Hi Katty
Many thanks for your email. It is hard to believe that we have been home for over a week! We are still playing catch-up with all the domestic chores around the house and garden!
In summary, our holiday was absolutely wonderful. We had high expectations and they were exceeded.
All three main trips – Manu, Inka Trail and Galapagos were just fantastic.
Covering things in more detail….
1. The only hiccup was, as you say, the change in plan for the Manu trip. It did come as a shock, being told at such short notice and we would have preferred to have been briefed earlier. But we still wouldn’t have changed our plans.
The guide, Jose Antonio, spoke excellent English, was very accommodating and really was a brilliant guide who made our trip such a success. We would happily go with Inkanatura and Jose Antonio again and recommend them to others.
2. The Inka Trail went very well too. The group was good. Both guides excellent and the group of 11 clients got on extremely well. Despite our concerns about AMS, Joyce and I found the walking OK and were not bothered by the altitude.. However, we all found the camp on the last appallingly bad. It is disgusting and does no justice to such a World Heritage Site. The sanitation was appallingly bad, the campsite was cramped and very busy – and the manager of the hotel was quite unfriendly and money-grabbing. We cannot understand why this is allowed to happen. With such an important Trail, surely better alternatives can be found and we would hope that Enigma would find an alternative to the 4 day trek finishing there. Full marks to Enigma though, for everything – the guides, the porters – the food – the hygiene (despite well publicized worries, nobody had any tummy problems).
3. The rail trip from Puno to Cuzco was a delight. It was much better than we expected and we enjoyed every minute of the 10hour trip. Highly recommended to others.
4. Galapagos was fantastic. The Santa Cruz was very well run, the accommodation and food excellent. We did ask for a change of guide mid week, as we weren’t happy with our first one. The second was superb, as were most of them. The animals , birds and snorkeling were superb.
5. the hotels were all good. The best was Machu Picchu Pueblo (the quality of service, and food were first class and the gardens a joy). The two Private Collection hotels, in Cuzco and Puno were also excellent. And we felt very much at home at Colca Lodge which we liked a lot. Just a pity we were only there for one night. In hindsight we should have gone for two. The two city hotels (in Quito and Lima) were OK as far a city hotels go, but perhaps to big and business orientated for us.
6. All our other guides were very good indeed – very helpful and friendly, particularly Rosario who covered Arequipa and Colca.
7. the overall organization of both SE Tours and Metropolitan staff worked like a dream. There was a huge number of connections, links and pickups which could have gone wrong but didn’t and that was a tribute to both organizations – and yourself and Lourdes (and other staff whom we didn’t have contact with). Please pass on our thanks to everybody for the superb organization of the trip.
8. We found Peruvians very friendly and warm and it is nice to report that throughout our stay there we had no tummy problems at all . Indeed we found the quality of food to be far higher than we anticipated.
9. There are many other aspects which we could comment favourably about. We loved Peru – and we only saw a small part of it – all the drivers were good, the vehicles used all very good etc etc . I am sure I could think of a lot more.
All in all, a superb trip, superbly planned and organized by SE Tours.
Many thanks, Katty – and please pass on our thanks to everybody in the company.
We’ll be boring Charles & Cathy – and all our family and friends – over the coming months with the stories and photos!
Kind regards
Lawrence
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