Vegas and LA wee a waste of time. Saw nothing in LA but crowded Hollywood Blvd. We were there for 40 minutes and people got back in the bus early… bus parked next to homeless people sleeping in the street. It was a good first impression.
In Vegas high roller was cool but the hotel was not great. Also a last-minute change in hotel in the weeks prior to the trip created problems for some people on our trip. Who were there the night before and booked in the original hotel down the strip that we were supposed to be in. So then they had to move down the strip to the change hotel on the first day of the tour. Death Valley was a long boring 10 hour day in the bus., We had no tour guide for that day. So we got absolutely no information about death Valley Park for 10 hours we sat in silence. You stop at Manazar was very interesting, but we had no guidance there and would’ve liked more time to explore. Mammouth mountain stop was nothing more than an overnight stop in an old ski resort that was shutting down for the summer. There is no town there, no place to shop just a
ski resort.. There is nothing to do there and the only option for food was an outrageously priced hotel restaurant. The lobby of the hotel there is nice, but the room accommodations are old.The breakfast on top of the mountain after riding the gondola was unacceptable for Trafalgar standards.Yellowstone, of course was beautiful and the talks with the Climber and the firefighter were very good however, because of a schedule change, we got not one chunk of free time in Yosemite. The only free time was time after dinner. We were supposed to have a half a day of free time there. Also, in order to see the fire talk, because the schedule changed, we had to drive an hour out and an hour back and the next day we drove again to get out of the park. We were promised a half day of free time in the park even with this change and we did not get it.. The accommodations in Yosemite were old and the bed uncomfortable. I did hear other passengers speak about bugs in their bathroom and mold in the bathroom.. The terrain is very uneven and somewhat difficult for seniors to navigate ( one person on the tour fell on the uneven blacktop sidewalks) around the accommodations there. The accommodations in sequoia national Park were better as far as the room was concerned. However, the room was a long walk uphill from the lodge, which was the only place you could get food.This was difficult for senior members and some members of our group who had mobility issues. We were stuck there and basically could not leave. There is a shuttle system that operates only on holidays and weekends. So we had a free afternoon with nothing to do and basically nowhere to go. Something should’ve been scheduled for that afternoon even if it was an optional experience.. Here we are in this beautiful place and we are stuck at a hotel. The shuttle system is complicated to the point where you have to get on and off and wait for shuttles for up to 45 minutes at a a time at different stops in order to get where you want to go. The stargazing event was not good. We were led through a dark forest, which was very difficult for some of the mobility challenged and older people on the trip and although the presenter was enthusiastic, it was really hard to see what they were pointing out in the sky. Once again stuck in the mountains in a place with only one real option for food that was quite expensive. The breakfast buffet here, however, was amazing and the trips to see the big trees were fine yet a little bit rushed. The bus trip to LA was a long nine hour day. The Marriott hotel in LA was the nicest place that we stayed the entire time. The farewell dinner had good food. There were no options to get your free breakfast if you had an early flight. So you can cross that included meal off.
There were some circumstances that affected the trip as far as the tour guide being a last-minute replacement, however, this replacement admitted she was a city girl, not a nature girl, and it was clear that she would’ve preferred not to be there. There were no group building activities on the bus and as Trafalgar no longer offers name tags by the end of the trip, we didn’t even know the names of 3/4 of the people in our bus except the few people that we became friends with. There was limited information shared about the places that we were driving through until the last day. We were encouraged to use WhatsApp to communicate with her yet she never ever once answered a question that was presented on the app.The bus driver was nice, however, he was extremely concerned about the cleanliness of his bus so much in fact that he would vacuum behind you as you got on the bus, and was clearly not happy when I had to use the bathroom one day. Now we paid big money for this trip to ensure that there is a bathroom on the bus and we understand that the drivers would rather not clean the bathroom. And many bathroom stops were made. However when you have older people on your tour you need to expect that once in a while, they’re going to have to use that bathroom. The tour guide even had to use the bathroom one day.
Only one group photo was done, which was in Yellowstone and that’s unusual for Trafalger tour guides as they really like to encourage lots of group photos so you remember your travel friends.
There were many stops in strip malls for lunches in our travels. This is really unacceptable for the price that we paid for this trip. We’ve been on many many tours with Trafalgar and have never been dropped in so many parking lots and strip malls.
I would highly recommend that you all visit Yellowstone and Sequoia and Kings Canyon national parks as they are beautiful. But do it in a different way. The start and end points of this trip are something they make sound exciting and they were not. You are basically taken from overcrowded, loud, noisy, hot cities to beauty, and then back to an overcrowded, hot noisy city. There were too many accommodations where you were stuck with nothing to do and where the rooms were not up to par and we’re far away from the main building. There were too many schedule changes. We understand that the last-minute change in tour guides was no one‘s fault however having an unenthusiastic tour guide dulled this trip.. Our other trips with Trafalgar have been absolutely amazing and this one was beyond disappointing.
We should absolutely all be given some kind of credit for not having a tour guide for an entire day with 10 hour bus ride.
