We had a fantastic start in the Tetons , great hikes and beautiful views. We managed to see black bears on one of our hikes. Some surprising dramatic weather whilst we went up the cable car. We were very disappointed to not be able to visit Yellowstone because it was flooded, but our guide Mark Harding more than made up for this with great walks in the Tetons and Glacier Park where we were able to stay another day. We saw grizzly bears and bisson on the reserve. We had a fantastic boat ride and dinner at Coeur D'Alene .All our accomodation was good. My favourite was staying in Glacier park, where Mike, our guide provided us with a fantastic breakfast everyday.
Overall we really enjoyed the excursion - we had been to NYC so many times before but had never managed to do Liberty & Ellis Island. Jeffrey was very entertaining and had many interesting stories about the sites and general NYC life. The only problem we had was at the start when our groups ended up on different ferries - both for our group and the other group. So this took about 20-30 minutes to sort out when we got to Liberty on the first ferry. Eventually the 2 guides and the bulk of the group arrived on the next ferry. Not a great start but after this everything was very good. The issue was that some of us got through expedited security checks and so ended up on earlier ferry. I suggest the guides ask people to wait on the dock until the guides get the group back together before boarding the ferry. We would do other walking tours on our next trip.
Incredible views, great food and wonderful memories! This was an incredible trip which exceeded my expectations! The National Parks on the itinerary were all places I'd wanted to visit for a long, long time but actually visiting them was much more impressive than I had imagined. Often this was due to the scale of these natural wonders which you just can't get a sense of in photographs or it was due to the varying colours of the rocks such as in Zion or the Grand Canyon which made the views all the more enjoyable. Unfortunately when we visited Yosemite there were forest fires nearby and the smoke spoiled some of the views but luckily the park itself remained open! Yes there are some long drives but the varying landscapes, regular stops for photos or snacks, WiFi, good conversation and a wide range of music available on the tour leader's iPhone all made them pass fairly quickly. It's a fairly busy itinerary but I did feel it provided enough time in each place to really get a 'feel' for them! The vast majority of restaurants I ate in were terrific (be prepared for large potions), the standard of hotels was very high and it was a great group of people to be on holiday with!