I am writing this on my return from Southern France, on an Odyssey Tours and want to share my experience with you in case you are considering booking a tour with this company. If you care about your travel accommodations and your hotel experience, I have one word for you. DON”T. If you’re not fussy, then you should be fine. For me, it’s about expectations. This is a company that boasts of luxury accommodations, but in truth, the rooms and the flights are based on the pricing they pay for group travel, and trust me, they are more interested in making a profit than the ultimate customer experience.
The problems started two weeks before the departure date for the trip when I received a call from Odyssey that my return flight was messed up (they mistakenly had me returning from the wrong city). After a few frustrating phone calls where they tried to put me on a flight with a seven-hour wait-over in Munich, I was scheduled on a flight with Air Canada. That sounded fine. The times sounded fine, but I was unaware that this was an eight-hour flight to Montreal!!!! A direct flight to Boston takes six hours, but they told me that they were unable to do that since they were only contracted with specific airlines. There was no usable internet on this Air Canada flight (you evidently have to preload the app before takeoff, but no one bothered to mention that, since not all the instructions are in English), and there were no movies, or TV screen...it’s basically an antiquated plane. This is NOT what I would expect from the booking on a luxury tour company.
Further, most of the hotels on the trip were funky at best. The last one in Aix-en-Provence was nice to look at, but it was on a noisy street and the air conditioning, which they supposedly fixed in everyone’s rooms, didn’t work. The first night I opened the windows to be awakened at 4 am by trash pickup and at 5 by street cleaners. The hotel said they fixed the air and it worked for about three hours, but at breakfast in the morning, it became apparent from the stories by disgruntled tour members that no one was able to sleep. I was up since 4:30 a.m. that morning. It wasn’t just that hotel. The other hotels had no air at all and in Avignon, when I opened the windows, I then spent the entire night swatting mosquitos as I tried to sleep. I am used to traveling on my own and know what nicer European hotels are like. Again, except for one exception in Perpignon, the company’s brochure misrepresented the accommodations, which were described as first-rate hotels. Three out of four hotels were not even close. However, at that one hotel which I actually liked, the shower door leaked and got the floor all wet. I slipped when getting out of the very deep tub, skidding on the matt on the water-drenched floor, and fell and hurt my neck!!!
The selections and destinations were lovely; France is a beautiful country and our guide was very knowledgeable, organized and capable, but I found the regimen of over-sized tedious meals ridiculous. I felt like I was one of the French ducks being force-fed. Who do they planning these trips for? I am an active, well-traveled, health-conscious woman and by the end of the trip, I had to go off on my own since I couldn’t stand it any longer. People complained they couldn’t sleep since we were all eating too much, too late at night.
I had opted to share a room with a stranger since it was the only way I could go on this booked trip. I lost my husband last year and we had planned a similar trip on our own. To honor him, it felt important to me to go, so I agreed to a roommate. The hotel’s “double” room was two twin beds shoved together to make a kind. I was horrified. They moved the beds one foot apart, all the room would accommodate, the roommate snored like a sailor, was intrusive and anti-Semitic, I refused to room with her. I wound up getting my own room at the last hotel and paid an extra $500 for it. With all of these frustrations, I am very unhappy with the total experience except for France itself and our guide. Asked a refund for $500 to make up for misrepresentation of the trip and inconveniences but they declined, saying that they were sorry and that they would pass my feedback along. I am also passing MY feedback along to you…and can only say, Buyer Beware.