Vacation in Italy from Danko Travel Company

Last August, for the first time, I decided to go on vacation abroad: to Italy, the city of Rimini. I did not pay due attention to the choice of the tour operator, believing that it does not matter from whom exactly to purchase the same service, but in practice this turned out to be not entirely true ... So, my acquaintance with Italy began with the conclusion of an agreement with the tour operator "Danko" . And my impressions of such cooperation were not the most pleasant. At the airport in Krasnodar, from where I flew to Rimini, the representative of Danko appeared much later than the representative of another operator, as a result of which he gathered around him a crowd of tourists who wanted to receive their package of documents, and thereby created unnecessary fuss and inconvenience. We flew on a charter flight of Yakutia Airlines. Not the best airline, the service on board is also not very good. Upon arrival at the airport

Rimini, a representative of the tour operator with a sign was waiting for us; No one escorted us to the bus for the transfer, they just waved their hand in the right direction, and then they began to tick the boxes and give out T-shirts. When the bus started, the guide started talking about the city and the rules of conduct in it, in principle, some information turned out to be useful in the future. Hotels are located along the coastline one by one, the bus just made stops, the guide with several tourists literally ran out, grabbed bags, ran to the hotel, then the guide returned and drove on ... Soon my turn came, in the same mode we reach the reception, the guide quickly gives the documents to the administrator, and without a word he heads to the exit.

I don't speak English well, so I tried to ask her some questions, in particular where you can buy a SIM card. She replied that she did not know (!) and that I had to wait, later my guide-assistant would come and tell me what, where and how, but she found it difficult to name the exact time of our meeting. Check-in to the room is from 14:00, and we arrived at the hotel at 9:00. The guide didn’t even tell me that I still had time for breakfast, but simply informed me on the go that they would check me in at 14:00 and rushed to the bus. As a result, after sitting during breakfast in the hotel lobby next to the suitcase for two hours, I realized that no guide would come to me, no one left the guide’s phone number for me either, and I went on my own in search of a mobile phone salon and a cafe to not to die of hunger while waiting for settlement. Thankfully, everything was within walking distance.

Therefore, the guide’s answer “I don’t know” to my question about purchasing a SIM card seemed even more ridiculous to me, since it’s enough to walk along the line of hotels once to know what and where is located, and it was easy for her, seeing guests to hotels every day, not to know impossible. After walking around the city for two hours, I already had all the necessary information about the infrastructure and geography of Rimini. Upon returning to the hotel at check-in time, a note from the guide was waiting for me at the reception, in which she said that she had not found me and that it would be at the hotel tomorrow at 10:00. Well, at least I thought I'd leave my phone number. I wonder how she was going to find me more than two hours after arriving at the hotel? As far as I was told at the travel agency, it was the guide who was supposed to meet me at the hotel, and not me waiting for him for several hours, sitting on my suitcases.

And of course, having arrived for the first time in a foreign country alone and not knowing the language, I experienced discomfort and I would like to receive certain information, but, apparently, the Danko employees believe that a tourist must know everything himself. The next day, our meeting really took place, she did not tell me anything new, a complete informational vacuum. She asked me what questions I had, but since I had already received all the necessary information from other sources, our conversation was short. I never spoke to my guide again. Although representatives of other tour operators regularly appeared in our hotel.

As for the hotel, the conditions of living up to 4 * clearly did not reach. And later I found out that "Danko" chooses the cheapest hotels, but you can't say the same for the cost of the tour.

In the evening, on the eve of departure, a note was again waiting at the reception, which indicated the place and time at which the bus would pick up for the transfer, and it was also indicated in large letters that the absence of a tourist at the stipulated time at the bus stop would be regarded as a transfer refusal. And that's it.

I decided not to be late for the transfer, so I was already there in 30 minutes. And she did the right thing, because the bus came a little earlier. Arriving at the airport, we ourselves unloaded things from the luggage department of the bus ... Again, turmoil, all with a huge number of bags after successful shopping. Moreover, all these packages and boxes somehow ended up in the cabin of the aircraft, I have never seen such an amount of hand luggage. It seemed that you can take with you to the salon anything you want and in any quantity. The entire flight, the passengers moved freely around the cabin, the flight attendants did not show any interest in what was happening.

The food was just as disgusting as it was on the way to Rimini.

In general, for the services that I received from Danko, I should have paid no more than half of the amount that the ticket cost me. I will definitely go to Italy, but I will choose another tour operator.

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