Hi from Rick: Guiding Unforgettable Tours
I just got home from Rome after wrapping up a tour. Not just any tour — my very favorite kind of tour…a mentoring tour, where I was the guide and the tour members were our newest Rick Steves' Europe tour guides. Twenty-four of them reported to Rome for a week of hands-on experience to learn how to lead in the "Rick Steves style."
We're fortunate to attract top-quality guides to our company. Why? Because our guides are teachers, not salespeople. They're paid well up front, so they can lead without angling for tips, selling optional sightseeing, or getting kickbacks on group shopping. (On a Rick Steves tour, none of this happens: All tips and group sightseeing are included — and there is no "group shopping.")
Most of our "new" guides are only new to us — they're already seasoned guides in their own right. On this tour, we gathered to share with them the vivid little experiences that make a Rick Steves tour sparkle.
We dropped by a farmhouse, where the family took us through a magic door in the kitchen that led down into their 2,000-year-old Etruscan cellars — always cool, and a perfect place to age wine. Then, after letting me tickle the ivories of their piano (the same one Franz Liszt played when he visited back in the late 1800s), we nibbled on cheese, prosciutto, and bread from their village as they proudly poured us wine from bottles bearing their family name. Raising a glass to the hosts, I taught our group a very important Italian word: indimenticabile…unforgettable.
That's the type of personal experience our tour members — many of whom are return travelers — expect when they sign up with us. They expect a tour that's fun, smooth, meaningful, and…indimenticabile. So, we spent the week practicing how to make exactly that happen on every Rick Steves tour.
We gathered at our hotel to show how to run an effective welcome meeting — a crucial kickoff for any tour, when the guide establishes their leadership style. Then at meals, on guided walks, and during other tour basics (like checking into hotels and getting full use out of our bus — while still keeping the driver happy), we covered important, if subtle, ways the guide makes our tours so appreciated. And there are so many:
Our guides work at each meal — making sure the menu is clear and that the seating and acoustics make for comfortable, convivial conversation for all. They work when we have a local guide — accompanying the tour, supporting that guide, taking up the rear, and looking out for pickpockets. They show how even autostrada rest stops can be fun (order your coffee like a local: pay the cashier first and take your receipt to the barista) and educational (EU law requires rest stops to help drivers stay fresh and alert). They establish and explain the "buddy system," so the guide isn't endlessly "counting sheep" — and our passion for punctuality. (When we say "wheels up at 4:15," we're actually rolling by 4:16.)
Little tips like these don't just help a tour run smoothly. They help our travelers feel less like tourists and more like temporary locals…and our group less like a ship of fools and more like a shipshape band of merry travelers.
Anyone can come to a place like Rome and spend a week ticking the boxes of what you "should" do. But you deserve more meaning from your travels. On our tours, your guide will give you just that — a deeper connection with locals, a richer understanding of what you're seeing, and the feeling that you're enjoying maximum travel thrills and fun for every mile, minute, and dollar on your European vacation.
We'll meet a few of our indimenticabile Italy tour guides in this month's Tour News. Plus we're featuring colorful day-by-day slideshows for a trio of our most popular Italy tours: Heart of Italy, Best of Italy, and Best of Rome; a short video with one of our favorite local guides sharing her passion for Rome; raves about Italy's greatest cities from recent tour members; and the inside scoop on last-chance tour deals and our upcoming Festival of Tours.
I had a wonderful time on this year's mentoring tour. These guides were already solid professionals when they arrived — but now, after my little tour guide boot camp, they're equipped with firsthand knowledge of our travel style…now, they're Rick Steves guides. And, whether you're heading to Italy or another corner of Europe, they're ready to welcome you and excited to make your trip meaningful…and, yes, indimenticabile.
Buon viaggio!
Rick