Do your prices include airfare?
No, our prices are "Land Only." Once you get to a Tour starting location, we take care of everything listed in the Tour Highlights including your own dedicated, US-based Tour Leader.
Why don't you include airfare in your tours?
That one was a tough call. What we ultimately came to realize was that air travel has become an intensely personal choice with individual favorites based on an airline's quality, any reward program, number of stops between origin and destination, time schedules and other factors. All of that noted, we are happy to book air travel for you (and we know some places for very good fares). Also, if it is a Traveler's preference, we can arrange for you to meet at the most convenient connection and continue on to the Tour-Start Destination with out Travelers from the Tour or even with the Tour Leader.
Does the full cost of a tour need to be paid upfront?
If a traveler is booking a tour the begins less than 45 days from the date of booking, then yes, the entire fare is due at the time of booking. If a traveler is selecting a tour further in advance, then a deposit is due at the time of booking — the amount of the deposit varies depending on the cost of the tour, but generally speaking runs about 15% of the total price — with the balance due 45 days ahead of the tour’s start date. The deposit reserves a place on our tour in the event of more travelers’ interest than available places remaining on the tour, but allows the traveler a chance to pay the bulk of the tour price at a later date. (Note: Deposits are refundable until 90 days prior to the tour start, but only to the degree that we can recover committed fees and costs from our vendors (hotels, transit companies, tour sites, etc.)
What happens if not enough people sign up for a tour?
We can not imagine anything more disappointing for a traveler than having a tour cancelled because the tour company could not successfully market the tour to other travelers. So, we don’t do it. Does that mean we would proceed with a tour even if there was only one booked traveler? Yes, that is exactly what we mean. When you decide you would love for Muybridge to show you some part of the world on one of our tours, we take that seriously. We do not like to lose money on a tour any more than any other operator, but if we have ended up with a single booking for a tour, that is our failure — not the person’s who chose to travel with us. So, what we would do in such a situation is contact a booked traveler or travelers, and say, “Looks like you are the only traveler(s) on this tour. That’s on us, but we want to give you some options.” Then, the traveler(s) would have the choice to [1] Continue as planned, traveling with a private tour guide on one of our trips, at no extra charge, [2] Change the booking to another tour or the same tour but different dates since the preference would be to travel with a group of others, or [3] get a full refund of their tour price paid to date. For the sake of full disclosure, we have only had that situation happen once, and that traveler had an outstanding private tour of Thailand. His rave review is even on our page!