If you ignore my other random advice, please give this one some serious consideration…. “DON’T TAKE A BUS TOUR”. Yes I am shouting. I’ve never really liked them, but was finally put off for good when we went on the Canterbury Travel Lapland holiday. It cost a monstrous amount of our hard earned cash for a 5 day Christmas stay in a log cabin in Lapland. There are more stories to tell of this but the 5 days consisted of being taken from one forest clearing to another by… you guessed it… BUS, to do sledging, reindeer patting, snow mobile blah blah. After four days of drudgery and annoying people – my mind was finally set – don’t ever take a bus tour!
There is however a much more rational and financial argument, if you have a family – the cost. Just by way of an example to show the scale of the issue. Fraser Island is a massive sand island just south of the the Great Barrier Reef, Bus tours come in at $239 per person – nice day out with up-to 30 other people. The obvious choice, you would think, what with it being an island made of sand, with no proper roads and you have to go over on a barge. Oh contraire – renting a 4*4, fuel, barge crossing, permits & insurance $595 with enough space for 7 adults! So in profit with three people and a million times the fun! Why would ya? Just sayin! This theory holds true for all bus tours (I suspect… though I haven’t done the peer reviewed research to prove it). Plus, if you want to linger you can. If you want to give something a miss, you can. If you hate other people – sorted (pity you can’t choose your family though).
This is a fairly extreme example, but scale it down and it still works. Most holiday destinations you can hire a decent car for £30-40 a day, so the economics work better – just don’ do it!