Most Inspirational Moment
Cycling 50 miles in one day - a first for us!
Thoughts on Group Leader
Well organised, informative, supportive of all cycling abilities.
Advice for Potential Travellers
As a group, we felt that the stops for lunch were unnecessarily long and resulted in late afternoon arrival at destination hotel. Arriving late meant that there was little daylight time for exploring or enjoying the new environment.
![Review Centre]()
Reply from Exodus
The hotels that we use on the Premium departure of this trip are the best options available to us in each location visited when taking into account our group requirements. We need to use lodgings that can cater for a group of up to 16 passengers plus our support team of 4. This does leave us with a fairly limited choice in comparison to countries with a more established tourism infrastructure, but still enables us to successfully run Premium departures with a higher than usual standard of accommodation. The descriptions that we give of hotels are all honest and certainly not intended to be misleading in any way.
The concept of efficient customer service as we know it is still in its infancy in some Central American destinations meaning that some processes experienced at restaurants and hotels can be understandably frustrating. We have developed long lasting relationships with various restaurants/cafes en route which enable us to spend a relatively short amount of time ordering and paying for lunches for a group of our size. A bit of flexibility is built into the itinerary in order to allow for delays as well as local conditions and client preferences on how long is spent dining.
The focus of the trip is upon cycling, and as a lot of ground is covered through three countries this understandably makes up the vast majority of the activity time. The only way to include more time in National Parks looking for wildlife would be to shorten certain biking stages and increase the amount of time spent in transit on road transfers – something that I feel the majority of our clients would disapprove of in this case.
Some beach time is available on Ometepe Island (Lake Nicaragua), at Playa Marsella (Pacific Coast en route to San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua), Black Beach (Cahuita, Costa Rica). Plus a full day at Bocas del Toro (Panama) during the free day on Day 11 where beautiful beaches can be visited on an excursion from the hotel.
A range of feedback from other group members has been received which we will be reviewing as always in conjunction with our local operator in Central America. We are of course grateful for all client input as it helps us to continuously evaluate and refine how our trips are designed.
Adam – Product Manager for Costa Rica
