When I heard that Trafalgar Tour was having a “familiarization trip” (aka – a version of one of their own trips for advisors to learn about their product) I was excited because they have always been so impressive when I’ve met with them or seen their executives speak at conferences, but I had never experienced their product. If you weren’t aware, I was lucky enough to start traveling with Tauck Tours, which is one of the best of the best of guided vacation operators, but Trafalgar is different. They aren’t 5-star luxury all-inclusive products, and since that’s the kind of escorted tour I was used to, I wanted to see what their version was like. The fact that it was going to be in Croatia (one of my FAVES) and Bosnia (a NEW country for me!) was icing on the cake — I applied immediately.
Itinerary Details: The first thing I look at when considering an escorted tour product to recommend to my clients is, of course, the itinerary. Where does it go? How fast or slow are you moving? How much free time is included? What meals are included? Our trip was a customized version of their Best of the Balkans trip – very similar, just a bit shorter & more condensed. We started in Zagreb with a little welcome meeting in the hotel, followed by a panoramic tour in our lovely & comfortable coach around town to see all the lights (Zagreb, if you weren’t aware, has been voted to have the best Christmas markets for the last three years and I can now see why – the entire city is SO FESTIVE!). We then had our included welcome dinner, which happened to be at one of the best family-run restaurants in the city. The local wine and food were both really delicious – so far, so good – and after dinner many of us decided to explore the nearby markets & festivities a bit more. Day two was a bit of a crazy day, as we had our walking tour of Zagreb the next morning (fantastic), but then hopped in the bus for a decently long trip south & across the border into Bosnia & Herzegovina. I had been to Zagreb before (basics covered here), but hadn’t gotten the history lessons of the city, so even I enjoyed the walking tour. Before I get into our time in Sarajevo – here are a few shots of my time in Croatia’s Capital.
So- back to that long trip into Bosnia. That’s one thing that you have to know about escorted tours (or guided vacations, as Trafalgar prefers to call them) – you’re going overland, so you’re going to have some bus rides. There’s really no way around this 5 to 6 hour trip, as there’s nothing really between Zagreb and Sarajevo – so you may as well be comfortable in a bus where you can sleep/read/chat with new friends, or just enjoy the scenery. Because this was one of the hardest-hit areas in the Balkan war back in the ’90s, we also got a really informative lecture during the trip, which REALLY helped us to understand the history of this region and also why Bosnia & Herzegovina is still a bit “behind the times” of it’s neighbor Croatia. We learned even more about the war, and especially the 4-year siege of Sarajevo on day 3, which was spent exploring this amazing capital city. This was another day that was very different from the normal trip, as we had to squeeze all the sights into one day, with no free time (thanks in part to some optionals that we all included). However, we had an AMAZING local expert guide with us the entire day, so it ended up being fantastic (more on her later). We learned about the tunnel that local militia built underneath the UN-occupied airport so that they could escape &/or bring supplies into the city during the siege. We learned about the Olympics, which were held there less than 10 years before the siege brought the city to its knees. We learned the very cool Turkish influence on Sarajevo, thanks to the nearly 400-year long rule from the Ottoman Empire. We learned about the Austrian influence which came after the Ottomans, plus we saw where Franz Ferdinand was assassinated, thereby setting off a chain reaction that started WWI. Plus, we got to taste some local beer at the historic brewery in town, which was also important during the siege as the only clean source of water inside the city. If all of that wasn’t enough, that night we were broken into small groups to eat dinner with a local family in apartments right by our hotel (more on that later too). Here are a few shots to give you a flavor of Sarajevo (it is SO cool!!)
Next up we had another lengthy bus ride, as we had to get down to Dubrovnik. Now, unlike the first long drive, this one had some interesting stops along the way, and in fact the normal tour splits the drive up across two days. For us and our limited time, we basically spent the day in & out of the bus learning more about the area and it’s history, but also about working with Trafalgar in general (see – there is work done on these trips!). The biggest highlight of the day was our stop in Mostar, a town in the “Herzegovina” portion of Bosnia & Herzegovina (which is one country, and always has been, but they just go by both regional names instead of picking one). Mostar is famous for it’s ancient bridge (“Stari Most” means Old Bridge”) which, unfortunately, the Croats destroyed during the war. The citizens have completely replicated it, using the same techniques, tools, and stone as the original, so you can’t tell that it’s new in any way. I suspect that Mostar might be a nightmare during the height of tourist season, as it’s small and there’s not too much in the old town besides shops and restaurants and the bridge, but in the quiet of December it was amazing. We all fell in love and shopped A LOT.
After Mostar, our itinerary slowed down for two glorious nights in Dubrovnik. This city (which I covered previously in detail here) is called the “Jewel of the Adriatic” for a reason, and seeing it in December with the festive decorations and, more importantly, without crowds was AMAZING. Seriously – the trip was worth it just for these two nights. We had two included dinners in local restaurants in old town (both were good, but nothing fantastic – keep in mind it was the off-season though!), another quick city tour, and then plenty of free time to explore on our own. I used that time wisely to run around the nearly-empty city walls (which are seriously impressive) and then run across to the fort overlooking the city, which was really a “Game of Thrones” filming location tour, to be honest. The whole city is! The “optional” experience that day was chosen in honor of “International Volunteering Day”, which Trafalgar feels very strongly about. SO- instead of choosing one of the normal optional experiences, like a day trip down to Kotor in neighboring Montenegro, some of us chose to have a special service trip to Dubrovnik’s only dog shelter (more on that below). I know a lot of people cruise the Adriatic sea and really only see Dubrovnik for a few hours, but I really cannot stress how great the city can be once the cruise crowds of the day leave. This really is the main reason I highly recommend either a combination land-sea tour of Croatia, or a land tour like this one. Here are a few new shots of Dubrovnik, its amazing walls, and the very cool night-time vibes.
After Dubrovnik, we only had one more night, and our time in Split really was a nice little denouement to the trip. Again – this is another area where our itinerary differs from the normal trip, as they have an full free day there which would be perfect to use to head out to some of the islands or inland to the nearby Krka waterfalls. We basically just had a short walking tour (made shorter by a mega thunderstorm that rolled in), some free time for lunch, and our finale dinner (once again, as now expected – a very tasty meal at a local restaurant!). The vast majority of our group (including me) had elected to take flights directly out of Split, so we did not accompany our coach and tour director back up to Zagreb via the Plitvice lakes as the normal Trafalgar trip does (as it should – see why here!) Here are a few shots of Split just so you can see (again) how empty the city is in the off season (for an in-season report, read here).
Hotels: SO – now that you know that the itinerary (and destination) were pretty rock solid, another very important aspect of any vacation is your hotel. This might be where Trafalgar shows it’s value in comparison to it’s 5-star competitors. We were not staying in super high end, luxury hotels. We were not staying at the best of the best in the heart of the city. Which is perfectly fine! They were all perfectly nice, 4-star options. In Zagreb we were at the Westin, along with leaders of many of the central European countries as there was a summit going on during our stay. (Impressive!) It was a 10 minute walk to Jan Jelacic square, or only 10 minutes from our dinner & after-dinner Christmas market explorations. In Dubrovnik, I was worried because we were not staying in or next to Old Town, but instead in the waterfront resort area closer to the big cruise harbor. That ended up being really great because the hotel was really nice, but also because we had SPECTACULAR views over the water. It was only about a 10 minute cab ride into Old Town, which was not a big deal at all. I barely remember the hotel in Split, since I basically just slept a few hours there, but it was also about a 10 or so minute walk north of Old Town. The only hotel I was disappointed (somewhat) with was the one in Sarajevo, but that’s also partly due to the fact that Bosnia is really delayed in getting it’s tourism industry back up to scratch. The hotel was SO ’90’s! Complete with a revolving restaurant on the top floor (which is where we had our only “hotel” dinner, which was also only so-so) and a smokey bar off the lobby. The room was huge, though, and our day was so full that it didn’t really matter about the hotel, to be honest. The fact that it was a fairly good distance from old town bothered me, but again – we ended up eating dinner in apartments about 5 minutes away, and traffic there is a nightmare, so the location worked for our purposes. However – just know that if you are a hotel snob, then a Trafalgar tour may not be the best option for you. Here are a few shots from our Sarajevo (the worst) and Dubrovnik (the best) hotels to give you an idea of the level you can expect.
Guides: The final piece of the pie for a guided vacation is in the name – the guides. Firstly, on all (good) guided vacations you have one tour director who travels with you from place to place and makes sure everything runs smoothly and everyone is happy (NOT an easy job!). Secondly, you have “local experts” in each city to give you the nitty gritty on their home town – they step on the coach or meet you in town and lead you through the city’s history from their native perspective. In this – I have to give Trafalgar props. We had an amazing tour director – Kassie. Now, at first I was worried as she was Australian and does “all of Europe” for Trafalgar – none of that sounded very specialized, and I know some tour operators brag on how their tour directors are native to the region. It didn’t matter at ALL. Kassie was simply fantastic. She was incredibly clear with us on where we needed to be and when, AND her grasp of the complicated history of the region and her ability to explain it to us in ways that helps us really understand it all was SO valuable. Those lectures on the longer bus rides kept me off my kindle (happily), but she also was so personable and fun that she knew when to be quiet and let us nap. LOVED her. The local experts were also fantastic – every single one – we had 5 different ones, so a good sample size. I can’t remember any of their names, sadly, but some of them I’ll remember forever. Our guide in Zagreb had been chosen the day before to lead around a delegation of those central European leaders for their city tour, so seems like he was one of the best to be had. Our guide in Sarajevo was just awesome. She was only 6 when the siege happened, she lost her father in the 1st year of the siege, and yet she was so matter of fact when explaining what life was like back then. She was so passionate about her city – teaching us about the coffee rituals, explaining the history between the Ottomans and the Austrians, explaining the pride they all had over the Olympics (which were before her time). LOVED her as well. Our guide in Dubrovnik was a teen when their (much shorter) siege happened, and while our time with her and the guide in Split was shorter – both of those tours were under an hour I think – they were both funny, informative, and clear. I really was impressed with the quality of guidance we had throughout the trip – here are a few shots of said guides.
Overall Experience: I really have to say that overall I was super impressed with my Trafalgar tour (if you can’t tell already). There were super cool experiences that I would NEVER have been able to have on my own. Two that stand out are the dinner with a local family in Sarajevo, and the volunteering time at the dog shelter in Dubrovnik. Both were completely local, completely authentic, and certainly something I would not have been able to really find without their local expertise. There were lots of other things I would have missed, like doing shots of a local liqueur with new friends on the bus, the ability to gaze out at all the gorgeous scenery, and completely easy border crossings. (I almost forgot that!) You have to go back & forth between Bosnia & Croatia a few times on this trip, thanks in large part to the 8-mile stretch of coastline that Bosnia has between Dubrovnik and the rest of Croatia. Each time Kassie & our driver did everything they could to make the crossing as fast & painless as possible. There was only one crossing that we all had to individually present our passports even – yet another huge benefit. There are just so many things that made this a great tour, I could go on and on – but I’ll finish with the people. I’ve traveled solo, with a few friends, and in groups. I knew two people on this trip prior to arriving- and I barely knew one (one of the Sales reps from Trafalgar). We ended up forming some really tight bonds – and I can’t tell you how much more fun it is to experience a place WITH people. I’ve been to Dubrovnik several times already, but I got super giddy walking into the main gate for the first time mostly because of how excited all of my new buddies were. Having friends who cared more about shopping than lunch in Mostar meant that I had company grabbing a super fast lunch as we walked back to our bus. More than anything – it was so great to have a little crew of people who liked staying in town to experience the night life, who enjoyed taking photos like me, and loved petting those pooches too. THAT’s what makes traveling in a group so magical. Of course it’s great if you can get 8-10 of your friends to travel together, but that happens rarely. Now that I’ve experienced a Trafalgar trip, I have a good idea of the kinds of people who will be on their trips, and it IS a different kind of person than is on a Tauck trip (for example). That’s the benefit of working with a travel advisor – once I get to know you and what’s important to you, I can match you to the right kind of product, so that you too can be on a trip with lots of like-minded potential new life-long friends. Here are a smattering of pics of my experiences on this awesome trip.