Rick Steves has suggested looking into a local guide with a car to provide a tour of the city. Has anyone done this, and would you recommend it? What did it cost? Would we let the guide know what we want, or is there a set tour that they do?
Anyone have a local guide to recommend? Thanks.
local guides for many cities can be found at www.toursbylocals.com You can read details about the tour they offer (some come with their own transportation). I've not used them in Budapest but have used them in St Petersburg, Moscow, Paris, Normandy, and other places I can't remember. You can leave a review for the guide upon completion and likewise you can read other peoples' reviews of the guides.
Guides with cars are a little rare. Generally you end up paying a guide and a driver. BUT, I know an exception. His name is Andrew ILLES. He was the first guide we hired a dozen years ago and to this date I still use him to show our guests around; and from time to time we use him ourselves. One of the world’s last great gentlemen: http://www.guideinbudapest.com/
When he is busy our fallback is: Anett Hrubiak [email protected] Anett is also very good, but she had to hire a car. Still, it doesn’t cost much if any more to do it this way.
Both will customize a tour for you. If you have any special interests let me know as I also know of a few companies that do off the wall and unique or specialized topic tours.
Have fun