Rabbies Multi Day Tours

I’m glad you asked this question. I’m considering a multi-day tour with them for Ireland. I just did some days tours with them from Edinburgh and was super happy.

If I do the tour, I’m going to have them book my accommodations because the tour bus will drop off and pick up at those hotels. They may also pick up from other hotels, but that was not a definite. You can tell them the type of accommodation you'd like and room type. On some of the reviews, i did see some comments about the room price being a little higher than expected.

I just emailed Rabbie’s with some questions and they were very quick to respond. They told me the tours are guaranteed to run once book.

Yes, I have taken the 4 day Isle of Skye and Western Highlands tour and would say that most days didn’t feel rushed at all. The guide was very good about informing the tour members of his plan for the day, even the night before at times, and actually would switch or tweak the tour depending on what the members expressed as their desires or if traffic/weather were concerns. For instance, a family of 3 hikers left the tour on the fourth day to go on a pre-planned hike and our guide made sure they were set to meet their other hiking mates in plenty of time and even gave them some tips on the trails they would take. Our group was perfect in size with 10 members plus the guide and driver.

Yes, I had Rabbies book my accommodations and the BnB’s they chose were great. My one little tich with them, and it might just be my anxiousness, is Rabbies took a long time to let me know where my accommodation was on the Isle of Skye. I’m a planner and knew that choices of accommodation on the Isle should be booked far ahead. So, I had a place reserved just in case. Ended up canceling the place I booked after hearing from Rabbies.

Feel free to ask me any other questions about the tour.

https://www.rabbies.com/en/scotland-tours/from-edinburgh/2-4-day-tours/isle-of-skye-the-west-highlands-4-day-tour

Linda, how much for accommodations if I could ask? I know Rabbie's lists "approximate prices" but that's not reassuring. I'd regret booking a tour and then get shocked by high prices for accommodations, like a bait-and-switch.

I hear you about booking far ahead. I booked a B&B in Edinburgh for 7 nights for this July for $1100 back in August of 2022. By December it was sold out for the summer and the prices went up. For the first time I also booked dinner reservations for each evening just to eliminate the stress of finding a place while tired and hungry.

I'm trying to decide whether to do a Rabbie's tour of Wales or do my own tour in Poland.

We took the Heart of England, Wales and Yorkshire tour last year. Our guide was the best ever. It didn't feel rushed and we did have them book our accommodation in Shrewsbury. We booked our own in York because we used Hilton points. My husband doesn't like group bus tours but he loves Rabbies.

Mike: The BnB rates were very affordable in my mind. They both included a full breakfast. I was a solo traveler so YMMV with the rate. Mine were double bed en-suites in both Fort William and Kyleakin. £80 and £75 per night.

I am also glad you asked this question. We are scheduled to take their three day Skye tour out of Edinburgh beginning June 21. I had them book our hotel because I waited too long and couldn’t find anything available “to my liking😜”. We will be staying two nights in Portree. Needless to say I am a bit nervous about our accommodations.

It’s our first time taking a multi day tour. Will report back at the end of our tour.

We are looking at doing Rabbie's tour of Wales during a future trip.
We've seen Conwy Castle and Caernarfon Castle, but want to go back.
For anyone who hasn't seen these two, they're amazing and so is Wales.
We went on the Rick Steves Best of England tour a couple of years ago, and the very best part was staying in Conwy, a very small medieval town surrounded by medieval wall you can walk on. Conwy overlooks the water at the Menai Straits/waterway and has small fishing boats at anchor in the bay. Watch out that the seagulls don't get some of your fish and chips if you're eating a take-away lunch sitting on the wall overlooking the water!!
Our hotel's bar and garden terrace was full of young people in the evening, but they were very quiet.
When one of them started playing a guitar and singing folk songs in Welsh, everyone was so quiet, you could have heard a pin drop.
Lovely evening, with the castle in the background with the nighttime spotlights on it.
The people in Wales are friendly, the food and beer are good.
The scenery and castles are amazing.

I just did three multi day tours with Rabbies . 3 days to Mull and Iona. 3 days to Arran. And the 5 day Devon and Cornwall. We enjoyed all three. None felt rushed. All 3 guides were excellent. We had them book our bnbs. Prices were right in the range that they told us they would be. Rooms were all small but clean and very good breakfasts. Other tour members were at the same place, one near by or in some cases, hotels if that was the option they chose. We were told the name of our accommodations several months before the tour so we could look at restaurants tclose by if we wanted to make reservations. I really like Rabbies and wouldn’t hesitate to take more of their tours.

I didn’t even know there was a wales tour!! Thanks to mike, cara, and Rebecca for mentioning it. This tour looks great!!

Beth, were those 3 multi day tours on the same trip? I’m wondering how the logistics would work. I assume you would need to check in and out of a hotel between each tour.

We did have a one night hotel in between the two three day tours and moved from Glasgow to Edinburgh to catch the second one but that is a quick train ride. The 5 day was at the end of the trip and left from London where we had arrived at for the rest of our trip. Meeting each tour was easy.

As someone who has done mostly independent travel, I'll put in a good word for the day tours.

It's nice to have someone explain what you're looking at as you're traveling to a destination, and also a tour guide to share a deeper history of the area than most people have. Many times I've been on a bus, train, or car and wondered about something outside, but with a tour guide you have an expert right there. In that sense a tour can be a more fulfilling experience.

Rabbies used to have a Northern Wales trip and a Southern Wales trip.
The Northern one gives you Conwy Castle and Caernarfon Castle.

I did the 5 night Outer Hebrides and Skye tour and I chose to book my own accommodations so I'll share my experience since it's a little different than ones previously shared. I'll admit to being a bit of a control freak and I wanted to handle that part myself. It ended up working out great. Caveat, this was back in 2019 so pre-pandemic, but I think some of my rationales would still be valid.

Rabbies had no issues dropping us off at the places I booked. They had guidelines on their website as to distance from the city center (I can't remember off the top of my head.) And when I sent them my list of placed I'd booked they were fine with all of them. In one instance one lady in our group who Rabbies booked and she was much farther away from town than we were. So far, in fact, that she had to get a taxi into town in order to eat dinner because there was nowhere to eat by where they booked her. She was not happy about it.

Also, I was able to book us at one hostel, one B&B and one hotel, for the 3 towns we stayed in on the tour. If Rabbies does it for you you are stuck with one "class" of accommodations. I was able to make decisions about what fit our budget and was also in the geographic area we wanted to be in. I liked the flexibility of doing this myself. To me it was worth the extra work, but you may have other priorities. Just wanted to share my experience.

Allie, it does seem like a big oversight on the part of Rabbie's to book accommodations with nowhere to eat nearby. Thanks for the insights. We'll book our own places.

Frank, I’m curious if you decided to book one of the multi-day tours and if so, which one.

This is an interesting, useful thread.

I've decided to postpone my multi-day trips as I couldn't get the accommodations I wanted. (I too wanted to make my own.)