Alternatives to Long Organized Group Tours

I doubt if anyone here would disagree with you. Independent travel is fine, can be more economical than a tour, offers more flexibility and tailoring to one's own priorities. Group tours can also offer bargains, save a lot of logistics planning, and give people who might not venture to strange places on their own an easier way to do so. I've done mostly independent travel, but my wife and I did group tours in China and central Europe, and we cruise a lot (the ultimate group tour I guess). I'm doing my first RS tour this fall in Italy, where I've never been.

Interesting that all your examples involve tours or guides. I've heard the Rabbies tours are very good, especially for us left-side-driving-challenged people, but they seem to differ from RS and other "comprehensive" tours only in length and geographical reach.

We like a slower pace than the R.S. organized tours. We stay more nights in most places, that is. And we like trains much more than buses. :-)

That said, we have found sprinkling in a few guided tours -- some private, some small group -- gives the tour guide (me) a break and enhances our knowledge. We saw places in Munich I would never have found thanks to a delightful private tour.

In other places, we do the group walking tours (London Walks, Paris Walks) and we use Rick Steves' guided walks in his various books and even his audio guides. I also invest in any walking tour books I can find. I especially like the (now-discontinued but still available used) "24 Great Walks in ____" series. The books may be out of print, but the routes still exist.

And yes, we get to choose lodgings with elevators and A/C when needed. I love the planning part, too.

Cala-I have found knowledgeable tour guides/companies in most countries I visit. It does take some research to know if your getting a bang for your buck, but we have yet to be disappointed. London Walks and Paris Walks are two of my go-to companies due to the many options they offer and there is no need to reserve a space, just show up and pay (Cash). Mad Max in the UK is a popular one, but I found one much cheaper with the same routes that we wanted that was marketed to college age students but did not require you to be in college and there landed up being a nice mix of people in our smallish group, and they provided transportation. BUT, I LOVE the research part and when it all goes well I give myself a hi-five!

We have done both independent and organized small groups tours mainly with RS (Turkey, Adriatic and Eastern France) and Odysseys Unlimited (Peru and Africa). I find that the tours offer special experiences that you might not have on an independent trip. I choose organized tours based on the country that we will visit and travel logistics. There is no right or wrong here. That being said, I would never choose a tour with a large number of participants.

Obviously you have to do a lot of planning a long time in advance for
this type of travel but it does alliw me to have some of the RS
experience without what we would see as undesirable hotels and the
cost of paying for hotels instead of getting the almost free hotels
available with our Hilton and Marriott points, many of which are
actually in quite centeal locations, at least in the UK.

Sounds like win/win to me. Planning is half the fun so it makes your trip even that much more enjoyable!