Colonial Treasures: San Miguel de Allende, Guanajuato, Zacatecas and Guadalajara

Posted By : RICHARD_P
Too many stops each day and little time to enjoy the important things. For example, Queretaro and Delores Hidalgo were destinations that could have been eliminated. They were just drive by destinations. Also, no need to go to Guadalajara, where we insisted on visiting the Orozco murals which were not even on the itinerary. We could have gone to a tequila factory elsewhere and not wasted two days.
In Guanajato we went to the university but just stood outside, then stood outside Diego Rivera's house, then went to a street where someone had kissed his girlfriend, all just a waste of time. In San Miguel we were in a hotel far from the city and 3 of the group were in another hotel far away so we wasted an hour and a half waiting for the van to drop them off, leaving little time to enjoy that wonderful city.
Our best day, in Zacatecas was when we decided (with another couple) to not see the mine and instead visited the two world class museums ( of the Coronel brothers) which were not even mentioned in the tour.
Leaving at 9 am, instead of earlier, we always arrived relatively late at the next destination which made it impossible to properly visit the local highlights when we arrived.
Additionally, no water was offered to us during the long drives and the music in the van was often, not only too loud but not everyone enjoys the same music. Nothing wrong with a little silence, either.
Our guide Fabrizio does not speak English well. It was often quite difficult to understand him and he would go hours without explaining anything during the long drives. He is a nice person, so we don't blame him but Mexitours should vet the people they send as English speaking guides.
The guide should introduce the members of the group at the beginning of the tour. Also, it should be made clear that people should change seats each day in the van. Otherwise, you may be stuck the whole time in the back of the van where you couldn't hear the instructions as well. The Spanish speakers were always up front and conversing with the guide which created a bond but the English speakers in the back were usually left out of the conversation.
Hopefully, this critique will be useful for improving this tour in the future.
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Posted On : 2024-01-25 11:36:42

Posted By : LindaF
Cities are delightful. However, I asked several times if guide would be primarily English speaking, and was told yes. Boarding bus for departure, guide only spoke Spanish. Quick switch with another guide who spoke English. However, of 12 original passengers, only two of us spoke English. So tour was mostly in Spanish. Our guide, Umberto, was a nice guy who tried, but when most of your audience speaks Spanish, that is what you are going to use. We enjoyed the sights and culture; hotels were nice, trip is good value. But narration mostly lost because of language. Would not be an issue if they hadn't misled me when I asked and was assured of an English speaking guide, not one who would speak mostly in Spanish.
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Posted On : 2023-05-01 22:16:34

Posted By : Martin_S
Overall, this tour was quite nice due to the wonderful ground it covered. With the lack of tourists due to covid, my wife and I had a single guide in their own car take us to to all the cities. No tourist bus or group pressures. This was great.

However, there were a couple of hitches. First, our guide's English was difficult to understand a lot of the time. We also had an incident where we arrived in mid afternoon in Zacatecas after a 4 1/2 hour drive from Guanajuato. Before entering the historic part of the city, we were delivered to a silver mine on the outskirts for a tour. This tour was not conducted by our guide and was totally in Spanish, no English. It was difficult not to get weary for 1 1/2 hours underground while trailing after the large group being entertained by the flowing descriptions of the Spanish-speaking guide.

After finally getting taken to the historical center of this beautiful city, our guide was surprised to find out that the hotel she was taking us to had been cancelled by the tour company a few days before. We had to inform the guide of this fact. We were give one quick trip through the cathedral and then were delivered to a Hampton Inn in a suburb for the night. That hotel refused the tour voucher that we presented to it saying they had no reservation, even though our tour company insisted they had changed our reservation officially from the cancelled hotel. What ensued was a two hour wait for us in the hotel's lobby while the tour company and hotel haggled over what our room rate should be due to the lost reservation. We are talking about a $50 room. Ultimately I had to threaten to our guide that we would call Tripadvisor and cancel the rest of our tour if the situation was not resolved soon, and miraculously it soon was. I also had to insist that my wife and I would be taken back to the city's historical center the next morning to stroll around this beautiful city we had spent so much time and trouble to visit.

To the tour company's credit, they quickly agreed to this our guide delivered and allowed us to stroll. This was probably allowed since we were the only two folks on the tour. The rest of the tour to the remaining cities unfolded without such problems, especially the city tour we got when we returned to Mexico City. That four-hour tour had a superb guide.
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Posted On : 2021-05-27 12:43:40

Posted By : meeyulee
Ten Chinese Americans from Los Angeles, California, signed up with Viator in September 2018 for the 10-day January 22, 2019 Mexico colonial cities tour. We arrived a few days earlier and needed pick up from our hotel instead of from the airport. After online payment, Viator email instructed us to contact Mexitours for further instructions. A Mexitours representative responded to our email and confirmed date, time, and place for pick up and start of tour. About 2 days before, we called Mexitours to ascertain everything, and although the answering phone agents kept us on hold and their replies were sketchy, came the day before, we received an assuring email.

Ten more (from Costa Rica) came on the 32-seat clean and comfortable bus with big viewing windows. Bus driver Antonio was a cautious driver, as we have seen cars raced ahead of ours on all the roads. Good to be safe. The tour was MAGNIFICENT! Great hotels right at the squares at every town. We got to enjoy local activities and eats, because our guide Eduardo was easy going and experienced. Every town on this tour opened our eyes! I'll leave it at this--like being inside Rome's St. Peters Basilica, pictures or paragraphs lack, versus the tremendous feeling of being on location. For world travelers, these towns must not be missed.

Stupid tourists as tourists are, while on our own in Mexico City or elsewhere, we did not encounter anything threatening. Uber and taxi drivers, street peddlers, shop vendors, police officers, hotel employees, and the general public all were helpful and POLITE when we approached with inquiries. Mexico City: just the Diego Rivera mural at the President's Palace was worth the easy 4.5 hour flight from Los Angeles. Mexitours offered us the Zocalo Central Hotel, which was super fabulous and at the heart of Constitution Plaza, but that's another review.
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Posted On : 2019-02-01 20:18:38

Posted By : HuiChin_S

it's the best tour that we ever had. we love the wonderful and knowledgeable tour guide Roberto. If you want to know the beauty and rich history of the Mexico then this is the tour that you want to take. We enjoyed so much.