22 Jun 2022
This was a colossal waste of money. We paid almost $3k for what may have been a $1k value and that’s being generous. The tour operator did send me the hotel selections a few days before the trip, but since I’m very busy I didn’t thoroughly review them. Each hotel was dated and dirty, and one of them had no AC and was so bad we had to check out early and find a different room in the city. One of the hotels booked for us was over an hour outside of the city of Florence, and we were given incorrect information. Thankfully I caught the mistake with enough time to book a new hotel on my own before arriving to the wrong hotel. Overall I ended up paying an extra $700 for 3 nights on my own out of a 6 night package. The last day, a walking tour was arranged for us and the tour guide never showed up. We stood in the sun for 30 minutes waiting with 10 other tourists waiting. I’m still waiting on my $90 refund for that part of the package.. I will say that the tour operator was quite responsive when I needed to contact him, and very polite. However, booking the hotels and train tickets on our own would have saved so much money, gotten us exactly what we wanted, and provided more flexibility. Overall, this was a huge disappointment and I do regret booking this tour.