As per my title, I thought the caves were amazing and really vast (they themselves deserve at least 4* if not 5*), but unfortunately, that's where it ends. There're set times that you can go and you show up at the designated spot to take a bus the 1.5km to the caves. From that point on, you're tied to going round with an Italian-speaking guide in a massive group. I personally dislike guides in general, simply because I don't like to be shepherded around and prefer to do my own thing, especially when I'm on holiday, but the fact that it was in Italian made it much worse. Looking online, it looks like they have tours in other languages from June to September. For me to understand a decent amount, I would need to be right at the front of the group being able to hear the guide very clearly at all times. With such a large group, it was impossible and I almost immediately gave up, especially since the guide was a softly-spoken woman who was very difficult to hear anyway. So you go round in this massive group stopping at each station, so that the guide can say her bit. The tour is quite long, way over an hour, and it soon becomes a real bore in my view. Our guide was a bit of a pedant as well constantly wanting to adjust and re-adjust where people were standing and telling them to be quiet when they were just talking in a normal way. I don't know why this is necessary; it's not like it's a church or a library or anything, but she was doing it all the time. Photos are not allowed, which is a real travesty. I think at the beginning I caught something about how at a certain point you could have your picture taken and then buy it at the end, but I didn't see this happening, so I might have misunderstood. The entry charge is more than 15 euro and the groups are massive, so they're making quite a lot of money already; preventing you from taking your own photos, so that they can try and sell theirs to you, doesn't really sit that well with me. As it is, after a short time, you become aware of the fact that everyone around you is, in fact, taking pictures anyway. The guide kept up the protest for quite some time; she must have asked people not to at least a hundred times, but everyone seemed to just ignore her, so we started to do the same. We were actually the naughty ones who, about half-way, started to try to lag behind the group a bit to relieve the boredom and have a bit of idependence. We didn't stray too far and our own guide just overlooked it, but at one point, a guide from another group on the other side screamed at us to rejoin the group immediately and threatened us with a fine for taking photos; it was quite funny, but also over the top. The path is very clearly marked; it's all concrete with rails at either side and there's really no way to go off course. There're some stairs to bear in mind if this is an issue for you and you also get dripped on a bit. The temperature was perfectly comfortable, but it did get rather humid after a while. For me, I think it would be much better to be able to go round by yourself with the option of a guide for those who want it. I appreciate they can't just let masses of people in to trample around, but it could be staged, so that a certain number of people are allowed in every hour or something like that with a few staff positioned along the way to make sure everything is okay. We saw some people geared up in climbing gear who were obviously doing something a bit different; that might be fun. The ticket includes the little abbey and museum at San Vittore. It's half-way on the bus back or you can collect your car from the car park and make your own way there. It's very close anyway, so you might as well pay a quick visit. The ticket also includes another museum in Genga, but the road was closed when we visited. At the car park, there're a lot of little stalls mostly selling the same tacky souvenirs. For food, the first stall is the best. It has a lot of big hams, salamis and cheeses in the display cabinet and generally seems to attract the most business. We had a basket full of panini in a large, round, flat bread called crescia to share - highly recommended. In conclusion, the caves themselves are great; the guide I would much prefer to do without.
