The tour by Imaginative Traveller's Gecko's was very
poorly organised;
1. We were quite surprised how much extras for
the sightseeing we had to pay. Quite often teh guide will say that we will not see best places if we follow the itenary so we had to pay (but then often tehre was not much difference from the tour itenary).
2. The level of the
hotels was below any standards - broken toilet, rooms not cleaned, TV not
working - something was wrong was almost in every hotel. Also while the notes
say that the hotel Nyaungshwe, "is situated by Inle Lake" in reality
the hotel was far from the lake accessible only by 20 minutes boat ride at
least in a very remote place.
3. It was impossible
to eat at some road eateries where we stopped at, no basic hygiene, food for cooking was picked from the dirt on the ground where it was stored.
4. The train journey
from Yangon was quite strenuous but still it was nothing compared to the
11-hours bus journey - it was very hot, the air conditioning was not working in
the bus, at least 7 hours drive was through an ongoing road construction, all
covered in thick dust, making it hard to breathe (even the locals were wearing
face masks).
5. No one told that we have to bring only new, crispy dollars to exchange into local currency. Our group lost so many hours moving from one place to another to exchange money - shocking that it could not be organised properly.
Basically the comfort
level was very different to the one described (and we travelled to 40 coutnries, some very poor) so we are not travellers with unjustified demands.
We would not recommend this tour - there are so many lovely places in Asia where people really care for their country and make the tourists welcomed.
Hello Elena and thank you for taking the time to post this topic on our forum and bring any potential issues to our attention. We were quite surprised to read your feedback from our Best of Burma trip. This is by far our most popular trip to Burma (which is also proving one of our most popular destinations in recent months!). We have received nothing but high praise about our tours here as anyone can see from the reviews posted on the tour pages. One traveller even specifically comments "Burma is an amazing country, and the people so hospitable. The train ride from Bagon to Mandalay is one I will never forget." Another comments on the surprisingly high standard of accommodation and all praise the organisation of their tours leaders extremely highly.
Burma is obviously an emerging tourist destination and there will inevitable be infrastructure issues, which as a well travelled client you are no doubt be aware of. I am sorry if you feel that teh comfort level was different to the one described and that you were not advised about taking clean dollar bills - this detail is stated in the trip notes which every client is directed to upon booking and sent again before departure but perhaps we need to reiterate this information to clients.
It is a great shame that you felt as a whole both the tour and the country were a disappointment to you. The country is in a great state of flux at the moment and it is extremely exciting to see what is changing on virtually a daily basis. Changes that can only continue if we continue to offer our support (in the form of tourism) that will encourage further change for the better.
Please do contact our customer services department if you would like to take anything further as, being one of our most popular destinations, we would very much prefer to address any potential issues immediately and continue to run successful tours to Burma. In the meantime I hope you continue to enjoy any future travels amongst the South East Asian countries - or further afield.