Group Travel
Everyone loves a good group trip! But what happens when your friend group can’t coordinate and solo travel is not an option?
Pre-planned group travel organized by a travel company is the best bet.
I’d been bombarded with Facebook ads from EF College Break advertising vacations throughout Europe and South America geared towards college students and recent grads. After weeks of seeing the ads, I decided to go on the site and take a look at their offerings. I found one package in particular that traveled through 12 European cities over 30 days for roughly $5,000. After seeing any sort of social media advertisements I am skeptical to engage with them or purchase straight from the platform.
I kept seeing the ads and I was intrigued! I began looking more into the company, reading blogs, reviews, and even watching YouTube vlogs about peoples trips. After a couple of months of careful consideration, I decided I had to go. $5,000 is no small fee, so after researching I saw that EF College Break offered payment options where you can pay monthly installments up until one month to your departure. In December 2016, I figured October 2017 was the perfect time to experience Europe. I paid my $150 deposit and counted down the months to my trip.
To prepare for the trip I got the newest iPhone, 8+ to make sure I had bomb pictures and planned my outfits for what lewks I wanted to wear at each landmark.
EF Ultimate Break is one of the best trips I have ever been on! Everything was planned and the only thing I had to do was pay my money and show up.
All transportation is covered (transportation to and from the airport in your home city is covered by you).
Ground transportation traveling through locations. We traveled by charter bus for the most part, but used trains and ferries/boats to see sights.
Local public transportation. In most cities, using a charter bus is not ideal to properly navigate cities, so we were provided tokens and fare cards to use the buses, trains, and trams.
Lodging accommodations were a 50%/50% split between hotels or hostels. When booking a trip, you can choose your package if you want to room with 0, 1, or limitless people. On our trip, we stayed at hostels about half of the time and the most we had in one room was 6, and there were no issues. If you’re going with a friend or a loved one and only feel comfortable sharing a room with that one person, you can select that option, and pay a higher trip cost per person. Our tour guide was very flexible if people wanted to switch rooms, and made sure everyone got roomed with a different person in each city so that we were able to mix and mingle and really get to know each other.
Breakfast everyday at the hotel or hostel
Lunch vouchers a few times throughout the trip
First and last night’s dinner
Thoughtfully curated excursions and activities in each city
A local tour guide in each city
A trip tour guide who is with you each day for the duration of your stay
Fun surprises from your trip tour guide! 😉
Access to your group’s Facebook page one month before departing and access to the page forever
Compared to other group travel companies, I found EF Ultimate Break provided more bang for my buck. With other companies, such as G Adventures, I still had to book and pay for my own in and out of country travel, and no meals were included. Pricing the same locations and similar trip duration, I spent roughly $400 more on EF with my transportation and breakfast covered.
With EF Ultimate Break, you do have an itinerary that everyone is expected to follow (because you’ve already paid for the trip), which covers group excursions, museums, city walking tours, and meals, but if you don’t want to attend the group excursions that is totally up to you. I will say, that the only time you’re required to show up is for city departures.
I 100% know that I got my money’s worth on this trip. I met some of the most amazing people, and I’ve made great friends through this trip and shared unmatched memories that I will cherish forever.
Your enjoyment definitely depends on the people that’s in your group, your tour guide, as well as your personality and what you’re open to experiencing. Our guide Silvia was so knowledgeable about every destination and had friends in every city, so we always got the hookup. My group was also quite diverse. We had people from all walks of life from recent high school grads, people in college trying to figure life out, engaged couples, seasoned travelers, people who’d never been out of the country and this was their first international trip, professional bloggers, corporate America workers, and a few people who were unemployed.
