Hello:
My husband and I want to travel to London, Paris and Rome with my 75 year
old Aunt in the Fall. We are looking at Perillo Tours, which are very
heavily structured, vs. Trafalger, which offers less structure (perfectly
o.k. with us) at roughly half the price. We have also noticed that Perillo
includes all meals; we would probably rather have some independence and
spontaneity in restaurant selection. On the downside, Trafalgar uses land
routes for travel from country to country vs. Perillo, which uses air. I
would imaging that this tends to increase amount of time available for
sightseeing, rather than traveling.


The question is this: everyone seems to give Perillo tours rave reviews.
Has anyone out there ever used Trafalgar? What was your experience
regarding reliability, quality etc? What is the difference between their
hotel classifications of "moderate," "superior" and "deluxe"? I would
appreciate any and all feedback on either tour company. Thank you!

>Hello:
>My husband and I want to travel to London, Paris and Rome with my 75 year
>old Aunt in the Fall. We are looking at Perillo Tours, which are very
>heavily structured, vs. Trafalger, which offers less structure <snip>
>Has anyone out there ever used Trafalgar? What was your experience
>regarding reliability, quality etc? What is the difference between their
>hotel classifications of "moderate," "superior" and "deluxe"? <snip>


2 yrs ago we (retired, married couple in our 50's) used Trafalgar for
the London, Paris, Rome trip & combined it with another trip which
explored Italy in more depth. Since this was our first trip to Europe
we decided to use a tour group. My observation is that it is a very
professional company which gave us good value for our money. Extra
excursions were offered, but we were never pressured to take them.
Meals that came with the tour price were not extraordinary, but
adequate. The escorts gave tips on good restuarants and local
markets, if we wanted to strike out on our own. It was obvious
"somebody" was getting a kickback when we stopped and "bought" at
perfumeries, leather shops and other such destinations. We were
upset with our local travel agent because we inquired before the trip
whether the hotels in the "moderate" category had air conditioning.
(We were travelling in July.) We were willing to upgrade, if
necessary, but our agent assured us they did have this luxury. WRONG!
We sweltered in London, Paris and Rome! Other than that, the
accomodations were clean, modern, small (by American standards) and
not centrally located. Complaints to the tour escorts about lack of
cool rooms were met with very tactful comments that translated to,
"You are getting what you paid for." The tour gave us enough free
time to walk all over London, explore pubs on our own, walk quite a
bit in Paris and explore the Louvre and D'Orsay museums at our own
pace. We even spent an entire Sunday in Rome in a large family park
(Borghese park), eating Italian ices and having dinner in a small
local ristorante. Hope this helps your make your choice.