First of all, our guide was working under extraordinary circumstances. Apparently the demand to visit Hoover Dam during the Christmas holidays was a lot higher than anyone anticipated. Our guide, Paul, arrived in a 15 passenger van to pick me up. I commented to him that I expected the group to be a lot smaller, say 5-6 people and he said that his company was surprised too at the large demand. He mentioned that some of the tours he conducted consisted of 2-3 people.
We arrived at Hoover Dam and there was already a very long line waiting for the tour to the generation plant on the bottom of the dam. He mentioned that he has done this tour when there was almost no line. We ended up waiting in line for over an hour in weather with temperatures of 37 degrees; fortunately it was a sunny day.
Paul seemed a bit overwhelmed by his 14 customers, having problems identifying who belonged in his group. I suggested to him that having a tag with his company's logo for each person might be useful.
One thing that concerned me was we were waiting in a line to purchase tickets for the tour while Paul was elsewhere trying to secure our tickets. I called his office and asked what happens if we reached the front of the line before Paul returned? The woman who answered suggested we remained in place, letting the people behind us purchase their tickets. Fortunately Paul did reappear in time to get the tickets.
The actual tour to the Hoover Dam lasted only about 30 minutes, including the long elevator ride down to the bottom of the dam.
We met up with Paul after the visitor's center.
One disappointment was the tour mentioned unlimited drinks (water) and snacks. We were offered water only after the tour and no snacks.
I realize that Paul did his best but perhaps his company should have considered splitting the group into two in order to offer better service. After all, this was supposed to be a small group tour, for which we paid extra for.