Short city tour in Philadelphia to see the Elsert alley, the Liberty Bell and the independent hall and have a quick brunch in a buffet restaurant before departing to the Lancaster county to visit the Amish village on a buggy ride. An interesting experience.
This tour was poorly organized. It was hard to find the tour bus; I was told that the meeting spot was across from the front of Grand Central Station. It would be better to say that the bus meets behind the Pershing Square building, which is across the street from Grand Central Station. There was two tour guides - Mike did an English commentary, and Andre did other languages. When we got to Philadelphia, Mike said we were all getting off the bus to use the restrooms and have breakfast. He didn't mention that he was also going to walk us around in the cold to visit the Liberty Bell and the other buildings, so some of us left our jackets in the bus. Finally I said something and Andre had the driver bring the bus around so that we could retrieve warmer clothes - thank you, Andre. Several others besides me retrieved jackets. My husband and I are very knowledgeable about America history, so it was shocking to hear Mike make errors about our history in some of his remarks; he kept referring to the original 13 colonies as states, kept confusing facts about the Declaration and the Constitution, and referred to Betsy Ross as "Betsy Rose". After this, we went to Amish country, and stopped at a place where buggy rides were given. We were then driven to a tourist trap with lots of shops and restaurants. There were a few trinkets for sale that were Amish-made, but most of it was made in China. Before we got back into NYC, Mike started a pitch for tips, suggesting $10 for each - him, Andre, and the driver. Since we weren't impressed with this tour, we didn't tip. MIke grabbed my husband's arm as were exiting the bus and asked for a tip, and my husband said no and pulled his arm away. We've never experienced such brazen and rude behavior for tips before. I do not recommend this tour.
It seemed unorganized, we have done many tours with Viator and this wasn't as good as the others. The food stop was not good, and after joining the queue to see the Liberty Bell we were told we were running late and had to leave....so didn't get to see the highlight that we chose this tour for! This was disappointing. We had to wait hours to go for the buggy ride with the Amish people, the tour seemed all over the place, this day was not so enjoyable.