Rick Steves Tours

I am 6-2, and, unfortunately, closer to 240. I guess it is a function as to what you expect for a bed. I am not overly fussy as long as it is flat. While we have never been on a RS tour we have stayed at a number of his tour hotels and crossed paths with his tours from time to time. ALL European hotel rooms (3 star or less) are much smaller than the average US hotel room unless you are using hotels like a Hilton, Marriott. Not sure what you mean by being small for you. As long the bed fits in the room and I have a place for the suitcase, I don't need much more. However, I am use to sleeping with my feet hanging over the end. Now, I have a cousin that is a former 49er lineman at 6-4, 340, does have a problem. My wife is a pretty average 5-8, 130, female so most rooms are adequate for sleep. We don't host room parties so don't need extra room. The rooms work for us.

So many double beds in European hotels are twin beds pushed together. I'm not sure if the twins are extra long, or if that is an American creation.
We have been on two RS tours precovid, and the quality of the hotels/beds did vary. On the Best of Switzerland tour, which was fantastic, the hotels were more upscale and overall nicer than our previous (unnamed) tour. We stayed at the Hotel des Alpes, with a view of the Chapel Bridge in Lucerne, ( in Engelburg, which location has been dropped),
Hotel Alpenruh in Murren, and the casino hotel (name?) in Bern ( very new and modern.) Of course, RS states that hotels can changes with successive tours.
Perhaps if you check out the RS scrapbooks you can research hotels used on past trips, and review the posted Trip Reports. Good luck!
I'm happy that you have this time together and can travel. Have a wonderful trip!

I don't think the RS tour hotel rooms stand out as different than European hotels in general. Generally not as large as N. Amercan hotel rooms, and almost never 2 large beds in a room. They have varied a lot over 10 tours. I should note that I travel as a single, so my room size might vary even more, because not all hotels have single rooms.

We’ve taken five RS tours. The room sizes varied from tiny (Coimbra) to decent sizes. I found Paris and some rooms in Italy to be rather small. It’s not a big deal to us. They are centrally located and clean. Honestly, the only one we hated was in Coimbra. It was tiny! Hubby is 6’ and 200 lbs.

We have been on two RS tours, both in Italy. I think your concerns are probably valid if you have stayed at some of the same hotels and found them small as a single person. My husband and I are around 5’6” and 155 lbs. the beds in all the rooms were adequate, however the room size varied a lot. Sometimes there was barely room to put our single carryon luggage anywhere, sometimes it was roomy. In one, the bathroom was so very tiny, even my husband complained ( and he doesn’t complain about much). But the overall tour experience was so positive for us that even though some hotels were not what we were used to in the US we would go again in a heartbeat ..when we talk to others who have been to the same places our experience was so much deeper we know we made the right choice. Plus we just told ourselves we really were in the room only for sleeping.

We've taken 19 RSE tours, and the room sizes have ranged from tiny to Wow! At one hotel in Florence we had a 2-room suite, with two bathrooms! In Beaune our room was so nice I didn't tell anyone, because about half the group was complaining about their small, inconvenient rooms.

I will say that over time, the hotels and rooms have gotten much nicer. When we first started taking Rick's tours in 2009, it was not at all uncommon to get a small room, several floors up, with no elevator. In the last few years, we've noticed the rooms tend to be bigger, the decor tends to be nicer, and elevators and a/c are now common, although not universal.

The smaller rooms are fine with us, though, and unless we're higher than the 2nd floor up (3rd American style), we don't care about elevators. We are also used to living without a/c, so that's not an issue for us. Neither of us is small - Stan is about 6', 180 lbs, I'm a few inches shorter, and ummm... ummm... shall we say "fluffy." The beds have always been big enough, although there have been a couple times when our feet were hanging off the end.

I think you'll be fine on a tour; keep your perspective and your sense of humor, and unless it's a city tour, know that you'll probably only be there 2 nights.

The smallest room we've ever stayed in was in Rome, not on a RSE tour. We had to crawl across the bed to get in the bathroom, and only one person could fit in the bathroom at a time. Basically, one person could be upright at a time. We moved there after the "Best of Rome" tour because it was cheaper.

Imagine my reaction when we looked it up a few years later when planning another trip to Rome, and saw the price had about quadrupled, and the hotel was now billing itself as "boutique." As in tiny and quaint, I presume.

My wife and I have been on 9 RS tours with number 10 booked for this year. The hotel rooms have varied from spacious to average to a few very small rooms. But most hotels have nice common areas where you can relax and are well located near restaurants and sites within an easy walk. Frankly, very little time is spent in hotel rooms since the tours are active and everyone is out and about most days. While I might prefer some nicer lodging, the many great sites and people and guides we have encountered on our 9 RS tours keep us coming back. Try a tour, you will like it.

We are booked for RS tours # 9 & 10 in May. My husband is 78 and is 6’2” and about 220 lbs. There’s always a first time, but we’ve never found the beds a problem and he does tend to have back issues. We have also found that tour hotels seem to be improving over the years. The central locations are one of the important things for us.