Disgusting!

In general, the tour is called "Date in Paris + Munich", however, both I and all my colleagues in misfortune agreed that it should immediately be renamed "Force Majeure in Paris - Munich!". We left on flight 618 "without night crossings", June 29, 2018.

We made our first and most important mistake: we decided to use the services of this, so to speak, operator, since we went abroad for the first time and had no experience. The motivation was simple: to show, tell, help to form a general impression of several countries and cities.

The beginning was already good, we arrived at Terminal A at 8 am on June 29, where there was nowhere for an apple to fall, in order to simply sit down to have breakfast. Somehow they ate.

Further, with a delay, it was announced: 3 groups (ours and 2 more, one of which was going to Barcelona), were put into 2 buses, as there was information that our bus had suddenly broken down (was there a "boy"? According to some reports, he was not was at all and the flight had to be canceled / rescheduled / compensated as a failed one). That is, our group, traveling all the way to Paris, did not have its own bus starting from Terminal A. A good start to the holiday, right?

Okay, sat down and went to the border in Beregovoye. At the Ukrainian border, ours is the first, but alas, as it turns out to be not the only one - when entering passports, the program allegedly crashes and all 40 bus passports are filled first by manual passport control, and then by customs control in the same way manually. A total of 4 hours in the heat at the customs near Duty Free, people whiled away the time, eating cookies and running to the toilet. Next, the Hungarian border: passport control and customs control promptly, then standing for 1 hour and 15 minutes at the closed barrier, because we simply forgot to open it after passing through the migration formalities. Total time at the border instead of well, hours - two lost 6 hours! Well, yes, force majeure, but the company itself must take it into account when developing a route and make allowances for hotel reservations somewhere closer to the border!

Then we go to Budapest, where according to the plan we have paid / included in the tour excursions. Naturally, even a child understands that having left at 8 pm, it is physically impossible to be in Budapest at least an hour later, which is located 320 km from the border, despite the optimism of the guide. The logical result: arrival in Budapest at one in the morning and (!!!) transfer to "our bus", which takes us to the hotel, which, gentlemen's attention (!!!), is located in the city of Mosonmagyarovar, which is near the city of Gyor, which is not far from the border with Austria, which is 175 km (!!!) from Budapest. Okay, the group going to Barcelona stays in Budapest and goes to sleep at the hotel, and we get off the bus and get on "our bus" at the Hungarian registration with a Russian-speaking driver and drive 175 km through Hungary at night to our hotel. Why not book a hotel in Budapest or at least have such insurance in case of "force majeure" is an open question!

The result of the first day and the beginning of the second: arrival at the hotel in a sleepy state in the city of Mosonmagyarovar at 3-4 am. Shower. Dream (its remnants) ...

Further, the guide announced that we have breakfast at 7 in the morning: if you don’t have time, everyone will eat it and you won’t get food! Okay, alarm at 6:40, going downstairs for a meager breakfast.

Further, the guide says that finally "our bus" picks us up at 10 am and we go to Munich, where we again have excursions included in the tour and already paid for. Well, it seems like we are on time and after 530 km of the way, in the evening, we should be in Munich. We wait.

Sudden news: there is no "our" bus by 10 o'clock and will be there only by 1 o'clock in the afternoon. The guide did not offer anything better than to offer tourists to go shopping. The option to simply sleep in the hotel after the fact of the overnight move was not offered for consideration.

OK. We went shopping, bought food, water, because before the tour we were not told that there would be specific food problems and tourists would eat hot dogs and sandwiches at gas stations for 5-6 euros apiece and french fries with a cutlet for 14 euros.

At one o'clock, the bus did arrive. But suspiciously "not ours": on the Hungarian registration and with a cheerful Hungarian driver, who, to the question "are we going to Paris with you?quot; answered "ya-ya Parish!".

Further, crossing the border with Austria, for some reason (!!!) we stop at the Vienna airport, which, to put it mildly, is not on our way and not in the tour program, where the guide says "guys, we are changing the bus and this is not funny" . A hornbeam silence reigned in the bus, but doubts crept in people's heads.

At the glorious airport of the city of Vienna, we were really waiting for a bus with a German registration with a broken headlight and with an elderly German grandfather at the wheel, who, showing the guide at his watch, with all his appearance said that it was time for us to move on. Colorful, right? Do you already have your fingers crossed over which bus this is in a row? Fourth, gentlemen!

However, even here it turned out to be a bummer: for some reason, the German grandfather did not take us along the bypass autobahn to bypass Vienna directly to Munich, but drove into the city, circling along the wonderful interchanges of the Austrian capital.

Arriving in the very center, to, apparently, one of the cool sights of Vienna (judging by the number of buses parked there, which clearly did not attract a car depot), we were told to get out and, taking our things with us, transfer to "our bus" at Polish registration with an unfortunate sleepy driver at the wheel, who, apparently, has not seen a quality sleep for as long as we have. By the way, the driver was Belarusian and also, apparently, was not very pleased with the situation.

Since all these bus changing operations took place already in Vienna and at 2 pm, it was clear that in the best case scenario we would get to Munich in the evening, around 7.

Since our guide was a "great strategist", a condition was set: either we call in Munich and run at a gallop through this glorious city, and then we get out of it through traffic jams and rush to Strasbourg, then we look less than Paris, we arrive at the hotel somewhere at 5-6 in the morning (if we're lucky) or we skip the paid Munich, the BMW Museum, the Alliance Arena and the brewery completely and rush to Strasbourg for the night and watch Paris. It is not clear what decision the second one was chosen, motivated by the fact that we can see the breweries already in Austria, which are "better" than the Munich ones. By the way, someone went on this tour precisely because of Munich ...

Let's go to Strasbourg… more than 800 km, one driver and the logical result: arrival at the hotel on the outskirts of Strasbourg at 3 am.

Again, an early rise, again an early, even more meager breakfast, since this is a French hotel, and the French, in principle, do not eat anything for breakfast except croissants and coffee. Ate. They parted ways. The following information sounds: since we arrived at 3, according to the rules of passenger transportation in the European Union, the bus must stand for 9 hours before being able to go further, in addition, another bus from Paris allegedly came to us with another driver there, but broke down on the way (! !!) and the driver got on a ride to Strasbourg.

On the offer of the guide to go on a tour of Strasbourg and pass the time before leaving Paris, the group naturally resolutely refused, as everyone is on edge, hungry and not getting enough sleep, they are driving like a regular bus through half of Europe, not seeing anything.

After waiting in the warm sun of Strasbourg until 12 o'clock, we left for Strasbourg for a second driver and went to Paris ... without air conditioning in the bus, due to its breakdown.

We arrived in Paris at about 9:30 pm and immediately got a very fast-talking guide, who quickly told us where the Sorbonne was and where the Louvre was, while we were pushing through the Parisian traffic jams. Then we ran on a run on a boat trip along the Seine River, which, by the way, turned out to be quite good. Then check-in at the hotel is already close to midnight. Shower. Dream…

Rise at 7 am breakfast, excursion to Montmartre. Good. Informative. Then the group was divided: some with children go to Disneyland (it seems that this is why they went at all), some to Normandy like us, some walk around the city in their free time until the evening.

Excursion to Normandy was articulated from 3 groups and was chic, worthy of a separate review, I guess. What can not be said about people in Disneyland, where, according to rumors, someone got lost in an unfamiliar city of Paris and ended up on an already closed subway. Arrival at 22:30. Hotel. Shower. The long-awaited more or less 7-hour sleep.

Early rise again at 6:40 am, quick French breakfast, packing on the bus, metro, Latin Quarter. Excursion to Notre Dame, the Louvre, and some people further Versailles. We refused Versailles to just wander around Paris and at least visit somewhere, since after Versailles we have a trip to Augsburg, Germany.

Instead of the promised departure from Paris at 3 pm, the bus left only around 6 pm, because suddenly (!!!) traffic jams! A little joy - the air conditioner has earned!

Departure at 6 pm, drive 784 km to Augsburg. I hope everyone understands when the arrival at the hotel? Right! At 3 am! Arrival. Shower. You can’t call it sleep, because again breakfast is at 7 in the morning!

Breakfast. The bus stops until 12. We walk to the shopping center, because there is nothing better anyway.

Departure to Salzburg, Austria at 12 noon. Arrival. An interesting tour of the city, as well as the Heinsalzburg. Augustinian breweries are out of the question. It started raining. Wet. Let's go to Budapest. Again, traditionally check-in around 2-3 nights, again promises that "our bus" is about to arrive.

In the morning, traditionally at 7 am, a modest breakfast, and also our bus with Ukrainian registration suddenly arrived, which was supposed to take us back to Lviv, stopping by Budapest on the way.

In Budapest, a couple of excursions, 1.5 hours of free time to walk around the Marriott Hotel and eat.

Moving to Lviv at midnight from the record-breaking fast border between Slovakia and Ukraine in the Uzhgorod region with an accompanying late, delicious, like a balm for the soul, dinner in the village of Korostiv.

In total what we end up with:

• a crumpled 7-day tour with night shifts, disgusting food and bestial attitude towards tourists. This tour should be at least 10-11 days long, taking into account its organization and the number of excursions!

• guide Sasha Bessonov, to whom there are a lot of claims as a person who is obliged to make tourists comfortable for their money, as an organizer, as a psychologist and a well-mannered person who should at least somehow defuse the situation, and not tell tourists that they are them, fools, they chose the wrong tour for themselves and generally still dare to be indignant. And in general, put all the authorities on their ears back in Terminal A that she was not given a bus from the very beginning and this is a risk factor for the failure of the tour.

• the risk of getting gastritis from eating sprite hot dogs at gas stations, since there is nothing else to eat and the tour does not provide stops near cafes, bistros and eateries with normal human nutrition

• risk of getting hemorrhoids from 14 hours of continuous sitting

• get tired on vacation, then sleep off for a week after the tour already at work

• in general, an excellent opportunity to spoil your vacation and spend a lot of money in vain, without getting a quality tourist product and some kind of compensation for a spoiled vacation, which you need to start over.

From the positive points:

• local guides: Salzburg, Louvre, Montmartre, Normandy and Budapest

• Belarusian drivers who conscientiously sawed their thousands of kilometers

• selfies with Paris :)

I strongly recommend everyone not to repeat my mistakes when planning your vacation:

• read reviews about the tour operator in advance

• take into account the number of kilometers and the number of days

• take into account your physical abilities in terms of traveling by bus for 12+ hours a day

• take into account your ability to eat hot dogs, salads and other dry food for a long time

• take a little more than a decent amount of money with you for additional meals and, just in case, for a plane ticket home from any city along the route of the tour

• consider the possibility of planning a tour on your own, choosing your plane and train tickets to cities of interest, hotels and excursions.

For me next time the choice is obvious: only plane and train (TGV), only excursions on the spot.

Comments (54) leave a comment

54 comments

Show other comments …