Special Interest Tours

Considering the distance from Istanbul to the Anzac sites (5 hours on a mini bus), it was absolutely fabulous. Pickup smooth, trip smooth, comfort stop half way, lunch plentiful, transition to guide smooth. 12 on our bus, Australian, Kiwi, Canadians. Our guide for the afternoon’s tour of WW1 sites was Burak, and he was pure gold. We stayed on for the read more second day (others headed straight back to Istanbul). Gorgeous half hour across the Dardanelles to the delightful surprise of Canakkale. Staff transitioning us across and to our hotel fantastic. We then bar hopped our night away and met the most wonderful Turkish people. Çanakkale was fantastic. Slow morning. Cafe hopped. Short (25 min) bus ride to the ruins of Troy - it was nice, but that’s all. Back across the Dardanelles and to our hotel in Istanbul by 9.30pm, which was ahead of schedule. If you must see Gallipoli, you also must have a night out in Canakkale. Glad we did it.

Again Global Journeys and Grace thank you for all travel assistance. Trip was amazing what beautiful countries to explore & through Cosmos a breeze. Loved every minute. Put on your bucket list. Will definitely recommend trip to everyone
Thanks 😀

My tour departed on 24 October. There are 46 in our group (too big for my liking). In Ireland it rained nearly everyday so probably should pick an early departure date. In Scotland the drive was a really scenic drive with trees with yellow leaves on both sides of the roads. It rained less in Scotland. Booking with Hannah is so easy and she is such read more an efficient and professional agent. I will book with her again.

The only downside is I don't like our tour guide Kathryn Dolan because she accused me of taking one token (1 pound) from her for the bus ride(at Giant of the Causeway), which I didn't because I was waiting for her to buy the return tickets for me. For this incident she didn't apologize to me. More than 19 people from our group were on the bus. They must have all heard the conversation. I think I have travelled more than 15 tours with Cosmos. I think this is the last tour with Cosmos. She is the second tour guide that I didn't give her tips to in my more than 15 years of travel time. Her 1 pound mistake made her lose 72 pounds tips from me and I wonder how many of my tour mates will give her tips and I purposely gave the tips to the driver in front of her face, and she didn't give me the after tour feedback form that I normally get. (GJ: Ouch!)

This was my 1st Backroads tour. This is a regional tour visiting some lovely scenic towns. Lecce was my favourite: biggest town we visited with wonderful limestone Baroque architecture. We stayed in a lovely palazzo here. Very energetic, fun, tour leader. A full group of 18. Bus was very cramped and not comfortable. Thank goodness we weren't travelling read more long distances. My gluten free diet request was well catered for at all hotels and included dinners. The last 2 hotels we stayed in were quite basic. I am usually a solo traveller. On this tour I travelled with a Canadian friend. We prefer a busier, more active style of travelling. I felt this tour was more suited to couples rather than solo travellers.This was the 2nd of 3 tours over 6 weeks that I arranged with the friendly and professional assistance of Georgie and Hannah.