Large Bus Tours
many foreign cities & sites everywhere
Table of Contents
I. Intro
- Traveler's Anxiety:
- Loneliness:
- New Friendships:
- Guest Age:
- Wardrobe:
- Luggage:
- Solo traveler's opinion - Planning & Logistics:
- Lodging:
- One night vs Multi-nights
- Food & Restaurants:
- Perks:
- Amenities:
- Where Bus Tours Can Go?:
- Seasonal Dates:
- Actual Travel Days vs. Advertised:
- Big Bus Tour Lengths:
- "Shop Steering":
- Tier 1, 2, & 3 Sites & Activities:
- Local Culture:
- Sensible Itinerary:
- Free Time
- Tailored Specialty Tours:
- Tour Company Reputation:
- Price & Extras:
- Large Bus Tour Book Agreement:
- Eco Friendly
- Support Local:
Large Bus TOURS
(LBT)
I. Introduction:
Bus Tours, generally, are very large luxurious tour buses with up to 60 passengers traveling daily from city to city &/or between travel sites & experiences, constantly, safely cocooned in a large bus or hotel when not semi-culturally immersed at travel sites.
For many LBT tourists bus touring is an escape from the humdrum monotony or grinding pressure of their daily lives AND a reward for sacrifices they have made for their children & family over decades.
The greatest value of LBTs to most folks, particularly, first-time travelers, is that such tours are worry-free, well-planned & organized including all daily itinerary logistics, lodging, most meals & professionally guided access to the important historical & cultural sites & cultural experiences that fulfill your travel dreams for the energy & budget you have.
Whether your first BB tour or one of many, IT should
be one of your life’s highlights.
Show up on time with luggage, some pocket change & you are off.
Your Cruise Company does all the rest … if you wish.
While mass market, large bus tours are the most economical, there are also a broad range of more tailored exclusive, more expensive options. Small bus & van tours offer more intimacy, fewer passengers, greater itinerary flexibility and a tiered range of quality amenities a higher cost.
It's important that it be the most fulfilling experience possible for the money you budget. The following information should help you choose a LBT Package at your ideal quality vs. price
My Brief suggested way to use these LBT Factors:
1. Simple Tour Factor List: Start a simple written or computer list of my “Expanded TOUR Factors” for keeping track of what you consider important. (At 85 I don’t remember if I don’t write down.😀
2. Thoroughly read Tour Factors: Read each Tour Factor thoroughly noting what's important to you AND rejecting the rest. NOTE: Some LBT Factors may have one or more links & sub-sections. [labeled (dig deeper)] taking you deeper into that Factor’s content making you even better informed.
If you initially skipped around to different Tour Factors that caught your attention, I strongly urge you to go back through the entire expanded list for the factors you missed. Those missed factors may well have key information you have not thought of that may be valuable to you.
Your ideal choice of Large Bus Tour package will be based upon the total/collective value YOU place on each of my Tour Factors. Your summary opinion will guide you toward the best Large Bus Tour package for you.
3. Super simple Tour Factor List: Finally condense your rough list into a very simple checklist you can refer to when screening through Large Bus Tour package offerings.
NOW, you will be ready to search the Internet for tour companies offering your ideal tour package. Your knowledge of these tour factors coupled with your research & prudence will help you choose your ideal package tour.
Your ONLY guarantee of quality vs cost is the thoroughness of your understanding of the following Large Bus Tour FACTORS I am providing you …. & perhaps the reputation of the Package Tour Company you choose
1. Traveler’s anxiety: IMO, all travelers (me) suffer some anxiety traveling to foreign countries, because the cultures are usually very different from our own: language, smells, currency, etc.
But LBT travelers can be inherently less anxious because your tour company intentionally avoids the most unnerving circumstances.
Dig Deeper: My Anxiety-reduction Strategy.
2. Loneliness: is our mind’s feeling of being unattached or unwanted, but LBTs mix you with 
dozens of others. You have to TRY HARD to be alone.
Large Bus Tour Option: airport & back transport.
To & From Airport & tour bus starting/end point pre-arranged and 
reliable transport may be offerred by some large tour bus companies at extra cost) particularly for uncertain or anxious single travelers make the process smooth and stress-free, regardless of whether you're traveling solo or with others for an extra price.
For single travelers, This can be a reassuring option for single/cou-le travelers because it’s.
3. New Friendships & memories All types of folks book big bus package tours; singles, couples, groups; all ages, genders, nationalities, and cultural backgrounds.
20 to 60 guests, mixed together between cities & sights in a large tour bus, randomly seated together for meals, and eagerly milling about your tour guide at travel sites for 4 - 7 days fosters/nurtures exciting new friendships & lifelong memories.
You must be an "Introvertus maximus” not to make new friends. 😃
4. Guest Age: Guest age
may not seem relevant, but it actually is. An elderly couple’s calm, relaxing bus tour vision might sorely conflict with a large bus tour dominated by partying youth or young families.
Not an indictment of either; merely a practical consideration.
Some large bus tours mix all ages; others, are restricted. (none over 90 or children etc) (if I live into 90s, happy to be excluded😇)
5. Wardrobe & Equipment: LBT companies seldom encourage or require formal or semi-formal attire, rather, a woman's much more comfortable woman's casual ”capsule wardrobe.” & man’s 'smart casual.'
Your Large Bus travel wardrobe should have 2 goals:
1) Respect for Host culture: its mores, religion etc.
2) Your Comfort: casual, comfortable sightseeing attire
6. Luggage: Most bus tour companies allow 1 Suitcase (62" total of W, L & H) stored under bus AND 1 carry-on per person.)
7. Planning & Logistics: Very little is required once you have CAREFULLY chosen your ideal LBT package based on your knowledge of all these LBT Factors. Tours provide worry-free, ground transport, food; lodging, site tickets, and local guides — you are never lost.
Unless you will travel independently before and after your tour ...
YOU just book your flights, before & after hotels (if needed) & pack.
8. Lodging: Often, large, sterile, impersonal tour company-owned efficiency hotel or a large chain's hotel for a single night only,
unless smaller, higher quality tour's lodging.
BEST: Welcoming small family-owned hotels near or in Old Town tourist areas allowing YOU easy "free-time"’ independent
walking tours. (Rick Steves Tours).
9. Multi-nite hotel stays v overnight: Multi-night hotel stays are a travel blessing versus the wasted time & energy of ‘pajama' or racing 'Jumping Jack’ large bus tours. These multi-nite hotel stays are ripe with self-fulfilling ‘free-time' options instead of daily long & frenetic drives to multiple site visits ending in nightly exhaustion.
10. Food & Restaurants: BEST: small tour’s relaxed, locally culturally authentic or ‘"free-time"’s guide-suggested local town's dining on your own …. rather than big tour’s culturally ‘faux’, rapidly served, dubious quality food.
11. Perks: tour companies may offer Loyalty programs, booking incentives and upgraded or luxury packages:
12. Amenities: VP Boarding, Seating, access, Food and Beverage Packages, Special Events or Shows, Merchandise or Souvenirs, Extended Hours or Night Cruises, Photo/Video Services, & large or excess luggage handling.
13 Where Tourist Vehicles can go?: Touring vehicles can go almost anywhere on land, of course, subject to: 1) tour's theme or goals, 2) tour’s duration, and 3) local large bus parking regulations.
Most cities and smaller towns have anticipated & provided reasonable parking, off-loading & loading spaces to facilitate access to their tourist sites. Tourism is usually in a town's economic interest, even if it annoys some.
14. Seasonal Dates: Select a season & tour schedule to match your desired climate, weather, and tourist goals, but remember the great travel opportunity:
-- winter in the Northern Hemisphere ....
-- is summer in the southern hemisphere including Antarctica.
15. Actual’ travel days vs advertised: Tour operators often define a 'travel day' differently
The average tourist may believe an ACTUAL tour day includes substantial touring to tourist site(s), ... rather than merely a 1st day's check-in and a last day's early morning departure.
need PIK opf calendar with colored tour and end dates
16. of Bus Tours Length: The length of the Large Bus Tour package you choose will be dictated by your motivation, # of sites & activities you want to visit, travel comfort & pace you desire, and your physical capability.
Some want to just 'get away', relax and 'see' the countries, cities & a few Tier 1 sites they have dreamed of throughout their lives. Others want much, much more: many sites, deep-dive exploration.
Dig Deeper: Typical Tour Length FACTORS
17. “Shop Steering" are undisclosed or dubious time-wasting, impromptu tour stops usually at 
retail shops, gee-gaw factory sites that makes & sells goods tourists might be interested in: souvenirs, diamonds; leather/silk clothing,
& even occasionally illegal or immoral.
Tour companies or guide may get kickbacks on your purchases, but often just waste your time or worse. Such tour operators/guides & shops are not your friends.
18. Tier 1, 2, & 3 Tourist Sites & activities: select a tour package with your most desired Tier 1 sites & a few 2nd tier sites, but few, if any, Tier 3, etc unless Tier 3 site is for convenience to break up a long drive.
BEST: A mix of Tier 1 & 2 sites & perhaps, the occasional unique off-the-beaten-path site or activity when feasible at guide’s discretion. If ‘"free-time"’ afternoons and evenings, then either Tour company's Optional Tours OR self-guide walking tour & a local dining.
19. Local Culture: Large tour buses are a ‘tight people-bubble’ racing through a culture experiencing little deep engagement with local people or their culture except contact with their tourist-acclimated hotel staff etc.
20. Sensible Itinerary: BEST: “Goldilocks” Rule: not too many nor too few; but just the right # of countries, cities, sites etc.”
Beware of:
a) wanting too many countries/sights, too fast
b) the bragging rights temptation.
c) Balance of sights and activities.
d) 'Free-Time'. (SEE #21 immediately below this #20 )
21: "free-time": is when your tour itinerary purposely has nothing officially planned during morning,
afternoon or evening segments ... that is your “free-time” to do as you wish.
A. Generally
Dig Deeper
B. How to determine Tour’s Available ‘"free-time"’ segments:
a) Check Bus Tour's itinerary for ‘free-time’ segments: mornings
(rare), afternoons & evenings AND particularly pairs of both.
b) Know BEFORE you book. Ask tour company for a written
itinerary with published ‘free-time’ segments.Dig Deeper
Dig Deeper
C. How Tour Company Pros design ‘free-time’ packages?
Your fundamental benefit of a package tour is that the terribly time-consuming design, research, planning & logistics to create a safe & time/cost efficient tour package at a reasonable cost has already been done for you by travel professionals. Just book & show up on time.
Anecdote: Itinerary creation: I know, because I have done it many times. As a solo, independent traveler, I have spent months researching & planning 2-3 month long trip itineraries for 1-4 countries at a time, many cities, & hundreds of sites & activities and all logistics.
I easily invested 6 hrs of planning for every day of travel, IOWs, 540 hours (90 days @ 6hr/day).1 mo Research & Planning for every month traveled. Foreign Travel Itineraries
Each tour package reflects the tour designer’s balance between logistics & site touring costs and profit. By design that cost/profit balance includes some ‘free-time’ afternoons & evenings.
So, ….again, …Why should you care? Understanding a Tour Designer’s competing objectives allows you to design a simplified & effective 'free-time' itinerary.
Dig Deeper
D. How to Research & Plan your four ‘free-time’s Options
There are 4 main “free-time" opportunities:
1. Personal rest & relaxation,
2. BBTour Optional tours,
3. Guest booked Local Excursions (Peer-to-Peer)
4. OR, self-guided walking tour.
E. How to Choose your ideal “free time” Local Tours:
My simple 6-step process
Dig Deeper.
22. Tailored Specialty Large Bus Tours: Themed, Luxury & 
Boutique Tours, Adventure & Expedition, Age or Lifestyle, and Educational & Cultural Tours:
Dig Deeper.
23. Tour Company Reputation: BEST: Online reviews that are NOT curated by a tour company or a site that benefits from tour company advertising: e.g. TripAdvisor etc. .
Dig Deeper.
24. Price & extras: BEST: Tour Package price you WANT to pay for should reflect YOUR:
1) most desired sites & activities, quality & comfort
level, & amenities,
2) willingness to pay upfront or, alternatively, as site
opportunities arise while touring, &
3) of course, a wise evaluation of my various 27 Tour Factors that you have just read thru.
Three (3) tour price categories: 1. Inclusive (all inclusive), 2. Partial Inclusive, & 3. All Exclusive.
Key Question: “What is included in the price?”
Dig Deeper.
25. LBT Book Agreement: most publish own versions of such agreements, tailored to them, but generally the same broad themes.
Dig Deeper.
26. Eco-friendly: The image of LBT buses is 'diesel fumes belching road hogs' which the industry argues is UNFAIR because the industry is pursuing eco-friendly initiatives as evidenced by their proudly displayed Green Globe Certification. BEWARE: Greenwashing!
Dig Deeper
27. “support local’: Does tour company proactively patronize local businesses (lodging, taxi service & restaurants, retail, etc) to direct your tourist dollars into local economy rather than to big or foreign businesses or worse, corrupt government (Myanmar’s Military).
ANECDOTE: Avoiding Myanmar dictatorrship: I purposely used local hostels, restaurants small grocery stores. Unfortunately, Mayanmar's corrupt dictatorial military directly or indirectly controls all 3 in-country airlines.
Subscribe!
Join my mailing list to get new content notifications.