Sadly, I had quite a negative experience from the start. The agent I spoke to called the tour operator, who advised if I stayed at a particular hotel, they could pick me up so I changed my hotel in order to meet that guarantee. As the Viator representative spoke to the tour operator while I was on hold then returned to my call to confirm, I didn’t think there would be a problem but after I paid, and to my surprise, someone from the company called me to advise they cannot pick me up, and they do not guarantee pick ups, as per their listing. I completely understand that, but why tell me to stay at another hotel? That caused a huge inconvenience for me. To make up for this, they offered to pay for my Uber back to my hotel at the end of the trip but advised I would need to find my way to the meeting point at 06:00am.
On the way back they started dropping people home and I noticed they passed my hotel. The next stop was about 15 minutes away, and there were 2 more people that needed to be dropped off, so they were driving me further and further away from my hotel and didn’t think that was a problem for me because they promised to get me an Uber back. It made no sense at all for me (having to spend way longer on the bus than necessary after a 12 hour day) or them (because the cost of the Uber would’ve been higher).
I made the mistake of sitting directly behind the driver which meant I had 3 out of 4 air conditioning vents blasting in my face for the 3.5/4 hour drive. When I asked the tour operative to turn it down, I received comments like “move to the back” (while the bus was driving at 100mph on a motorway) and “I am hot, I have the engine right besides me”. I put my light jacket on, but was still freezing. It’s super cold in the front and warm at the back and more people are sitting at the back so they have a ‘tough luck’ sort of attitude so please be mindful of where you sit.
Now that I’ve been on the tour I would say it’s probably better to just drive there yourself as you’re not provided with any particularly useful information about the tour and it’s super easy to find your way around the canyon because they’ve made touristic pathways to follow with museums, restaurants, etc within it which is very close to the car park.
I contacted the tour company directly to provide feedback in hope that they would take this on board for other passengers but I didn’t receive a response so I decided to write this public review in hope that it saves someone else from having the same experience.
Відповідь від хоста
Jul 2022
Hello Khalila,
I spoke with you regarding this booking. A few things:
Your guide did not pass your hotel. He tried to tell you that but you would not believe him. We offered to Uber you back to your hotel but you insisted to be dropped off at another hotel that was not at all closer to your hotel. Tempe is south of Scottsdale, so once again, I can assure you we did not pass your hotel. We are very familiar with the metro area, as is your guide, so I'm not quite sure why would would't believe him and let us Uber you back to your hotel as we had promised. Also, I do not see where you tried to contact us directly to provide feedback. We did not get any emails or phone calls from you. In regards to the miscommunication about the hotel pick up, we are working with Viator to understand how you were guaranteed a pick up when no one from our office confirmed that. As far as the air conditioning, I'm not quite sure if you would have been comfortable at all, as you seem to have had issues no matter where you sat. it's unfortunate that you didn't see the value in having a guided tour to the Grand Canyon. I've spoken with several of the other guests on your tour and they all had an amazing time with Aldo, as have many of our previous guests, as you can see from our many positive reviews. We do hope you got some great photos of the Grand Canyon.
Thank you,
Rachel