Frequently Asked Questions
Less often than people assume, and here is why. You pay for what you will actually use instead of a generic package. A week built around cycling or vineyards strips out the filler days, the tickets bought by default and the badly located hotels. Call us and we will put the two scenarios side by side, numbers in hand.
Not at all, and it is often more enjoyable when you arrive without the vocabulary. Estates welcome curious visitors every day and a good tasting can be explained in plain words. What matters is the choice of houses and the pace of the day: three well-chosen estates beat six rushed visits. Start with our file on wine routes from Quebec and on Burgundy.
If you play regularly with the same set, yes, and most carriers accept the bag as checked luggage. For a single week or a flight with a connection, renting on site solves a lot of sore backs and broken straps. Courses in the Caribbean and Mexico rent recent equipment. See our all-inclusive golf packages and our selection of the world's great courses.
It depends entirely on the trail, and this is where an honest conversation saves a bad trip. The Camino de Santiago is walked in stages of fifteen to twenty-five kilometres on rolling terrain, within reach of anyone who trains a few months ahead. A high-altitude trek in Nepal or Peru asks for something else. We will tell you plainly where you stand. Our files on the world's great treks and on the pilgrimage of Saint James give the real distances.
Good retreats welcome every level and split the sessions accordingly. What separates a successful stay is the group size, the quality of the meals and the free time left between classes. A centre that fills the day from morning to night rarely delivers the rest it promises. Our overview of yoga and meditation retreats compares the formats, and our spa and relaxation page gathers the gentler stays.
From the spring for the first weeks of December, which are the most sought after. Markets open in late November and many close on the 24th, which catches out travellers aiming for the week between Christmas and New Year. German and Alsatian cities work beautifully by train, one market to the next. Our articles on the most beautiful Christmas markets and on planning the trip give the calendar city by city.
The second half of January and early March give the best combination of snow and open runs. February comes at a premium in Europe because of French and British school holidays. For a first stay, a linked area serving several villages leaves you room if the weather turns. See our ski trips.
In Hungary, Iceland, Japan and Portugal, yes, and several of our clients now build their itinerary around them. The trick is to place them at the end rather than the beginning: a thermal bath after six days of walking has nothing in common with the same bath on the first evening. Our selection of the world's thermal baths says which ones earn the detour.
If the journey is part of what you came for, very much so. The train drops you downtown, spares you two airport crossings and hands you landscapes the plane flies over. In exchange it asks you to accept longer days. Our all-inclusive rail journeys and our list of the greatest train journeys show where it genuinely pays off, and Portugal by train is a fine example.
For scuba, yes, and a serious centre will ask for it. A supervised first dive remains possible without certification, and several destinations let you complete the entry-level course on site in three or four days. Freediving and snorkelling need nothing but a good mask. Our diving travel page lists the sites by level.
Around two dates: the registration, often a year ahead by ballot, and the flight, which must give you at least two nights on the ground before the start. The rest of the trip goes after the race, never before. Our file on the world's marathons sets out the registration windows.
That is the most common case, and it works out well. We build a stay where the theme fills half the days and the other person finds their own: a city to explore during the golf round, a spa during the tasting, a terrace during the dive. Our romantic getaways and our adventure escapes often start from exactly that compromise.
Call 1 866 628-6241. You will reach someone who has travelled these routes and who has time for you. We start from the passion, pick the right dates and the right hotels, keep real free time in the schedule, and stay a phone call away while you are there. That is the difference between booking alone in front of a screen and leaving with someone behind you.



