Adriatic Unearthed

Was an awesome time but feel like we didn't get as much time in some of the places that i would have liked to but absolutely loved the itinerary

I didn't regret buying any Me-time optionals, the price turned out to be really good for what we received as a group. #NOREGRETS

Beautiful scenery and amazing food! Nice mix of different countries that all have something unique to offer. Great blend of history, night life and ME time experiences. We loved Montenegro and the Amalfi Coast but it's hard to choose from all the amazing places! If you're a game of thrones fan you'll love Dubrovnik and even if you're not you'll still love the amazing walled city. Definitely no regrets here!!

The tour was the best of both worlds, touristy and full-on vacation in one! I loved the journey, the people, the places and didn't want it to end!

I absolutely loved my experience with Contiki! I picked a pretty fast paced trip, therefore I was slightly worried that I wouldn't feel fulfilled after the trip (potentially missing out on the historical/cultural side of traveling, the social, or something else). Contiki did a fantastic job of allowing for all types of moments each day. We had tours which allowed us to learn about the culture and people in that location, then free time to be social, then exciting "extra activities" that we would not have the chance to do if traveling on our own.

I never knew I could see so many amazing places and experience so much in such a small amount of time!

It was AMAZING!! I would truly recommend this trip to anyone

This tour is excellent!!! The summer months were perfect weather. A good introduction to Italy (Rome, Florence, and Venice). They did the Colosseum on Day 2 and the Vatican tour the morning of Day 3, so it was a mad dash to get to Florence. We barely had any time there. The Venice wine/food tsasting tour could use some work. A good deal on the gondola ride. Grab some pasta to go and a bottle of wine while taking in the many canals. The drive through Slovenia was very pretty. Ljubljana is a hidden gem. The addition of the Slovenian caves was a nice afternoon stop. The Plitvice National Lakes in Croatia were spectacular! Staying by the lakes was a great way to take advantage of the whole park. I didn't feel rushed on the trails. Being in Split during Yacht Week season made for an entertaining time! The optional organic farm dinner in Split should become an included event. The food and local wine/liquor were incredible. Dubrovnik had beautiful views along the walls. The optional kayaking tour along the walls was my favorite! Budva, Montenegro had some greta beaches for a lunch spot. The drive through to Albania was rough. Tirana had some good food options. Spending 3 days in Corfu was a great way to relax after the fast pace of the earlier part of the trip. George's Boat...do it!!! Rent a car to get to the other beaches away from the old town. We got an upgrade to cabins on the overnight ferry from Corfu to Bari, and so glad we did! The Amalfi cruise was beautiful! I wish it had kept going to Positano. You stop at Pompeii on your way back to Rome. The final Rome dinner was a nice way to end the trip. The hotels were decent. Wifi was available at most hotels. Spotty service in some of the rooms. Basic continental breakfast each morning, though some hotels offered hot options. The coach was very comfortable. The middle section of the trip had a lot of driving. The whole trip (Adriatic Unearthed) has 2 other tours (Adriatic Spirit and Adriatic Horizons) that feed into it. Overall the trip was amazing!!! Definitely worth it! The itinerary could use a little tweaking, but Carly and Enzo made it work. Made a whole new Contiki family on this trip and have already met up with some post trip. You won't regret it.

Can't fault the experience. I saw so many countries I would never have thought to visit and was so impressed by all of them.

The Adriatic Unearthed trip was incredible. I got to see so many places I wouldn't have by myself. The friends I made on the trip are now friends for life. Our tour director, Carly, was amazing. She was fun, friendly and did everything she could to make our trip one of a kind. Before I went on the trip, I was quite hesitant, but now that I've been, I never want to travel with any other company. Contiki really lives up to its motto #noregrets

This trip was great! We saw a lot of sites in a very short amount of time. You will be constantly on the move with the group. Be prepared for not a long amount of time in some places. For example in Florence we got there at 5 and left at 8 am. If you are really into exploring history and museums this trip isn't really designed for it. Often the group gets to the city after working hours and leaves bright and early

Although the trip came with a large price tag, I think it was definitely money well spent and for what we were able to do on the trip it was actually quite affordable.

FREE TIME: Barely spent anytime exploring the listed cities. Often rushed, in split we only had 40 min to see the city after driving ~3 hours then it was off to the optional dinner. If you chose not to have the optional dinner and wanted to stay in the city centre it costed about 250 HRK to get back to the hotel. HOTELS: All of the hotels with the exception of Rome were so far away from the city centre that if you wanted to stay in the location you were at to explore the city at night, you would have to pay a lot of euros to get back to your hotel. INCLUSIONS AND OPTIONALS: All were expensive and very rarely ever worth it, especially the dinners. You were basically paying to go to dinner so you wouldn't miss out on the experience of being with everyone else. The dinners were not worth it. Also don't be excited to smash plates as they advertise for one of the dinners. Only a total of 9 people get to do it in a group of 3 contiki groups with about 50 people per each group. For the captains cruise in corfu, they advertise watersports. They should have also mentioned that the watersports is EXTRA on top of paying for the captains cruise. should you choose not to do watersports due to cost, you're basically swimming in the ocean at 3 different spots. Might as well go to the beach. The only 'included' activities were walking tours. There was a very falsely advertised 'ferry/boat tour' of venice. It was just a boat to take us into venice. Not a tour. I say skip all the inclusions and optionals, make some friends and do your own thing. Not only do you save money, but you get your moneys worth. Because of the location of the hotels chosen, Contiki is essentially funnelling you towards paying for very expensive optional activities. They lack transparency in what is actually included when you pay for an optional and how much more will be extra. BUS WIFI: Falsely advertised. You get 100 MB then have to pay for the wifi. Better to unlock your phone and buy a sim card when you get to europe and not with contiki.

We were the first group to do this tour, so in a way we felt like guinea pigs. The countries on offer looked great, however, this tour was too short to get a good taste of all these countries. We got a good look around Italy, as we stayed the longest in this country. We also had 2 full days in Corfu Greece which allowed us to actually relax and get a good look around. The time allowed in Croatia was OK; we had enough time in Plitvice Lakes but only one evening in Split and 1 day in Dubrovnik. There was hardly any time in Slovenia, Montenegro & Albania which was a shame, as these were the countries I wanted to see the most. OH and the tour says you visit 7 countries including Bosnia but you literally only drive through Bosnia for like 15 minutes. Overall the quality of the hotels was pretty good. Some were on the lower end and some were quite nice. The only issue was that a few of them were out of town, so you had to pay almost 30 Euro to get back to the hotel. It wasn’t so bad as most times we were able to get a group of people heading back to the hotel at the same time, so we were able to split it between 4 people. My main issue was that I did a Contiki tour 12 years ago from London to Athens which included visiting Italy and Corfu Greece. I didn’t expect that 12 years later, I’d still be doing the same optional extras at the same places. In Florence we went to The Red Garter karaoke bar and in Corfu Greece we went on Georges boat – exactly same as 12 years ago! Ofcourse it was a long time ago and the experience would be slightly different with a new tour group but it was so strange telling people that I had done this already 12 years ago. It was exactly the same and I felt déjà vu badly! Understand Contiki has long running relationships with their partners but it would have been nice if they mixed it up abit after all this time. Overall the optional extras were good but the quality of some of the food was quite poor. The dinners are quite expensive and although you get a lot of food, it’s not very tasty. I’d rather pay the same cost to get a 1 or 2 course delicious meal rather than 4 courses of average food. It just seemed mass produced and not authentic. This wasn’t for all of the dinners but most. The dinner in Corfu was probably the worst. It was sold as an authentic Greek experience with Greek dancing and plate smashing etc. The entertainment was OK but the host of the night was American – weird! The venue was also supposed to be a taverna but instead it was a giant hall that had random ‘greek inspired’ things stuck on the wall. The actual bricks on the wall were painted foam! I could actually pull the foam off. My mum is Greek, so this was not authentic at all. A taverna should be a small intimate venue with local greek people, better food and made from real bricks! I was quite disappointed and didn’t participate at all. The Amalfi dinner was also disappointing. On the other hand some dinners were really good. The build your own pizza night was awesome and the final dinner in Rome with the Opera singers was also really good. So overall I guess it was a mix of good and bad. One other issue was that my tour was from Rome-Rome but when the tour got to Split, half the tour left there but a new group of people started. After 7 days, I had only just started to really get to know the original group so it was sad to see people go but it was even harder trying to welcome all the newbies. Ofcourse you want to meet new people but I had done that already, so it was quite exhausting having to introduce yourself and tell your story all over again. I made an effort with a few newbies but didn’t really get a chance to chat to all of them. I think this tour would be much better as a 21 day tour where you spend more time in Croatia, Slovenia, Montenegro & Albania. The quality of the food could be abit better if you reduce the number of courses and some of the hotels could be closer to town.