India Odyssey ToursReviews 

Excellent trip to India, very accommodating, helpful and giving with time, knowledge and thoughtfulness. Thank you for a great experience, would recommend Odyssey to anyone planning an international trip.

Drivers were safe and on time.
Hotels were great.
Sri Lanka was super.

Much of our Odyssey tour of Rajasthan was excellent. We had a tailor made package and Owen, the consultant was prompt with replies and very helpful. Our driver was with us the whole time, Deepak Kumar Halder and he too was excellent. He was the glue which bound our whole experience together. He was safe and knowledgeable and nothing was too much trouble for him. Our local guides ranged from acceptable (Delhi) to excellent (Agra). We knew what to expect from the hotels as we had looked at them on internet but the hotel in Bikaner in particular( Gagner Palace) was too far away from anywhere for us to go and explore. It was also very expensive.
The lunchtime meal as part of the itinerary between Jaipur and Agra was a disappointment, a beautiful heritage hotel with mediocre food and a self-service canteen ethos. We would have preferred to go for the best aloo paratha in the region at a restaurant nearby.
We were supposed to be greeted and checked out by a local manager but this was really a waste of time. Two failed to make the meeting and one turned up so late we had already gone. To be honest, these formalities added nothing to our experience, though the meet and greet at the airport was efficient and effective and very welcome at 01 15hrs! These meetings need to be carefully linked to client information and preferences to be of any value. We would use Odyssey again and recommend to others.

Really enjoyed India. Such a beautiful country, Catherine did a splendid job on creating an itinerary for us, the places we went in India are all magical. Every historical sights we went to, the tour guide gave us a history lesson about how things were done in the past, it really felt like we travelled back in time.

We did the golden triangle, started in Delhi, Agra and Jaipur. Our tour guide in Delhi was nice until he took us to a rug store and when we didn't buy anything, his attitude changed. We felt like we were pressured to make a purchase.

Our tour guide in Agra was really good and really cared about our wellbeing. She looked after us like we were her own daughters, my sister and I ended up calling her mummy.
Jaipur tour guide was also very nice and didn't pressure us to purchase anything. He's also a very skilled photographer. I still keep contact with the tour guide from Agra and Jaipur.

We received a surprise from Odyssey office in India at the end of our with marble photo frame with our photo at Taj Mahal. We also received two nice packaged tea.

We arrived in Nepal, there were 3 people waiting for us. One driver and two other people, the driver and guidewere putting our luggage in the boot of the car and the third guy asked for tip. When we took out some Nepali rupee he asked if he had dollars because the amount we had was too small. "No, I don't want it, unless you have higher amount. Do you have dollars?". I was shocked when I heard it, so I said "it's either this or nothing".
When we got to the hotel we told our tour guide and turns out the guy that asked for dollars was fired the day before due to his actions.

Our first tour guide in Nepal was a tad below average. He wasn't punctual and I felt like it's his way or no way at all. If we didn't do what he suggested his attitude would slightly change. He was always on his phone and I felt like his very unstable, one minute he's really nice and the next he doesn't even take notice that we exist. For example, when we were walking around the streets of Kathmandu, he would walk so fast and leaving us behind trying to catch up. He also left us walk back to the hotel on our own. He kept asking if we knew where we were, and i was like "no, i don't know where we are (we've only been there for two days). So we walked further up and we could see the hotel, he told us the way to the hotel and he left. I thought that was very unprofessional.

The second guide was really nice, he took us to the orphanage and had to do a stop over to purchase some stationery for the kids (the first tour guide promised to take us to buy stationery, but in the end he said there's not enough time because we didn't remind him).
On our last day in Nepal I felt really sick and vomitted a number of times. When the second tour guide picked us up, he saw I was unwell and went to a pharmacy to get me some medicine. Had to stop in the middle of the road to vomit and he was standing next to me like a friend and making sure I was ok and had water.

Both drivers in India and Nepal was great. Very lovely guys.

I'd definitely go back to both countries, if I won't have to tour with the first guide from both countries. I feel like they made the experience less memorable.

I'm planning to travel South East Asia in the future, would definitely be getting in contact with Catherine to organise an itinerary.

My sister and I did the golden triangle tour with odyssey and it was amazing. Odyssey made it very easy for us to travel and see the highlights of the cities. My only gripe is they would occasionally send us to stores that are clearly working with odyssey and would almost force us to buy something from them. I understand that this is a common practice within the industry but our tour guide’s attitude changes after we didn’t purchase anything, not very professional if you ask me. Other than that everything was brilliant from start to finish.

They did everything they were supposed to do....and in a charming , helpful efficient way
Catherine with whom we dealt was always willing to help with any amendments we needed to make. Satish the driver they provided was WONDERFUL...he was good humoured , charming and a great driver...what more could we want ? !

Although we couldn’t take up the trip this year after all, it was impeccably planned by Allison for us and with patience due to our dithering. Hopefully we shall return to Allison next year to complete the trip.

Our tour to the Ajanta and Ellora Caves and Mumbai was organized by Don Li at Odyssey Tours and we were very happy with everything! The guides and drivers were wonderful and everything ran smoothly with no hassles. I take a group of students to India each year and Don always organizes a great end of trip tour for us. This year our plans were a little complicated and I really appreciated Don's flexibility and patience in finding the best options for us. Looking forward to next year!

I would recommend this company to everyone if they want to travel to Asia. From the small group experience with the individual tour guide for each place you visit, to the nice hotels, to all the activities involved, it was great. I couldn't have navigated India on my own and Odyssey made it easy.

Wow! That's all I have to say! India Odyssey created an inspired trip for us. Owen was very patient and really listened to our needs. He worked with us for over a year through all of our changes with patience and understanding. The result? An amazing and epic tour of India. Our itinerary just flowed from one awe- inspired location to the next. From the knowledgeable guides, to the skilled drivers - Jobins in Kerala was both a driver and guide extraordinaire - and well chosen hotels, Odyssey made sure our trip was memorable. Will use them again and would certainly recommend then for travel.

Our trip to India and Nepal was fabulous. Planned activities and travel transitions were well executed. In fact, we were were able to adjust and add in extras easily because of this. Hotels, drivers, and tour guides were all excellent. We were definitely pampered and well taken care of (so appreciated as I landed in India with a cold). Mavis was wonderful to work with throughout our planning process and kept contact during the trip and afterwards. We are so looking forward to working with her and Odyssey again, for our next adventure to Asia. Thank you for a magical travel experience!

Easy to book and customize. Excellent service and care throughout the tour.

I booked a 6 night golden triangle which I ended in Jaipur. From the very beginning, Debora Wei helped tailor all of our itinerary over many emails and many changes we ended up with the perfect trip. The hotels were fantastic, comfortable with great breakfasts and buffets included.

Our driver, Mr Sanjay Kuwal was such a gentleman and became a friend more then someone who was just driving us around. He was calm, patient, informative and made us feel very safe. I could not have hoped for better! Consider yourself very lucky to have his services.

Ashel from the homestay who cooked for us, amazing. So humble and lovely to chat with. The food was delicious! Highly recommend this experience.

All three tour guides were all fantastic!Pawan Agarwal was the stand out guide. Such a lovely man with great photography skills also.

Overall I give oddysey tours 10/10.

My friend and I travelled on a private tour with India Odyssey Tours in January 2018 to Rajasthan. The tour went beyond our expectations. A representative met us at Delhi airport and thus began a pattern of superb service. At each hotel, we were met by a company representative, who assisted us with check-in. Informative guides escorted us around each city. In particular our driver Arun Kumar, who escorted us for the whole tour, provided us with excellent service. He ensured our safety with his skilled driving and went out of his way to provide us with wonderful experiences. The hotels booked for us ( we chose to stay in 5 star accommodation) were exceptional. All of our entrance fees and breakfasts were included as part of the tour prices, as were meals at Ranthambhore where we were fortunate to have an encounter with a male Bengal tiger. Our pick of cities was Jaipur, but our visit to the Taj Mahal in Agra was magical. From the beginning, when we were deciding on our itinerary, our consultant Owen Zhou was helpful and always promptly responded to my emails. He even arranged for a visit to the bear sanctuary outside of Agra, which was fantastic. No question was considered unimportant. I would thoroughly recommend Odyssey to anyone. My friend and I have travelled extensively and we can honestly say that this was one of the best tours that we have undertaken.

Hello, I would definitely recommend Odyssey Tours to anyone planning a trip to India. My husband and I are novice travelers and felt very comfortable and safe with all the arrangements, drivers and tour guides provided. Our agent, Owen Zhou was extremely helpful and understanding of our needs as first time travelers. From the beginning to the end, Owen understood our concerns and tailor made a touring itinerary around our schedule. This included attending our friend's wedding in Jaipur and then touring Jaipur and Agra within our time constraints. We are very thankful for the excellent service he provided and would highly recommend Owen to help with your travel needs.

Our family of four worked with Owen Zhou to book a 24 day tour to India with Odyssey. Owen was great, quick to respond and update or change our itinerary to meet our requirements.

This is the second time we have used Odyssey and overall things went really smoothly with both trips. There was always a representative to meet us at the airport and when we arrived in new cities, we regularly received calls from the Delhi office to check on aspects of our trip and we retained the same driver (Balam Singh) throughout our entire trip. Balam was fabulous, he ensured we got where we needed to, when we needed to, he pointed out animals, monuments and various other things to us on the long road trips and most importantly our family felt very safe travelling with him.

The majority of our accommodation was fabulous (8 hotels in total), with the exception of the Royal Desert Camp in Jaisalmer and the Golden Tulip in Jaipur. The Royal Desert Camp was very different from the pictures on their website. It is old and dirty (including dirty bedding), no hot water and the sewage ran back into the bathroom from leaking pipes. The Golden Tulip hotel has a disco each night commencing at 8pm, if you are staying on east wing in either level 4 or 5 the music will keep you awake until the wee hours. the front office staff at this hotel are also rude and dishonest.

We travelled over the Christmas New Year period and Odyssey organised a great Christmas eve dinner at a local hotel in Pushka and a New Years Eve celebration at a hotel in Agra, both of these were fabulous nights.

We had different guides in each city and some were much better then others. The Guides in Delhi and Agra in particular, were fabulous and very knowledgeable about the sites that we visited.
Guides in Jaisalmer, Jodhpur, Udiapur and Pushka each insisted on taking us shopping to cloth, jewellery and carpet shops where there was significant pressure from us to make purchases, and each shop took up valuable hours of our sightseeing time. The guides (and possibly the company) were obviously on commission from these shops and despite us raising this with the guides and the Delhi office during one of their 'check in' phone calls, it continued to happen which was really disappointing.

For me to continue to use Odyssey, and to recommend to friends, there needs to be some acknowledgement from Odyssey that the pressure shopping trips occur, and what their plans are to ensure customers are not put in these positions in the future.

I worked with Owen Zhou of Odyssey Tours to plan a 2-week, first-time trip to India for my family of five. As a busy woman with a full-time job, three children, and a husband, I was dreading the planning process because I thought it would take a lot of my time, which is already in short supply. However, Owen and Odyssey made it very simple, easy, and cost-effective. We had very specific dates that we were available and certain places that we wanted to see, so I provided that basic outline and they made arrangements for airport pickups/dropoffs/transfers, car and driver, internal flights, and English-speaking tour guides. Tickets for all sites visited were also covered, as were all breakfasts and some dinners, and they suggested a busy but not overwhelming sightseeing agenda for each city. They even arranged for a visit to a local produce market and a cooking class at someone's home, which was a highlight of the entire trip! Special meals were also included for Christmas Eve and New Year's Eve. The daily tour guides in each city were very knowledgeable, our driver was friendly and responsible, and it was super convenient in a crowded place like India to have access to a private van for the five of us to take us wherever we need to go. Odyssey's local manager in India has checked in with us along the way, and we enjoyed the beautiful hotels and each city guide's restaurant recommendations. I would recommend Owen Zhou and Odyssey as a tour company for their high quality staff and good customer service. They were also very reasonably priced--I asked several friends to recommend tour companies for India, and Odyssey was highly competitive.

All of the drivers & guides were very knowledgeable, approachable, accomodating & friendly. Praveen our first driver was an absolute character & made the long journeys enjoyable. I’m sure without india oddessy we would have struggled to enjoy the culture & diversity India has to offer.

Spent 12 days in India in a private tour with my wife, sister and brother in law, many days in the bus viewing different cities in northwest India and Mumbai, Delhi, Varanassi, Agra, Jaypur, Jodhpur, Udaipur and Mumbai.

The Odyssey Tours travel consultant, Nikki Xia was knowledgeable, and bent backwards to satisfy our requests. People waited for us at each airport, even when the flights were delayed. The driver for most of it, Mukesh Chudhari was incredibly good and attentive. The guides on each city were knowledgeable and personable.

We would recommend Odyssey Tours to other people we know.

Myself and a friend booked a private tour to India with Odyssey Tours. Overall, I liked the tour company. They arranged for a representative to meet us at the airport and he was there on time. We visited three cities total.

We had a different guide in each city and as to be expected some were better than others. We had the same driver for the entire trip and his name was Arun. He is AWESOME! He knew the best places to eat where the prices were reasonable and very tasty compared to the restaurants recommended by the guides, which were the complete opposite. He also took us to a better shops than the ones the guides took us to.

The three major disappointments I had with this tour were the weather, the hotels and the fact the guides take you to see jewelry shops and carpet shops in each city.

While planning our trip, we were told the weather in India was great during the time we would be visiting (the end of December 2017-early January 2018). A warning to those thinking of going during the months of December & January. Those months are very foggy. You may not be able to get a great view of the Taj Mahal & your flight may be cancelled due to weather. This is a very high possibility during those months, but the tour company will mention nothing about it.

The hotels were all chosen by the tour company. They did not give us a list of hotels to choose from. The first hotel we stayed at The Suryaa, I would rate as 4/5 stars. I saw staff cleaning the hotel every time I walked through the lobby, etc. the restaurants was very well staffed and the food was greasy and replenished in a timely manner. The room was small compared to those in the US, but it was clean.

The other two hotels: The Four Points by Sheraton Agra & Fortune Select Metropolitan Jaipur were HORRIBLE! If I had to give them a rating it would be 1/5 stars. During booking we were told the Four Points was sold out of standard rooms, so we had to pay more for the “Executive Tak View Room”. We never saw the Taj from this room, just the delapetated building & empty lot across the street. The room also had a “ranky” smell that permeates my belongings. It was so bad we had to ask the hotel staff to spray our room each day with air freshener, just so we could breath. The Fortune Select was extremely dirty and the heat in the room didn’t work so the hotel had to bring in a small portable heater to warm the room. I will post pictures on Tripadvisor in my review of all the hotels please view the reviews there if you want to see the conditions of the hotel rooms.

The guides took us to a Jewlery shop & Carpet shop in each city, even though we said several times we didn’t travel to India to buy Carpet or jewlery. We learned this happens with tour companies because the guides and tour company get a commission if you buy something from those stores. You can tell this is true, because you will notice several other tour groups/guides going to those same stores. If you are lucky to go to a more local restaurant or store you will see the difference as well.

I would recommend the tour company to a friend if my friend was able to choose their own hotels and review rating on the tour guides selected for their trip prior to starting their trip.