ToursByLocals - Kotor, Montenegro and Tirana, Albania

We have used Tours By Local several times in Canada/France/Italy. We have always been very pleased with our guides. They are private tours and hence pricier than a small group tour. I think TBL typically keep about 30% - guides may increase prices to offset TBL cut. Guides are vetted and if they do not have favorable reviews they are no longer on the TBL website per a guide we used in Canada. We are arranging a 8 day private tour of Montenegro with a guide we heard about in the travel forum in late May/early June. I can provide her info if interested.

I have used toursbylocals twice and was not disapointed, worth the money both times.
We used it for a day trip to Kotor from Dubronick, the guide was really good, nice and quite entertaining.

We have used TBL in Scotland, Dublin, Amsterdam, Split, and Cuba. We have never been disappointed. After reading the guides’ profiles, and their price point, we contact them through their email about our ideas. They will usually let us know how long our stops will take and gives us a price. When we used the gentleman in Dublin we emailed what we wanted to see, and he told us what would make the most sense. We then reserved our tickets (Kilmainham Goal, Guinness, St Patrick’s Cathedral, Dublin Castle, and Leo Burdocks for the best fish n chips). Our day went smoothly, not rushed, and we even had a little time left over to do some shopping in Grafton Street. Great Memories! We have used the guide from Split on 2 trips there, great guide. We took him to lunch after our last tour in September and he was telling us it took him almost 2 years to qualify for TBL to get on their website. He also told us he missed meeting Rick on his last trip there by a few hours. TBL usually have a booth at the travel shows around the country, met them at the NYC one. Highly recommend them.

Thanks, Kim and Marine. We are exploring Europe east to west, predominantly in former SSR and former Yugoslavian countries.

We've used ToursbyLocals in the Czechia, Hungary, France, England, Portugal, Italy, Croatia, Montenegro and Germany. Never had a problem. The prices are steep for some places, for example, guides in Gibraltar charge around $800 for a half day. We passed! We have always enjoyed our tours, and I felt that the price was fair for the customized personal attention of an expert for 3 or 4 hours. On cruises, we often are joined by another couple, cutting our cost in half.

I have used ToursByLocals a few times to book a guide (Poland, South Korea, Slovenia), and I have been quite pleased with my guides. Lately, I have become more skilled at combing the site for enough info that I can find the guide through google, use her/his private site, and save $$$. You can easily find a guide's first name and city on the website. For the locales you are visiting, I would expect that it shouldn't be terribly difficult to find the guide's private site.