Eastern US & Canada Grand Vacation Reviews

This is a well established tour for Cosmos and is clearly popular - the bus was virtually full with 50 people. I was a little disappointed with the pace at the beginning of the trip - after a full day in Boston we drove to Quebec in Canada in one hit (with three breaks) - a very long day indeed. We saw very little of the East Coast New Hampshire or read more Vermont apart from the highway. It was also somewhat disappointing that the Fall was late this year and the trees were not yet coloured. However, Canada was lovely and the way south through Niagara Falls and Pennsylvania lived up to expectation. The half day in Lancaster County meeting the Amish people was fascinating and made up for the fact that, when we got to Washington, it was closed! (Due to a Government shut down.) The Tour Director, Brett, was knowledgeable and good tempered, took everything in his stride and did his best to minimise the problems in Washington (he managed to get us within sight of most monuments, if not inside). Accommodation was generally good and once or twice brilliant! This tour is great as a taster for Canada and Pennsylvania, but if you are hoping to catch the Fall colours on the east coast, I would recommend you take a New England only trip.

The tour was excellent. Tour director & bus driver were fantastic. I recommend that you do the extra activities that they suggest, it's worth it. Accommodation is reasonable for the price but some hotels are a little dated & most are not centrally located but the bus generally takes you to the centre & picks you up. The stop in Philadelphia was really read more too short to be useful. An extra day in Montreal would have been nice perhaps sacrificing the Amish experience (personal choice really). Thousand Island tour was totally unexpected & really beautiful. Niagra helicopter ride was fantastic so was the CN Tower dinner in Toronto. I'd recommend it to anyone thinking about such a tour.

There was a good balance of included tours, free time and optional tour experiences. The guide (Larry Schwartz) initially appeared tense. However, he proved to be very knowledgeable and extremely well organised. He gauged the interests of the group very well and catered for this. Local tour guides were generally excellent, apart from Al in Boston. The read more group found him very difficult to understand. The hotel accommodation was very good, except for Boston (the Brookline Hotel) where the room was very cramped and both the air conditioner and the indoor pool pump were noisy, making it difficult to sleep. Overall, we thoroughly enjoyed the experience and have recommended it to our friends. We would have no hesitation in booking another Cosmos trip.

Very well organised and punctual arrival and departures each day. The pace was constant, without being too hectic. There was sufficient free time. It could not have been better.

I guess it will always be a struggle to get the right balance between tour pace and and spending enough time at a place to enjoy the experience. For the most part, our view is that the tour got it right. However, with regards to Quebec, they could do better. The hotel was too far out from the city centre.

Excellent tour director and competent and friendly driver. Included sightseeing was extensive and appropriate. Bus was comfortable but had some minor airconditioning and internal aesthetic problems. Standard of accommodation varied considerably from place to place. All was acceptable but some was old and lacked maintenance. No meals were included and read more this was one thing that attracted us. Two unexpected continental breakfasts were included. Only did a few optional tours but these were good. Overall would give it a high rating.

I will always book through Frances as she is kind and supportive. Overall it was a great experience. Many thanks to Frances/Noel and the people I met on the coach. It's hard when you haven't travelled alone before and all these expections. I appreciate your services and being open to feedback.

Had a terrific time on our Cosmos tour. Tour guide was informative (despite being overall quite bossy re his 'rules'). Plus the extra guides for each city really were valuable sources of knowledge. Optional excursions were worthwhile and overall my husband and I really enjoyed the experience. Impressed with the overall standard of the hotels. Also the read more majority supplied really nice and varied breakfasts at a reasonable price, which provided a great start to the day. Pace was fast on the tour but allowed us to cover so much ground and see so much in the 2 weeks. In hindsight I am amazed at how much we saw and learnt. We liked the amount of flexibility in the free time too. Allowed people to vary the pace for themselves if they were tired etc. Found Global Journeys to be easy to book a tour through and very responsive when questions were asked. Well done!

Overall the tour was excellent. Fellow travelling companions on bus were great. Would have liked to have had more time in Pennsylvania.

It was our first Cosmos tour, we had a fantastic experience! The sights were amazing, and we learnt so much about the cities, culture & history through the tour director. Pace was good and the hotels were comfortable, better than I had expected. Thank you Frances, for all your help and prompt responses to all our enquiries. We will be booking with you guys again!

Tour was better than we expected. Good pace not to fast, just a nice moderate tour. Was able to see quite a number of attractions in the main cities we visited. Would consider another tour with Global Journeys & Cosmos.

Although we have travelled extensively, this was our first coach tour and we approached it with entirely open minds. It was an easy way to get around and we sure did that - 3,000km in two weeks. The trip booklet we were issued with covered most organisational things so well that we were not having to ask. The hotels were exceptionally good, the coach read more very good and the driver amazing! But it was the tour guide who made the trip run so smoothly and successfully - he was very well organised, extremely knowledgeable, a great communicator, and calm and understanding at all times. The local guides were on the whole very good. We like the way Cosmos offers optional excursions, and also free time in most places with maps and information provided. The videos relating to some cities visited were good. I can think of only one thing that I would have liked - a large-scale map showing our daily routes. And maybe some books/info on the areas we were passing through to peruse as we drove along. All in all, thumbs up Cosmos for an economical and well-run trip.

We enjoyed the tour very much. We had a great tour leader in MJ and driver in John. It was our first tour and we were very lucky to have had such a great group to tour with. It was a very positive experience. Having said all of that, there are one or two things that we feel could be improved upon, although we realise that it is difficult to provide read more first class options within budget. We felt that the Skyline Hotel in NYC was below expectation. In our case, the first room we were given had wet paint on the door, workmen working in the passage and a paint sheet still over the bed. The second room we were given already had people in it (which we found when we opened the door) and the third room was quite acceptable. It was noisy at night and generally unappealing. Another hotel in Canada had only one lift working and we understand that the second lift had been out of order for a considerable period of time. Lastly, we felt that 4 cities in the few days we had in Canada was probably one too many. Quebec and Ottawa were great, but we felt that one of either Montreal or Toronto should perhaps be dropped. We also felt that the minimal time in Philadelphia was a waste of time and a disappointment. We are not sure what should be done about this because Philadelphia is such a significant city so it probably should be given more time rather than dropping off the itinerary. We hope that our comments will be seen as constructive feedback as they are not meant to be negative. We reiterate that we had a great time on tour and enjoyed it very much.