Many people enjoy international travel and dream of visiting exotic locations and foreign places. But there can be a lot of anxiety associated with planning a trip, reaching your destination, and managing your time and money. This article will review the benefits of working with private guides and drivers instead of relying solely on group tours or cruise ship excursions during overseas trips.

Traditional Group Tours

Group tours were the preferred travel method of most people fifty years ago. Only tour companies and travel agents had access to the detailed information needed to plan a trip, and the contacts to arrange airline flights, visas, English language guides, local currency or traveler’s checks, tour buses, etc. The proliferation of the internet and websites, coupled with the widespread opening of international borders, made it possible for individual travelers to review information themselves and execute their own travel itineraries. However, this method still takes a lot of research so package tours remain one popular approach to foreign travel.

Cruise Ship Excursions

Cruise ships provide a middle ground for Americans seeking a broader travel experience. Once you reach the cruise's port of embarkation, your stateroom is your hotel. The cruise ship takes you from port to port and country to country to visit selected destinations. Food, entertainment, and activities are provided during the evenings and on sea days. Daily ship excursions bring fifteen to forty people to local sites with occasional stops for refreshments, shopping or walking around the port. A local person usually serves as a guide and explains the culture of the region and the background of the sites being explored, while keeping the group moving and amused. Some cruise excursions are interesting while others try to do too much or accomplish too little. It is important to read the details of each ship excursion carefully to understand fully how much time will be spent in transit or at predetermined shopping sites.

Explore Your Own Information Sources

Approximately twenty years, the website Trip Advisor was launched. Suddenly, individual travelers were empowered to write public reviews and to rate hotels, destinations, travel experiences, and guides around the world. There are many drawbacks to open websites such as fictitious reviews, fake or vindicative complaints, and manipulation of displays and ratings by the website owner for commercial purposes. Nevertheless, travel sites allow travelers not only to learn what hotels and attractions are available in various cities, but to hear what people had to say about them, see pictures, and make their own judgments about where to go. Hotels do not always disclose on their websites that their lobby and restaurant are under construction and closed, or that red tide has made the beach unswimmable. Instead, you generally find out such information from reviews by recent visitors. These sources also provide a mechanism for contacting providers directly for rate information and to make bookings.  

Benefits of Using Private Guides and Drivers  

With many sources of information now available to the public, individual travelers may want to consider hiring a private local guide and driver to accompany them when visiting a country overseas. Here are some of the benefits of using a private guide:

1. Deciding Your Own Itinerary - Most private guides have standard tours they offer in their country or region. But one advantage of using a private guide is that you can work together to design an itinerary that features only the destinations you want to see or offers the experience you want to have.  One person may want to spend the afternoon biking around a picturesque village or lake while another may want to see the Roman ruins. Some people want frequent stops for pictures and breaks while others want to fit in all of places on their list. With a private guide, you set the parameters and can modify the itinerary as needed as the day unfolds. 

2. Saving Time – A private guide will save time by handling logistic details such as transferring you from the airport to your hotel, getting tickets to attractions and museums in advance, avoiding traffic and parking delays, and interfacing with local vendors. For example, our guide in Angkor Wat arranged the times for our visit to the various ruins there to avoid large tour groups and the heat of the mid-day sun. 

3. Providing Expertise and Inside Information – In most European and Asian countries, private guides are licensed by the government and must pass a test or complete educational courses to guide tourists.  Equally important, private guides develop good contacts with the people at tourist sites. When we were in Cairo, our guide was able to get permission from the guard for my son and I to accompany him down the shaft of a ruined pyramid in Saqqara to see the broken sarcophagus and empty treasure room that are not open to large tour groups. 

4. Keeping You Safe - In some countries, it is important to know exactly where you are going and to avoid traveling in remote areas at night, during times of political unrest, or in bad weather conditions. Adventurous travelers sometimes rent their own car for travel or set out without firm plans. Private guides are more aware of local conditions and are better positioned to extricate your family from any dangerous situations. During a trip to the Taj Mahal in India, a group of political demonstrators decided suddenly to block the main highway halfway between Jaipur and Agra, and in a few cases to rob people in their vehicles.  Our driver and guide became aware of the situation, got up to date information from headquarters, and arranged to caravan with a group of other guides and detour through local villages around the trouble spot. As a result, we were able to avoid the problem area and didn’t have to turn back as dozens of tour buses heading to the Taj Mahal did that same day.

5. Developing a Personal Relationship - Most personal guides are good communicators and enjoy being with people and telling stories.  So, visiting new places with a guide provides an opportunity to have meaningful conversations about life in their country and to learn more about the places you are visiting.  The best guides may or may not be scholars, but they usually have special insight into the history and traditions of the area. After several days of riding around together and talking about families and interests, new friendships are often created.

6. Ensuring a Comfortable Experience - Group tours usually take place on a large bus or a crowded van.  In contrast, even in remote countries, private guides generally provide a comfortable air-conditioned car with water, hand wipes, face wipes, and umbrellas, and ensure that the guests get a good view from the vehicle. You also control when to stop for a meal or take a rest.

7. Avoiding Pressure Stops and Solicitations – In some countries, group tour guides earn a good portion of their income through commissions received from the stores, restaurants, or sites where they stop with tourists. Similarly, cruise lines are not always able to control the itineraries of the local tours made available to them in port. It can be awkward, however, to have to stop and visit a shop or lunch spot owned by the guide’s or the bus driver’s cousin.  In contrast, private guides rarely pressure their customers to shop in special stores or buy expensive souvenir items. The good ones will tell you objectively which merchants to avoid and where the best meals and goods can be found 

8. Cost Control – Having a private guide and driver take you around a city or a country can be an expensive proposition, particularly in some European countries.   But group tours can also be expensive. A full day tour on a cruise ship can easily cost $300 to $400 per person.  When you work with a private guide, you can negotiate your total cost up front and then determine if the benefits outweigh the cost. In some nations, it is not unusual to be able to hire an experienced guide and driver for under $300 per day for a carload of family members.  

 Finding a Reliable Guide

Some travelers feel uncertain about looking for a guide in a distant land.  However, the process is not much different than what people do in looking for a place to stay on Airbnb or other websites.   First, spend some time on the internet looking up travel websites and guide listings for the place you are interested in. For example, if traveling to Beijing, begin by searching the words “private tour guides in Beijing”.  You should read about the services they offer, see if the places they visit match up with your interests, and how much they will charge. Second, confirm that there are mostly strong and positive reviews of the guide service posted on applicable websites. Frequent complaints from customers about changing plans, pressure to make additional purchases or confirming the financial arrangements may be signs of a problem company. Third, look at recommendations for private guides in established travel guidebooks and independent websites or travel magazines which do not accept commissions or referral fees like The Traveling American.  Fourth, after identifying one or more guides who look appropriate for your needs, contact them by email for more details and include the dates of  your trip and your key objectives for the tour. Finally, if you like one of the guides, ask him or her for a written proposal of services outlining the dates, times, activities, and costs included.

To assist with this process, this section of The Traveling American website will present sample profiles of ten private guides who offer comprehensive travel and guide experiences in different various countries or regions of the world.  Each profile will provide an overview of the tourist attractions in the region, describe the services and special tours offered by the guide, summarize the experience and qualifications of the guide, and explain through pictures and stories the experiences which our family had using the guide service.  

Notice: The information provided in the guide profiles are true and accurate to the best actual knowledge of The Traveling American. However, my family's experience with any particular guide or company profiled may not reflect the experience of other travelers using these services. Travelers should rely on their own judgment and information in retaining any guides or drivers mentioned on the website.