I want to share a serious pattern of behavior I experienced across three separate staff members…read moreduring several trips with this company: tour director Debbie Card, tour guide Lisa, and bus driver Sean.
Debbie Card repeatedly crossed professional boundaries throughout multiple trips. She was condescending to me the entire time, closely monitoring my movements and narrating everything I did, when I simply wanted to be left alone. I was polite about it, but that only seemed to encourage more of the same behavior rather than less. On one trip, she put her hands on my shoulders and physically walked me through a dining room, forcing me to sit next to her and Sean, both of whom intimidated me with personal questions the entire time. When I tried to explain that I simply wanted to sit by myself and enjoy my own company, she became loud and obnoxious about it. She also made condescending remarks to my teenage daughter, criticizing her for wearing a jacket in the summer -- an inappropriate and unnecessary comment from an adult in her sixties toward a young teenager who was doing nothing wrong.
Tour guide Lisa was reportedly cleaning up a coffee spill nearby -- I was reading my magazine and hadn't said a word or given any indication of an issue -- yet she put her hands all over my legs and shoulders, patting me condescendingly as though I had caused a problem or needed to be soothed. I had to tell her directly to take her hands off me. "I didn't even say anything," and yet she still treated me as if I had. She also had a pattern of insinuating I was causing problems where none existed -- for example, when I simply walked past a building, she commented, "Oh, you're trying to get in the building, are you?" as if I had done something suspicious. I later told her explicitly that she needed to be professional with me and limit our interactions to itinerary information only. Rather than respect that, she twisted the request and used it against me. From that point forward, she manufactured problems and turned the staff and other passengers against me, seemingly unable to tolerate a passenger who was simply calm and enjoying herself independently.
Bus driver Sean added to this hostile environment. During the dining room incident, he was part of the intimidating personal questioning I was forced into. Separately, he commented on my appearance to other passengers, acted overly familiar as if he knew me personally, and gave me dirty, intimidating looks without provocation throughout the trip.
I paid a single supplement specifically to travel independently within a group setting, and chose a group tour for the logistics and safety it's supposed to provide. Instead, I felt targeted, unsafe, and taken advantage of by the very staff meant to ensure a safe, respectful experience.
I complained to the company directly, and absolutely nothing was done. Their response was essentially that if I didn't like the tour guides, I should go elsewhere -- no retraining, no accountability, no real acknowledgment of the pattern. I spent a significant amount of my own hard-earned money across several trips with this company to be treated this way, and they showed no interest in fixing it.
This is not a one-off bad experience -- it's a pattern across three separate staff members and multiple trips that speaks to a much larger problem with how this company trains, manages, and holds its employees accountable. I would strongly caution anyone considering booking with them, especially if you value being treated with basic respect, safety, and independence.
