Go Real TravelReviews of gorealtravel.com

Patricia Addiss Recently, we booked a "dream Vacation" with GO REAL TRAVEL. While it was quite expensive, it would have been worth it had we been furnished with what we were promised. We traveled across Austria and Switzerland. We were to be supplied with an Itinerary, Hotel reservations and transportation passes, tickets and private tour guides. Before we even embarked on our journey we noticed discrepancies after carefully examining the itinerary provided by GO REAL TRAVEL. We were missing tickets and much of the information did not make sense. When we tried to inquire as to our findings with GO REAL TRAVEL, we found it near impossible to communicate with them. When we were finally able to get some semblance of a response from them, we felt as if we were shuffled around and placated in order to pacify us and our concerns. Finally, we were told that all missing information and items such as travel tickets and maps were going to be forwarded to our first hotel. We were left having to hope that said items would appear in an unfamiliar country. While, there were some items waiting for us, not all of our missing pieces were there. At this point we just improvised changing much of their itinerary to suit our needs and almost completely reinventing our own itinerary. Thankfully, we managed to salvage our "Dream Vacation". Once we arrived back home we tried to no avail to address GO REAL TRAVEL, yet again, we were placated and still have no satisfaction or reciprocation of funds.

Would not recommend this company. We booked a trip with GO Real starting in Vienna and ending in Zurich, 15 days with stays in Salzburg, Lucerne and Interlaken in between. The reason for the low rating started before our trip began and the failure of any communication and response back to my phone call messages and emails while we were traveling. Our itinerary was incomplete after I paid the full balance because we were missing train tickets and maps. Go Real promised to have delivered to our first hotel, tickets were there but no needed maps. The train tickets were terrible having us traveling at night through unfamiliar stations and missing out on beautiful, Austrian and Swiss sceenery. They were not available to fix or adjust for us, we were out of pocket over $400 euros to fix. After being home now for over a week, they still refuse to respond. On a positive note all the hotels were what we requested, very nice and helpful staffs, all 4 star. Getting breakfast every morning was fantastic although for some reason, not included at the last hotel in Zurich, another $170 out of pocket. The tour guides who were booked was fantastic but should have been at all sites, not just 2. Again we believed this would be included but no response back from Go Real. Please do not apologize, this does not help after the fact. We depended on Go Real and were let down. There were several inaccuracies regarding travel directions in our itinerary, route numbers and more. We remained flexible and open to changes knowing things, names and places do change especially with ongoing construction projects and more. We found that the itinerary was not that useful or a good value considering the amount of $ paid. Better, any communication would have really helped us during our trip. Do yourself a favor and choose another company for your travel needs.

Go Real Europe had to get one of my very few negative reviews. First off, the service was good when they needed your business. Once the money was paid, service almost non-existent thereafter. My specific requests for hotel accommodation was not looked into. I had the rude shock of finding that out when I reach the hotel. I was specific to my agent the 2 things that would make or break my holiday, 1. People factor (understandably is not in anyone's control) 2. Hotel requirements. And I gave my agent specific needs for my accommodation. That was why I did not scrimp on my hotel budget with my agent. Unfortunately he blatantly ignored that need, because 2 out of the 3 hotels were exactly my nightmares. My gripe is if they could not find hotels for my specific requests, at least let me know beforehand. At least that would have been more accepting. My emails were not promptly replied after payment and sure, my agent gave me some excuses for his lack of efficiency. I did not remember that lack just before I made any payment. I don't even want to start with the printed itinerary on Croatia but had to force myself to write this excruciating negative for the sake of the travelling community. I plan my own holidays on the usual basis but because I was busy with my home festivities, I thought why not pay a middleman agent to plan my holiday? Bad idea. I chanced upon Go real for it's rave reviews (wondering why). The itinerary was a shame to begin with and we hardly used it. We printed 60plus pages and hardly referred to it after a few days. Why? Because Croatia's tourism is seasonal and the offerings for winter is very different from summer. The itinerary included attractions good for summer and not winter. So many suggested itinerary was not useful for us at all. We were thankful that we had local guides to take us around on our trip and mind you, that's extras from our pocket. And then the wine tour I booked through Go Real. That's another bemoaning moment. I emailed my agent to try to put it on other days rather than the initial last day of the tour, no reply. By then, I resigned to the fact that I'm just down on luck that I booked through GoReal. And the most interesting part of the printed itinerary is there were a couple of free days to explore the old town of Dubrovnik (free I mean walking tours plus really free), most shops were not open during this season and basically it's empty and nothing much to do. I paid the GoReal for transfers, accommodation which I disliked, 2 walking tours and one wine tour (which I paid something like close to USD5K for 2 persons, not including food, airfare, additional day trips and transportation, in a low season) And most times, in many old towns you get free walking tours like the few I did in Czech and Italy. I understood from a local friend who paid only USD2500 for full board tour to Croatia in low season. And another associate divulged that USD4.5K can get you a reasonable good inclusive tours with airfare. All these information came too late. When I was there, my problems were all troubleshot by myself, if not my local guide. Nothing much was done by Goreal except for the few emails. So having said all these, my advice is skip this company altogether and go direct to local agents in that country or plan it yourself with your own requirements. You will be better off with your time and money. The company got 1 extra point from my initial 1-pt rating because they did arrange good guides for the trip. That's about it anyway because you can also easily source them out in TripAdvisor which is free.