First visit to Europe...Paris to Athens Overall, we had a great trip. We appreciated that Bookmundi booked our hotels, intra-city transportation, pick up from Paris and to Athens airport, and tours. However, the first hotel, Novotel in Paris, was terrible. It was absolutely horrible!! We were greeted very poorly by the French staff, treated very poorly in the restaurant where we ate one night, and, worse, the rooms were run down and dirty. It was very, very loud and in a terrible neighborhood. We really couldn't believe that was our first impression of Paris :( Luckily, once we got to our tour sites (which I might add were a little far and difficult to find.. maybe better explained in the itinerary), the tours were pretty good. Our hotel in Rome was much better, but again, it was a little far from the sites, so we had to take a taxi everywhere. You definitely need to allow extra money in your trip for taxis, trains, subways, etc...Our hotel in Venice, the Leonardo, was beautiful, but the location unfortunately was not so good. Our room faced the train tracks, so we heard the loud trains starting at 5 in the morning. I asked to change to the street side, but of course they had no rooms on that side left. Our last hotel in Athens, the Athena Grand, was beautiful! It was again on a busy street, but we didn't hear the noise as much since they had enclosed balconies. The staff there by far were the friendliest, kindest, and had the best breakfast of all the places we stayed. Once again, however, we had to walk 30-40 minutes to get to the nice restaurants and to our tour of the city. We did take a taxi one day, which I guess is always an option. My suggestion is that the agency books better hotels that are closer to the tour sites, even if the price is higher. Either that or give us an option prior to booking on where to stay.
It was our first time in Europe and had a wonderful experience! It was more than we expected especially our accomodation in Switzerland! Magnificent landscape and fresh air! It was the highlight of our tour for sure and will definitely go back there! Overall, the trip was awesome! Tiring as we are always on the go but so worth it!
A great way for us to experience travelling and get confidence to do things again. It was a full itinerary and couldn't have done as many things by ourselves in this time frame. Good to have like minded travel companions on the bus. Driver Silvian did manoeuvres I wouldn't have tried in a car! He's an excellent driver. Tour leader Darius was friendly and approachable. We would book another tour, and have recommended yourselves to friends.