I took this tour in early August, it was my second expat tour and I would definitely use this company again mainly due to the great prices, good itineraries and variety of countries covered. I enjoyed the tour but the interpersonal part dampened it a little. To begin with mostly retired people, families, couples and friends made up most of the group; same with the last. I am under 35 and travelled alone so I shared a room with another solo female traveller a few years younger. We were roommates during the entire trip and I felt she was a bit inconsiderate. While the tour leader spoke about seat rotation and being considerate of others on the bus nothing was said to the solo travellers who were virtually sharing rooms with strangers. My roommate would grab the key before me, enter the room first and choose the side with the window/balcony and/or more space, it wasn't until the last leg of the trip that I told her we should take turns choosing our side. Although she agreed, it dampened our relationship. Overall though she acted like she was in the room alone for instance, on our free day in Bulgaria she stayed in the hotel while I went on the optional excursion, on my return I noticed a 'do not disturb' sign on the door. According to my roommate she doesn't trust hotel cleaners so she didn't want them to clean the room, and our bathroom was left dirty and without toilet paper. When I told my roommate about this she said I should use facial tissues...apparently, for all our free days the room was not cleaned. Another thing she did was use the hairdryer in the night when I wanted to sleep to dry her clothes, there were other little things that were a bit inconsiderate too but one of the worse happened in the morning when the tour ended in Athens. She finished breakfast before me, went to our room to get her stuff and left the door to the room wide opened. All of my belongings were inside unsecured. The tour leader was curt, unhelpful and and a bit standoffish.
The name says it all! It was like stepping into another world. We met some of the friendliest locals! Kate organized for us a private cooking class in a real island house with a Greek hostess Vasso who taught us that love goes through your stomach 😊 We ended our adventure in Folegandros, which was honestly the highlight of the trip. It's this tiny little island with 600 inhabitants that feels like it's completely off the radar, and we absolutely loved it. Throughout it all, Kate and the team were great. They had everything planned out perfectly, from our transportation to our accommodations to our activities. They even gave us a personalized guidebook full of insider tips and recommendations about little local taverns we would have never found by ourselves.
Great value for money. A lot of travel in a short time, but you expect that when you see so many tours. Great tour guide and driver. This is my second expat tour, and it won't be my last.