August 11, 2013
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take tours bus review
A review of the bus tour we took to DC/Niagara Falls was www.taketours.com which is probably one of many shell websites like gotobus.com and some other chinese websites. In the end they all end up with one puppet master controlling it all.
I just wanted to let you know the real deal so you know what you’re getting yourself into and if that is fine then it is an okay tour, otherwise you’ll be in for sticker-shock.First we took the 3day two night [Visit the Thousand Islands, Niagara Falls, Corning Glass Center, Philadelphia (Independence Hall and the Liberty Bell), and Washington DC (the National Air and Space Museum, the National Museum of Natural History, the Lincoln Memorial, and the White House). 2-night hotel accommodations. Round trip ground transportation and tour guide.] is advertised as $132 per person but I think in the end you’ll be paying closer to at least double per person in admissions and tips and that doesn’t even cover the food and souvenirs along the way. There is a similar tour that skips the corning glass museum and replaces it with Howe’s cavern which I’ve been to in the past. If you like cold and damp caves with tight spaces it is okay to see.
The benefit of the bus tour is you don’t need to drive and you can take more people than the car will fit and it is semi-guided to the points of interest and they will leave you to explore.
The down side is the unspoken price and the limited time scheduled at each stop, and the time limit imposed at every stop – be back on the bus on time or else. Basically you get there, have a few minutes literally anywhere from 15-40 minutes (sometimes an hour or three hours per location), then you move on. Bring food because there won’t be time for eating regular meals except maybe one dinner. Normally they expect you to sleep and eat on the go on the bus.
Also because of the fast pace, this tour might not be good for older people who can’t keep up with the get on bus, get off for few minutes then get back in. As for toilets, there is one on the bus, good for guys not so good for females because it is cramped and I doubt any guy picks up the seat, no faucet in there either. Bathrooms at the sight seeing places are packed because of the many other tour groups also in the same area. That right there will take up 10 minutes or so at peak times, and when you only have 40 minutes at a location to sightsee OR eat it matters. And yes you need to decide to either sightsee or attend to basic human necessities like food or relieving yourself, it is that time limited. You need to also factor in if you have 40 minutes you need to allocate time to walk back to the bus because they sometimes drop you off at a location and expect you to meet at the same location which isn’t near the point of interest.They demand tips near the end of the tour and make it seem like it is mandatory at $7 per person per day, and they hint that if you like the bus driver’s hard work you can put in more, but they split the tips I assume.
All prices are per person in cash. They said if you wanted to do everything on this tour the price was $106 per person. Otherwise you can pay a la carte.
Here are the attractions worth paying for (if you never done it before):
- Thousand Islands Cruise (Apr – Oct) $25 (it was a short one hour cruise)
- Maid of the Mist (Apr – Oct 24) $15.50 (prepared to get wet dress appropriately)
- Night tour of the falls $25**
Avoid these admission prices/unecessary (unless you into that kind of thing):
- Corning Museum of Glass $15 – museum is free, this is something they don’t tell you. This price is to watch them blow some glass live which is all of 20 minutes and not a big deal.
- IMAX Movie (Niagara Falls) $12
- President (Madame Tussauds Wax) Museum $23
- Indian museum/performance near Niagara falls $??
- Avoid the chinese buffet if you can find other food, $15 was a good deal which included tips and tax until you go in and see half the platters are empty or had food in it so long it is unedible and most of the quality of the existing food is below average and americanized style.
**The night tour at Niagara is another scam to get more money because we arrive at the falls in the afternoon around 3pm-ish then you get an hour or so to spend there plus time to take the maid of mist, then they originally planned on bringing everyone to the hotel/dinner. Then if you booked the ‘night tour’ a different shuttle bus will take you from the hotel back to the falls to see the same falls with some HD colored lights turned on and shuttle you again to the hotel after 40 minutes. They may have given more time but the math works out to about 40 minutes because only lights come on at five min to 9pm and you have until around 9:40 to get back to the shuttle bus (don’t forget walking time).
Some French lady had the same idea as me but she had the guts to voice it to the tour guide who actually made it a reality, however still charged the same $$ to get back to the hotel. The idea was why not just let everyone stay at the falls until it is night time then bus us back to the hotel.
pro tip – the food court at niagara falls is another tourist trap, but we were hungry. almost everything was $12 a plate, american/indian/chinese food all pre-priced at that selling point. that would explain why the food court was mostly empty, no locals would eat at that price.
Any more questions feel free to ask. I know it is a lot of negatives but I think if you know this going in, it will be much easier.
Oh yeah at canal street where they had 20 buses and hundreds of people with suitcases on the sidewalks over a span of five-eight blocks it can get very confusing to find the right bus. Get name of tourguide for your tour and find him and stick to him.
They have pickups in flushing HSBC bank (shuttle to canal st/delancy) and in NJ somewhere.
