Client Favorites  Bike Tour Reviews (page 38)

  • Three Lakes Tour
    (2/5) shea214 November 13, 2016

    too much is too much

    · Three Lakes Tour: From Geneva to Annecy

    This tour is quite lovely, but not at the level we expected. This is our 8th tour so we feel we get them by now. We like the unguided aspect, but they completely outsourced the work of actual directions to a machine. It is not an adequate substitution. The machine added at least 15 miles on the first day and was most frustrating. Please, give us actual directions AND MAPS. A silly little device is certainly helpful but should not be a substitute. And the distance and hills were definitely not Medium. This was proven out the first night by the guy who biked to the hotel (he likes extreme and he thought it was tough).

    What was the date of your tour?
    Sept2016
    How many tours have you completed?
    8
    Difficulty (actual vs. expected)?
    Somewhat harder
    Do you recommend this tour?
    No
    Countries included in this tour?
    France, Switzerland
    • BikeTours.com staff reply from Lindsay Nash November 14, 2016

      Hi! Thanks for your review. We're glad to hear that the tour was lovely despite the tour level not meeting your expectations. We're taking your review to our products team and to the local tour operator to re-assess the tour level. Thank you for sharing your experience and helping us to better advise other travelers in the future.

      -----

      I wanted to follow up once more on your review after following up with the local tour operator. They've never received complaints about the GPS before, and they did provide maps, a profile, and a large marked map in the roadbook on your tour. Also, to clarify, the client you mentioned who said it was a tough route was doing the more challenging version of the tour, not the version you went on. I'm sorry if that was confusing.

      Again, we apologize the tour level did not match your expectations, but we do state clearly in the Surface and Terrain details about the daily climbing.

      Thank you again for sharing your experience.

    • 4/5 Value
    • 4/5 Included meals
    • 4/5 Bikes + equipment
    • 4/5 Hotels or boat
    • 4/5 Scenery
    • 2/5 Ease of navigation
    • 1/5 Tour documents
    • 3/5 Local tour company services
    • 3/5 Route selection
  • Amsterdam to Bruges
    (2/5) Mungo September 25, 2016

    Nice not to have to pack every day

    · · Amsterdam – Bruges by Bike and Boat – Princesse Royal

    Flat terrain, mostly bike paths and not having to pack and unpack are great advantages of this trip. The food and accommodations were better than expected. However, it is not recommended as a self-guided tour as the directions are not complete. Also, as a group tour with 35 people in a large pack makes it too cumbersome.

    What was the date of your tour?
    September 2016
    How many tours have you completed?
    10
    Difficulty (actual vs. expected)?
    As expected
    Who is this tour suitable for?
    First-time bike tourists
    Do you recommend this tour?
    No
    Countries included in this tour?
    Belgium, Holland
    • 5/5 Value
    • 4/5 Included meals
    • 2/5 Bikes + equipment
    • 3/5 Hotels or boat
    • 3/5 Scenery
    • 3/5 Ease of navigation
    • 1/5 Tour documents
    • 2/5 Local tour company services
    • 3/5 Route selection
    • 2/5 Guides (if applicable)
  • (1/5) Amanda Jennings September 25, 2023

    Serious amounts of traffic

    · Algarve Coastal Route

    This ride has you in a lot of heavy traffic and even on the motorway at some places. The ride takes you through heavily touristed areas and then areas with nothing. This country very much highlighted the haves and the have nots in the country. I did not like the ride, it wasn't worth all of the traffic that we had to deal with.

    What was the date of your tour?
    September 2023
    Difficulty (actual vs. expected)?
    As expected
    Do you recommend this tour?
    No
    Countries included in this tour?
    Portugal
    • 1/5 Value
    • 1/5 Bikes + equipment
    • 5/5 Hotels or boat
    • 1/5 Scenery
    • 2/5 Ease of navigation
    • 5/5 Tour documents
  • Royal Zealand & Copenhagen
    (1/5) Sam Fleischacker 10 months ago

    Denmark is great; BikeTours is not

    · Royal Zealand and Copenhagen

    Are you looking for a tour company that will send you bike directions to the wrong hotels, follow that up with a condescending note when you complain rather than apologizing and correcting their mistake, book you in charmless corporate hotels way outside of the towns you're headed for, and delete your GPS tracks before your trip is finished? If so, this is the trip for you! If not, look elsewhere. My wife and I had some wonderful biking on this trip - but that's because of Denmark, which has beautiful and very well-marked bike trails everywhere (running through forests often), not because of BikeTours: indeed, we sometimes needed to correct the GPS tracks we were sent by the Danish markers, or by asking locals for help. Our previous experience on a self-guided bike tour, in France, was magical: with lovely, varied hotels in beautiful places at the end of each day, a well-crafted route accurately represented on the GPS tracks, and good help available by phone if we needed it (to be fair the Copenhagen representative of this local bike company, Sofia, was very friendly and helpful). This was a great disappointment after that. If you're looking for a tour that is geared towards your enjoyment, rather than the bottom line of the tour operator, I'd avoid BikeTours.com.

    What was the date of your tour?
    July 2024
    How many tours have you completed?
    2
    Difficulty (actual vs. expected)?
    Somewhat harder
    Do you recommend this tour?
    No
    Countries included in this tour?
    Denmark
    • The bathroom in one of our hotels (the shower runs via the sink) - not sure how this hotel managed to eke out 3 stars ... (photo by Sam Fleischacker)
    • 1/5 Value
    • 4/5 Bikes + equipment
    • 1/5 Hotels or boat
    • 5/5 Scenery
    • 2/5 Ease of navigation
    • 1/5 Tour documents
    • 3/5 Local tour company services
    • 4/5 Route selection
  • Danube Bike Path
    (1/5) Richard Severson 7 months ago

    Very dissatisfied

    · Danube Bike Path 8 Nights (Upscale Lodging)

    Our trip was shortened due to previous rains which had damaged the trail and sections were closed. We were not informed of this issue until we had been biking for two days. We were unable to ride the final two days as the trail was closed.
    We should have been notified of this situation prior to our leaving home. We would have cancelled the trip (we had trip insurance) and rebooked for next year. VERY disappointed in the way this information was withheld from us. It is a clear case of the bike touring company looking out for themselves and totally disregarding us, the customer.
    Also, one member of our party had to cancel due to medical reasons. This information must not have reached the provider as 4 bikes were delivered and all hotels were expecting 4 people.

    Countries included in this tour?
    Austria, Germany