nice, which was why I still gave it 4 stars. We thought the pace was good, and Jose was very good about keeping everyone on time. His English did leave something to be desired, and it was sometimes hard to understand what he was saying as his pronunciations were off some. But he wasn't terrible and usually if you thought about it a minute, you could figure out what he was saying, and he was very knowledgeable. The one complaint we had was that he played music constantly on the bus unless he was talking. It was loud at times, so that we could not even converse with those across the aisle. We requested many times for it to be turned down. I think that this should have been told us ahead of time, so that we could have prepared. We were looking forward to a quiet bus ride, where it was easy to converse or to do paperwork some of us had to do. Most of the hotels were nice and most of the breakfasts were great. One improvement to the trip would have been for a short optional afternoon trip out in the countryside on Dublin's 2nd day. We were going to sign up for one from another company, but it was pouring down the rain so we opted not to do so. The trip was very good for the price and one of the few that allow small children. (Our little man (under 2) did fine, and was a favorite on the bus!) Other than the above episodes, we all enjoyed the trip a lot. Let me add that Ben, the driver, was also great. He was witty, and added a lot with his humor.