I will preface this epinion by saying that I have never taken a Contiki tour. My fiancee, however, has been on four Contiki tours.

I will mainly be writing this review based on the information I know about Contiki from his experiences I have heard, people I have met along the way in Europe who were on Contiki trips and of course my fiancee's many Contiki trips.

Sorry, you're too old.
Contiki has an age range -- 18-35. At first I think this was a little discriminatory. I mean, why limit the age of a trip?

Contiki limits the age group because it is a very specific kind of tour that they are offering. Most of their tours are fast-paced and oriented towards younger, social people who have a lot of energy to go out and do a lot of things. The excursions that they tend to offer often involve late night drinking -- and Contiki goes ahead and assumes that this will be the 18-35 year olds who fall into this category. My fiancee says, "There was never a night with nothing to do."

Also, Contiki is not limited to singles. My fiancee tells me that there were a few couples (both married and not) on several of the trips he took, but he also said that they were the "young, fun, going-out type" who fit amongst the rest of the crowd.

Range of destinations
Contiki offers a trip to practically every area a person would want to visit. They have dozens of different trips in Europe -- major Europe trips to several countries, or specific city trips within one region. My fiancee and I almost signed up for an Iberian Penninsula trip last year -- 10 days to various parts of Spain and Portugal. This was a very specific trip, although the movement around the region was the same kind of movement that is done in Europe.

The European trips (and there are a LOT of them) tend to move a little faster - rarely staying in any city more than one night.

My fiancee did four trips with Contiki: Europe for 26 days; 14 days sailing in the Greek Isles; Australia - Cairns to Brisbane for 18 days; and New Zealand for 21 days.

As you might be able to tell from his trips, most of the tours are more than a week. In fact most of the trips are at least two weeks long, or longer. There are a handful of week-long trips and hardly any that are less than a week long. If you are going to do one of the European packages to several cities, I would recommend the longest amount of time you can spare and afford. You just can't see enough in some of these major cities in a day.

Diversity of people on your trip
Tour groups are made-up of an international assortment of people. My fiancee's roommate throughout Europe was Australian, and two of his good friends on that trip were from South Africa.

Cost
The price of a Contiki tour is competitive with other tours, probably even considered a little cheaper. The reason that Contiki is slightly cheaper is because the accommodations are also not as high-end as some of the more general tours. I suppose they figure that younger travelers have less of a need for "comfort housing" than older people, which is probably a fair assessment to make.

My fiancee tells me that they stayed in all two and three-star hotels, and that he always shared a room with another guy in any given hotel. Couples obviously get their own room.

Also, the trips are categorized into budget or superior. Obviously, the budget trips are cheaper - but these often involve camping out, or staying in group hostels. The Superior tours are all stays in hotels, mostly two people per room.

Would I recommend Contiki?
Would I recommend Contiki? Based on my fiancee's experiences, I would have to answer -- I would only recommend it to certain individuals. Upon hearing the nitty-gritty from my fiancee, I think I realized that Contiki was not for me. I think that Contiki is for the college student -- the partier, the person who wants to visit a ton of cities in a limited amount of time and spent most nights out in the pubs. If you are that type of person, I can't think of a better tour to go on.

However, I'm biased. I would rather be on my own than with a tour, so also take that into consideration as I give my advice. Although having the organization of a schedule and group is ideal for some, I would rather be spontaneous and travel where I want to, making changes along the way.

I want more information, Whitty
For more information on itineraries, dates and general inquiries (visit the discussion boards for some more opinions) visit Contiki's website at www.contiki.com.


Recommended: Yes

Best Suited For: Singles
Tour format: Various
Tour type: Group