London & Paris - 13 Day

LONDON – Overall a great trip. The excursions were well guided with excellent guides. Hotel was about 2 blocks from the British Museum in the Bloomsbury neighborhood with many places to eat within easy walking distance. Tube stations were about a block in either direction and the Thames River was about a 15 minute walk. Pros – hotel and its location, excellent excursions (Stonehenge, Windsor castle, Saint Paul’s & Westminster, London Eye (a must do), and dinners), good tour guides. Enough time to explore on our own. Cons – Would be nice to include an excursion to the Tower of London as most people went there on their free day. Too much to see in London in 4 days. Hotel blocked e-mails on their computer causing us a problem, as we needed to contact our pet sitter. PARIS – I would give this part of the trip an “average “ rating overall due to the hotel location. Excursions were excellent (Versailles, Givenry, dinners & boat ride, Moulon Rouge show) with an excellent tour guide. We had two full days of free time at the end for exploration on our own. Metro station was only 2 blocks away and had stops at all the main locations (Notre Dame, Louvre, Opera house) which was convenient, except at night. Pros – excursions, tour guides, convenient Metro stop. Cons – The hotel was located in what was called an “up & coming neighborhood” but I would use the word “SCARY” especially after dark. A man followed two ladies from a local café up to the doors of the hotel where he looked in to make sure the ladies were really staying there. The walk from the Metro stop to the hotel at night was very uncomfortable with several of us on alert any time we traveled after dark. I would NOT recommend this hotel. Only a couple of eating places/cafes in the area and I would only give them a grade of D. Hotel hallway lights were off to save electricity and usually were slow to come on due to the motion sensors and their location. Often the hall lights stayed off until you were halfway down the hall leading to some apprehension. Overall: Pros - Excellent tour director ! Derek went out of his way to book restaurants, arrange tours, give directions on how best to travel to different museums, art galleries, shopping and sights. He really seemed to enjoy being a tour director and I would recommend him highly. First night in Paris Derek took us on the Metro to show us how it worked, ticket procedure, and how to get the doors open. Each morning he was at breakfast and in the lobby for several hours to answer any questions or concerns. Cons – our 13 day tour was combined with the other 9 day tour and I believe this caused problems, I felt like the 9 day group was driving the excursions and the agenda. It seemed to me that our group had to see everything in two days so the 9 day group would be happy. In Paris we did excursions from early morning until late a night for the first 2 days and then nothing for the next two days. Had we just been the 13 day group the trips could have been spread over all 4 days instead of crammed into 2.

London Paris Tour 13 days

I went with my 12 year old son, my 33 year old daughter, adn my husband. With GAT arranging for hotel accommodations, airline reservations, hotel transfers, and even throwing in an overall tour of London and Paris, my family was able to enjoy a stress free pleasant vacation. Choosing hotels with breakfast allowed us to tour more of the cities and not waste time on planning where to eat. Our Tour Director, Kathy Pickis, was very knowledgeable and very accommodating. I love how she goes out of her way to show us how to navigate around town, how she can speak French as well. Kensington Close hotel has the perfect location but the rooms were hot (airconditioning not working well) and the beds were not comfortable. Housekeeping also needs training on how to properly clean a hotel room. Hotel Novatel Montparnasse on the other hand, is perfect! One suggestion: the tour guides could suggest that travelers should do an airline check-in online and print their boarding passes (if available) before they go to the airport. This will allow travelers to just check-in their luggage and avoid the long lines at check-in. Thank you GAT for helping make our London Paris vacation very memorable!

Cities great, tour not so much

First time travler to UK. I expected, as the catalog suggested, a tour of the highlights of London and Paris. I paid extra for a handful of side trips, knowing that the extra cost would be worth it to see historical sites and curious ones such as Stonehenge. Two of the trips were cancelled for lack of minimum numbers -- but no actitivites were substituted for them. Dates and times changed with no warning. The second cancellation, that had the required ten members, was never explained. I think some of my fellow travelers, and we were a great group of 28, have written posts here. The hotels in both cities were sub-standard and in neighborhoods far away from bus, metro and tube connections. Another woman and I decided not to tour for ourselves at night for this reason. The tour director Margaret was either inexperienced or highly disorganized. I was greatly disappointed to discover that she accompanied the people on the side tours (the extra fee optionals) and left the others to fend for ourselves. I would have thought the local tour guides would be sufficient and our tour guide would make suggestions for the rest of us to choose and then accompany our group.. The food in the hotels was very bad and the service, too. The farewell dinner a disaster. The pre-selected menu was changed so we all had the same thing: chicken leg and thigh. Mine was so tough, I sent it back and ordered another salad. The guide said she had heard this restaurant was good. Someone noted that she did not know places for us to have dinner and had no suggestions. More than once we were left somewhere on our own to find our way back to the hotel! The price of this tour is great and the cities wonderful. But I would not recommend it to first time travelers or travelers not extremely familiar with the cities. There are the usual highlights: an evening cruise on the Seine which passed by the Eiffel Tower ablaze with lights; the amazing Roman baths at Bath, Versailles, Bleinheim Castle, Stratford upon Avon,and the magnificent Westminster and St. Paul's. But whoever heard of a tour of London without seeing the Tower of London?! Or a pass on the Louvre (the Mona Lisa# in Paris? A big negative, among the others, was the amount of time we were given to explore the sites. They were all optional side trips for which we paid extra, and they were too short to stop and enjoy in any depth. As to the city highlights tour, Stewart was magnificent, funny, wry, and extremely informative. The rest was, I would say, guideless. I heard a couple of my fellow tourists remark they had been to the cities more than once and had taken this reasonably priced tour just to go off on their own. I think that is a good idea for seasoned travelers. I was so disappointed in the tour that I flew back to London and stayed a week there on my own. I spent time in the British Museum #Rosetta Stone#, British Library, National Portrait Gallery and even took in a play in the West End. I will say this in support of GoAhead. They did arrange for me to fly another airline #for proximity to my town) and they did let me fly home from London instead of Paris as the others did. With another tour director, at these prices, and my greater knowledge of navigating the two great cities, I probably would take the tour again. But I would not recommend it for first-time visitors or those going single.

Inferior Accomodations

The hotels booked for this tour were in VERY bad locations - far from city centers and in bad neighborhoods. We were limited to going out and about during the day, as we did not feel safe being out after dark. The hotel in Paris was especially bad - small rooms, no facilities and the included breakfast was inedible. I was lead to believe that the hotels I would be staying at were close to the city centers, and always in safe neighborhoods, so I was left feeling taken advantage of.

Good Trip

I enjoyed the tour both the London and Paris segments. The excursions were very enjoyable. I selected sightseeing London, Bath and Stonehenge St Paul's and Westminster Abbey and London Eye and Pub.The hotels selected in both cities were far from centrally located. The London hotel was a ten minute bus ride to the Underground and a good 30 minute walk. The hotel was very nice with comfortable rooms, excellent breakfast and good service. The Paris hotel was not centrally located but close to two Metro stops. The hotel was comfortable. The breakfast was very poor and the hotel staff indifferent. Some will say that's the French but I have been to Paris before and stayed at hotels where the service, breakfast and staff attitude was excellent. In London, we had to wait until the 2:00PM check in time as stated. However, I saw other customers checking in much earlier. Our tour director seemed unconcerned about the wait and advised me to keeep checking to see if we could get and earlier check in. I believe that was her responsibility but of course I could be wrong. On our trip to Paris on Eurostar, after giving us our tickets and arriving by bus at the train station, I didn't see her again until Paris. We handled check in, security, customs check and boarding on our own. During our London stay, information was posted in the lobby about the daily activities but there were no postings at all in Paris. We found out the information by word of mouth with fellow travellers. I found this inconvenient and unnecessary. I enjoyed the trip overall but I think a more acitve director would have improved the trip for everyone.

As fun and active as you want

This tour was a celebration of my 65th birthday and my daughter's 45th - one day apart. In spite of some typical London weather we went everywhere and did everything - The Eye, British Museum, Victoria & Albert Museum, Stonehenge, shopping, etc. Margaret, our tour director, was excellent and put us on track to do and see all the sights we wanted - at our pace. Paris was excellent - weather cooperated and even the wet city tour via bus was timed perfectly - the rain quit just as we got to each of our locations! Can't do better than that. Notre Dame, Louvre, The Eiffel Tower and Seine River Cruise were the final touch.

A trip you won't forget

This travel tour trip to the city of London and Paris was not in the hotels that were listed in the catalog, 30 days before departing for the tour the hotels were changed to many miles out of the city center of London and Paris. In London this required us to take many means of public transportation to get into the city center at our own expence, hotel were not up to my standed of 3 star rated, poor hotel booking management. The tour director kept making comments about this part on London, and that the hotel was not in the best part of town, and about the kind of people that lived in this area, not very good comments. Some of the tours did not pick up people at the hotel, and we had to make our own way to the city center to pick up the tour bus at our own expence again. As for Paris, hotel again was way out of the city center, had to use pubilc transportation to get to the city center, at our own expence again.

Looking back...

My wife and I had a truly wonderful time. Paris and London were non threatening and very easy to navigate. The tour guide was helpful and knowledgeable, making our exploration of the two cities effortless and uncomplicated. Sadly, our guide was not familiar with restaurants within walking distance of our hotels selected for this particular tour. This made for evening meal planning a bit cumbersome. Some helpful hints: Pack light - this is not a fashion show and you will probably never see these people ever again Wear comfortable shoes - you will do an amazing amount of walking Bring a raincoat/umbrella - never count on perfect weather Purchase Euros and British Pounds at your local bank before you go (also make sure your Debit Card, if you bring one, has a chip and pin) Our most memorable events (and there were many to choose from) included a play at the London theater, the Eiffel Tower at night, and boat rides on the Thames and Seine Rivers.

Not What I Thought I Was Getting

Based on the hotels listed in the brochure and discussions with your staff I though we were getting hotels in the middle of both cities. This would have been convenient for independent travel. However, both hotels were a distance from city sites. This meant my husband and I had to take a lot of public transportation, which in both these countries, means a lot of stairs. He has knee and back problems and all the stairs exacerbated those problems. The locations of the hotels, especially the Crown Moran in London, was not great with local restaurants. By the time the day ended, my husband's limbs were pretty worn out and going back out a distance to dinner was not in the cards. Local restaurants were not plentiful and we were soon bored. The tours we took were good and the tour guides great, but having to use a lot of public transportation added expense to our tour that was not expected. I was not a fan of our tour guide. She was only available an hour a day for questions and never once gave us her room number in case we had an issue. She was very obviously anti-Irish. She repeatedly made anti-Irish comments and this offended me as I have Irish family members. She needs to learn to keep her personal preferences out of the tour. She also was not as knowledgeable about where to go for meals. We would ask for suggestions, and she would say "go out and walk around." The Paris Hotel did not feel safe to me. They have motion sensors in the halls and they are not set to go off until you are directly under them. As a woman, I don't like to go down long dark halls in strange buildings by myself. Very unsettling. There is no storage at all in the hotel room in Paris. My husband could unpack a couple of things, but I lived out of my suitcase. Great if you're a young person traveling in a backpack, but I'm older now and that's not great for me. My husband and I take package trips so we don't have to tote our own luggage since he has knee and back problems. But we had to tote our own bags out of the hotel in London, off the Eurostar in Paris and in and out of the hotel in Paris. We might as well have booked our own flights and hotels and got Grey Line tours for all the assistance we got. We travel a lot and have used other companies and for our needs your company does not fit the fill and we'll be using someone else next time. For being a package deal, it was not an "good deal" at packages go.

London and Paris were beautiful.

We especially liked this tour because there were options each day to take sight seeing tours or you could be on your own to do what you wanted to do. London and Paris both had the subways which were interesting. Also the high speed train to Paris was quite an experience and very enjoyable. The highlite of the whole trip was the Eiffel Tower being able to go up in it with a wonderful full view of Paris the seeing it at night with the strobe light show.