Eclipse Traveler Reviews 29

As an international studies school principal in Los Angeles, I led my teachers, staff and students (usually about 120 members) on global travel-and-learn tours every other year. We have contracted Eclipse Travel to organize our professional journey 4 times including the most recent trip to Cambodia, Vietnam and Thailand

Eclipse Traveler has provided outstanding services that include:
1. Divide our large group into small cohorts with personalized care and differentiated pace
2. Is affordable while providing good quality lodging, tours and meals
3. Provide us with knowledgeable national and local guides, clean and comfortable buses
4. Allow some flexibility so we meet our goals in visiting "non-tourist" places
5. Never pressure "buying" and "tipping"

Our Southeast Asia trip to Cambodia, Thailand, and Vietnam was exceptional from beginning to end. The itinerary was thoughtfully designed and allowed us to visit all of the most important locations in each country within the time we had, without ever feeling rushed.

Accommodations were excellent throughout the trip, and logistics were handled seamlessly. Local guides in each country were knowledgeable, professional, and offered personalized options that enhanced the experience and allowed for flexibility based on our interests.

Overall, the trip was extremely well organized, ran smoothly at every stage, and provided outstanding value for the cost. We would highly recommend this experience to anyone looking for a comprehensive, well-curated introduction to Southeast Asia.

An unforgettable journey through Southeast Asia

Our trip to Vietnam, Cambodia, and Thailand was truly unforgettable and exceptionally well organized from start to finish. Every detail—from flights and accommodations to local transportation and daily itineraries—was handled smoothly, allowing us to fully enjoy the experience without stress.

The guides were outstanding: knowledgeable, professional, and deeply passionate about sharing the history, culture, and traditions of their countries. Visiting places like ancient temples, historical landmarks, vibrant cities, and local communities was both enriching and inspiring. Each destination offered a perfect balance of learning, exploration, and cultural immersion.

Hotels were comfortable and well-located, meals were thoughtfully arranged, and the pacing of the trip allowed us to experience a lot without ever feeling rushed. The overall coordination and communication throughout the journey reflected a high level of care and expertise.

This was a meaningful and well-curated travel experience that left a lasting impression on all of us. I would confidently recommend Eclipse Traveler to anyone looking for a professionally managed, culturally rich international tour.

Lake District May 2025. Hotel Dunes was amazing . Just been fully renovated and beautiful. Food excellent staff lovely. Our coach driver Daren was excellent good sense of humour and extremely helpful. The coach itself however should have been scraped many years ago, very uncomfortable journey. I am 5'2" and my knees were firmly in back of seat in front. No trays to put water bottle, no elastic to hold book. Certainly nothing to charge phones it had been built long b4 phones were invented. If you dropped anything it was gone until you reached your destination. Called Eclipse to let them know. Got the usual not our fault we hire coaches & that's what we got. Just not interested they had your money take what you get.

We booked the August Erciyes annual Perceids shower trip. We ended up being the only two people on the trip (the original group was apparently rather large but most canceled after the Oct '23 attacks in Isreal and then the last family had a family member get sick, so they ended up canceling at the last minute). Surprisingly, ET continued with our trip even though many other tour companies would have likely canceled instead of dealing with just 2 people. We had a wonderful time. We really enjoyed meeting Cengiz and Uygar and learning more about Turkey. They also put us is touch with a local guide for Istanbul prior to our tour, who was also an excellent guide. All of our guides really have a love of their country and want to share it with others.
Because we were the only 2 people on the tour, I'm not sure we can speak to a full-tour experience; however, I feel sure that they would treat all of their clients as we were treated - great conversation, interesting and unusual side trips, good food, and wonderful history and insight into the countries they visit. While we currently have other trips on our list that don't include eclipse-chasing, we would happily book another trip with them.

Fantastic experience!! We booked another eclipse trip as soon as we got home!

The Eclipse Traveler crew & the local guides were great. They were all super friendly, unrushed, and very professional. The buses had lots of empty seats, so we could spread-out, or take a whole row to ourselves - sounds trivial, but it was nice.

The itinerary was full with cool places to see, but also had downtime scheduled in. Each day a few of the travelers would stay back at the hotel instead of going on the daily excursions - if they needed a break.

They booked a fantastic location for eclipse day! We had the whole place to ourselves with tons of rooms to spread out. Great food! Beer on demand. :)

We went to Torreon, Mexico to view the total eclipse. (My photo of that eclipse was on the cover of Astronomy Magazine!)

We LOVED the trip! We're heading to Egypt in 2027.

The great tours with an astronomy and cultural emphasis.

We were very happy with the Eclipse Traveler tour in October to Easter Island. The trip was well organized and managed by tour manager, Cengis Aras. The local guides were knowledgeable and engaging and the professional astronomers provided excellent information to make the eclipse a great experience. The hotels were excellent and there was a great small group atmosphere. Our eclipse tour was a great experience and we would recommend Eclipse Traveler to anyone looking for a unique and memorable experience.

We did a tour with Eclipse Traveler to Easter Island in October 2024. Our Tour Manager, Cengis Aras did a great job at managing all the details and making sure we were well informed and well taken care of. We had a great time and I'm sure Cengis also arranged perfect weather for the eclipse! We were very happy with the tour and are looking forward to the next eclipse!

The trip was first class. The guides were excellent and very knowledgeable. However,the sincerest form of compliment is I am already planning more trips with Eclipse Traveler.

Wonderful trip to Chile: Santiago, Rapa Nui and the Atacama desert! Thank you for the great organization. The eclipse was amazing and the venue was delightful. I enjoyed the astronomers' lectures and learned a lot. We were very fortunate with crisp clarity observing the southern hemisphere night sky. Hotels were very nice, clean and provided good food. Transportation buses were roomy and comfortable. Local guides were very knowledgeable. The picnics at the view points were such an extra treat! We had time to do some activities on our own too. Thank you for making it a memorable experience!

The buses are always late at the Royal Arms bus stop going towards fareham. I can't seem to understand how a bus can be delayed for 20 minutes while the the later scheduled bus arrives before the sooner bus. Its literally 3 stops from gosport bus station

Excellent planning and logistics. Extremely helpful and informative guides. Comfortable and spacious luxury transport with 'bigger' buses throughout enabling us to all 'spread out'. Excellent hotels and an amazing variety of sights and historical monuments and ruins were packed in to ensure that none of the main highlights that Mexico is renowned for were missed. Exceeded expectations and it will be our first choice for future trips.

We were in the Texas version of the trip. There were many issues that made this a suboptimal experience.

The initial presentation by the ET president was difficult to understand due to a combination of poor PA system, bad acoustics, and the presenter's accent. This could have been amended with a simple PowerPoint presentation, but he did not bother.

He then left the next day for Mexico leaving us with local guides. There were no ET personnel with us for the rest of the trip. All we had were local guides and the bus drivers.

The only meal included every day was breakfast. Lunch and dinner were only included on the day of the eclipse. For the rest of the trip, it was our responsibility to find a place to eat lunch and dinner and to pay for the meals.

The initial itineraries had no times on them and the guides seemed at a loss themselves as to exactly when events were supposed to occur. The first itinerary only stated for the day of the eclipse that we were getting up "very early." How early? Apparently that was going to be a surprise. Several days went by before we got an itinerary with specific times.

While in Houston, we were advised to spend the entire day visiting the Galleria Mall which was in the same building complex as the hotel. This did not merit as a very special or interesting activity.

The next day was advertised as "a day at Houston Space Center" which was to include a presentation from an astronomer. There was no such presentation and the "day" consisted of three hours. There were no other activities for the remainder of the day.

There were few guided tours. Mostly we were dropped off at locations and told when to get back to the bus.

There were some odd stops including a bar on the way to the eclipse site and another day a stop at a shoe store. Neither were on the itinerary, nor was any explanation given why we would want to stop at these places.

A group photograph was taken on April 8. I have made several requests for ET to send it to me. Instead, they sent me the group picture for the Mexico trip. As of this post on May 21, they still haven't sent me the picture. I had to track it down myself from another customer.

There's more, but I think that's enough. We are not going to use ET in the future.

Dan and Margy

UPDATE 10/21/2024

This is our response to the reply ET posted to our review. The fact that it took five months for ET to do so is a statement in and of itself.

Once again, ET promised to send the group photograph--just as they did five months ago. I am not holding my breath.

Their claim that they received 95% great reviews from our group is surprising. At the last breakfast, someone at my table asked, "Is anyone else ever going to use Eclipse Traveler again?" His question was met with silence, to which he said, "I didn't think so." Given about eight people at the table and you claim that 95% gave "great reviews", you would think at least someone at the table would have said they would use ET again. Yet, they did not.

As for being happy to see the eclipse despite the weather, I also felt that way. Being happy about seeing the eclipse and how we felt about the performance of ET are two different things.

"Many" of the Texas group travelers have booked with ET for the Egypt trip? Really? Would ET care to share the percentage of the Texas travelers who have booked with ET again? Over 50%? 20%? 10%?

Note that there are three other reviewers from the Texas trip: Bill Sudow, CustomerJudith, and Sara M. None of them were favorable.

"I have traveled to more than 100 countries over 30 years, and this was the least professional group I have ever traveled with." -- CustomerJudith

"This tour wasn't up to the standards I'm used to when traveling, and I will search for another provider for future eclipse tours." -- Sara M.

If you reply to this update five months from now or whenever I will read it with great interest. But as for using your company for any future trips or recommending it to anyone else, no way.

Updated 10/23/2024

With regard to the update posted by Eclipse Traveler on 10/21/2024:

-- We have not requested a refund.
-- Our reviews are true, not false.

On 10/21/2024, the ET CEO sent us an email threatening legal action. I replied, asking that he point out the false portions of my review. I also requested his lawyer's contact information.

Thus far, he has not replied to these requests.

Logistics were weak until the local tour director took over. The itinerary didn't have meeting times or enough detail to prepare for a day until Esther, the local tour director heard complaints and created a more detailed itinerary. Transfers to and from the hotel weren't provided. Local guides in Houston and San Antonio seemed rusty and were often hard to hear. This tour wasn't up to the standards I'm used to when traveling, and I will search for another provider for future eclipse tours.

This was our second totality experience with Eclipse Traveler, and again, this exceeded our expectations by far! Very well run, with excellent hotels and meals, and the Astronomy guides and fellow astronomy nerds made it unforgettable. There is a lot of uncertainties that have to be managed right up until the last minute with these kinds of tours, and felt we were very well taken care of. Would definitely recommend! Looking forward to our next trip with them!

One thing that the tour company could have done a much better job of is having a time for each day when we would be back at the hotel, so that we can make Dinner Reservations far enough in advance....at least 1 week before we were to arrive. A second thing was that the Astronomy Guest Speaker should have been scheduled immediately upon our return to the hotel. Instead there was an hour and a half wait and hence too little time to go out to Dinner before the talk and too late at night for dinner after the talk. On the plus side, our Eclipse Hostess Esther was very delightful with a good sense of humor and the Hotels we stayed at were very nice.

We arrived late due to storm preventing plane to land. And so we Ubered to the Space Center to catch with the tour, but the tour was very short and everyone went back to the hotel to spend the afternoon on their own. We didn't get our breakfast voucher for the three days at the first hotel. Even when we asked about it, she didn't know anything about it. Then we asked the hotel, they didn't know either. So we had to buy our own breakfast for the first three days. Had one hour at the Space center, next day is on our own day, third day is travel day to another hotel. Tour of other places are disappointing, some just quick drove by. They gave us lot of time shopping. The eclipse day(last day) is ok, dinner was good. BTW, that's the only dinner provided.

The fact that I received this email addressed to "Mexico Eclipse Travelers" is typical of the way this tour company works. I did NOT go to Mexico, but to Texas. Throughout the tour, everything was just a bit - or a lot - off, from the opening night, in which the presenter seemed to not know that this was the computer age and one could use slides to back up the info being shared, or continuing on a tour where it seemed as if it was almost being planned as we traveled. I have traveled to more than 100 countries over 30 years, and this was the least professional group I have ever traveled with.

This was the best trip by far. It was a total solar eclipse , so we could see all the phases. We were given eclipse glasses, a pinhole viewer, and a solar filter for a telescope . The eclipse lasted for about half an hour.We had an amazing weather for the eclipse, and it was best experience of my life.