This was the worst guided tour ever. If you value your time and money, do not book with DETOURS!
CONS:
-Terrible customer service! The woman working reception at DETOURS hung up on me!
-The pick-up time at the hotel was changed, but they did not bother to call me! Good thing I checked my email in the morning!
-The tour bus was shaky and rattled a lot. And it was LOUD inside the bus. Bring earplugs...I got a headache from all the noise!
-The seats on the bus were okay, but you lose leg room because of the wheel base, and the back row seats did not recline!
-Our driver had a lead foot, which meant we felt every bump and turn he made, and there were a couple of times when we nearly went out of our seats after he slammed on the breaks! Yikes!
-The microphone in the bus kept malfunctioning. All we heard from the driver was static and nails on a chalkboard! Get that thing fixed!
-The driver could not hear anything we said. We had to yell at him to get his attention!
-The driver's commentary was dry and dull. It was not educational! Fun facts and historical insight would have made the tour livelier.
-The first stop in Williams is a joke. It is a 45-minute pit stop at a string of gift stops. No historical context for the tour. We did not even stop at the Route 66 sign!
-DO NOT ORDER THE $12 LUNCH! I got the wrong sandwich! The driver could not do anything about it because the pickup had already happened! What a ripoff!
-The second stop is a 15 minute stop at a gas station. We could have skipped this entirely and added time to our tour instead.
-The tour took a detour to the airport because one of the group members decided they wanted to go on a helicopter tour (which is a separate tour option on the DETOURS website.) We burned about half an hour of our tour trying get this person a helicopter ride, which ended up getting cancelled!
-We arrived at the Grand Canyon about 45 minutes behind schedule.
-It was snowing when we got there! The DETOURS staff told us to dress for 50°F weather, but it was freezing in the canyon! There is a huge difference between expecting mild spring weather versus getting freezing winter temperatures!
-Our first stop at the canyon lasted only 15 minutes. It was the only portion of the trip where we could actually see any of the canyon before the fog rolled in. What a shame to be rushed through the only good thing on the entire tour!
-The driver was so concerned about being on time to pick up two guests at the canyon hotel that he cut short the only part of the tour where we could actually see the canyon! Terrible! The guests did not need us to be an hour early! What a jerk!
-We then spent 75 minutes at the El Tovar hotel, where we were instructed to take shelter from the rain and snow while we sipped on cactus margaritas...We did not join a Grand Canyon tour so we could sit inside and drink cocktails at a hotel bar!
-From this point onward, it was zero visibility at the Grand Canyon. The entire canyon was covered in fog from top to bottom. What a waste of time! Fraud!
-For the rest of the tour, we stared into the fog and wondered what the Grand Canyon would look like with our best imaginations. What a major disappointment!
-We made a 10 minute stop at the train station (we were not allowed to get out) so the VIP hotel guests could retrieve their bags. We were prisoners inside the bus!
-The tour made a few more stops along the way. All of the stops offered no views of the canyon. The tour did not deliver on anything they advertised!
Overall, the tour spends about 3 hours in the canyon, but of those, nearly a full hour is burned just driving around, making bathroom breaks, and waiting on the tour bus while the driver gathers other passengers. Of the two hours actually spent at the canyon, only about 45 minutes of it is dedicated to seeing the canyon. The rest of it is centered around gift shops and museum displays.
The tour was a complete failure. What a gigantic waste of time and money!
Knowing the conditions leading up to our departure, DETOURS should have cancelled our tour. Instead, they took our money and ran. None of us paid good money to sit in a bus for 10+ hours for the payoff of ten minutes of canyon views. This tour was a total scam!
Our driver could have salvaged the situation by offering to take us to an alternate stop (like Sedona), but that never happened. The driver could have guided us toward scenic stops along the road on the drive back to Phoenix, perhaps sprinkling in some breathtaking photo ops to make up for the complete disaster at the Grand Canyon, but that never happened, either. The only thing the driver cared about was getting back to Phoenix on time and collecting the tip at the end of the trip.
I can say with absolute certainty that the DETOURS tour of the Grand Canyon was the worst guided bus tour I have ever experienced in all my years of traveling. I will not, in good conscience, recommend their services to anyone.
Shame on you, DETOURS! I am greatly disappointed.
Одговор домаћина
May 2019
Hello, thank you for bringing your concerns to our attention. We would like an opportunity to speak with you further about your tour experience in order to get a better understanding of what occurred that day. Without a guest name or a guide name, it makes it difficult to fully rectify situations such as these. Our owner, Jeff Slade, would appreciate an opportunity to speak with you personally. He can be reached at (480) 633-9013. Thank you.