I had a layover of about 8 hours in DC and didn't want to spend it in the train station, but I also didn't want to get lost or lose track of time and miss my next train, so I booked a tour that fit into the time I would be there.
I joined the tour a bit late; my transportation to DC was not as punctual as I was led to believe. I only had the information from the email confirming my booking, so I replied to it and Dean got right back in touch with me, giving me his cell phone number for texting. I ended up joining the tour at The White House Visitor Center and I had so much fun! My daughter came to DC for a week and didn't see all the things I saw in the short time I was able to be on this tour.
When you see the words "small groups," believe it. Our tour group, once I joined, was three people; a couple and myself in an SUV driving from place to place, getting dropped off to walk around a bit and getting picked up to go to the next place. I actually hadn't slept well the night before, so I my energy was really low, and Dean had no problem toward the end of the tour just letting me sit in the car. Sure, I missed the Vietnam Veteran's Memorial, but I'm pretty sure I would have just fallen over exhausted had I tried. I did get some great pictures of monuments I had no idea even existed, and Dean was very knowledgeable about the history of DC. He also brought an iPad to show us pictures of historical DC as opposed to what we were looking at. It was great to compare then and now.
At the end of the tour, he even brought me back to Union Station instead of dropping me off where we were supposed to start and making me take Uber or whatever mode of transportation I would have to use to get back.
All in all, this is a great tour, and I highly recommend it. I felt like the experience was very personalized to what I needed, even though Dean does this day in and day out. The next time I'm in DC, I'm going to plan to stay for at least a week, and I will definitely take the Monuments by Night tour.