Lauds Vantage for alternative tour

My husband, Stanley, and I traveled with Vantage Deluxe World Travel (90 Canal St., Boston, MA 02114; 888/982-6824) in April and May 2006.

We were supposed to have a 2-week river cruise on their “Eastern Europe and the Black Sea” tour, April 13-26. We opted for the post extension Transylvania excursion as well, three nights in Brasov, Romania. When that was over, we traveled from Bucharest to Berlin to begin our second tour with Vantage. It was called “Historic Cities of Eastern Europe” and originated from the U.S. on April 27.

Well, Mother Nature had other ideas, and the Danube was flooding worse than anyone had ever seen, so the river trip did not go. We were disappointed, of course, but did not blame the travel company. In fact, we have nothing but accolades for them.

All 120-plus people planned to be on a river cruise but instead found themselves on a bus. Vantage had to quickly find hotels and wonderful and unique places for lunch and dinner along the way. We ate in places like the ramparts of a fortress and, in another fort, a dungeon. The hotels all were superior/first class and located in city centers. In fact, the luxurious J.W. Marriott in Bucharest was in back of the People’s Palace built by Ceausescu.

We stayed three days in each major city, with daily excursions to interesting historical locations. We did see almost everything we would have seen via the river cruise, missing only Croatia. And we also saw some areas we would not have seen.

We cannot say enough about Vantage’s handling of the situation. We know tour companies have a “plan B” to fall back on, but some parts of this trip also called for “plan C.”

The four program managers did a superb job keeping us informed and moving us along. They certainly had not planned on leading a bus tour. In fact, our guide told us that he always did river excursions; he had never done a bus trip. But kudos to Mihai Dimofti for such a great job!

The river trip cost $3,714 per person, including air from San Francisco to Frankfurt, Germany, and Budapest, Hungary. The second trip cost $2,399 per person, including air from Warsaw, Poland, to Frankfurt to San Francisco. These prices reflect a past traveler discount and reduced airfare. In their latest catalog, the river trip is shown as $3,449 plus $299 for Transylvania.

THOMASINE ELEFANT
San Jose, CA