2022 BOOKED!
Finally was able to book a 2022 trip with our 13 year old granddaughter for her Bat Mitzvah. The Bridges tour has become a tradition with our grandkids and we have 503 days (per Tauck) to look forward to this trip. We have received one of the two Covid shots and are starting to see this past year in exile in our rear view mirror. Our trip is June 10, 2022, and it can't come fast enough. Feels good to have something to look forward to.
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It’s still our dream to take our grandchildren to Africa in 2024. I just hope there is a vaccination approval for children by then. Enjoy.
Austin Gal here,
Congratulations, This is a wonderful trip, it was our first Tack tour that got us hooked. What a fabulous gift full of memories. This is on our bucket list to travel with our four Grandkids once their old enough to travel for this length. Memories last a lifetime!!
Hi British, seeing all your travels and your determination, I know you will get that special experience. We have taken trips with 7 other grandkids over the past 8 years and each has been special and memorable for us and each child. This will be our big finish with our 8th grandchild; not all previous one were with Tauck, but the Tauck Bridges tours were always special, 2024 is a long way off and I look forward to your running dialogue from Africa!
We did the bridges Africa tour with our grandkids in 2018 to celebrate our 50th anniversary. We have traveled to 100 countries and people always ask which is our most favorite and I really didn’t have one until we did this tour and now my answer is always Tanzania!! It was so special to do this with our grandkids. You will enjoy it so much!!!
I’m about to post about Africa on General
I’ll be sure to post a full report when we do the tour. I’ve said many times, Tanzania is my favorites African country so far, but it’s not the prettiest, those for us are Rwanda and Namibia. If this pandemic hadn’t happened, we would have already booked another tour of Namibia.
We get so much pleasure by the wonder and joy of watching our grandchildren get so excited.
I'm not sure this is the right forum post for this question, but I have a dilemma. We have 2 17-year-old grandchildren (1 boy, 1 girl) that are excited about taking a senior trip. In the past, we've taken grandchildren on ocean cruises to Alaska. With Covid, though, the ships just seem to big and more dangerous for illness than river cruising. The two Tauck trips we're considering are the Rhine (Basel-Amsterdam) or Paris - Lyon cruise. Does anyone have an idea whether either of those would be fun and interesting for that age? I want it to be a good experience for them, and not a cruise with little children.
kidfixer - The Tauck Bridges tours are meant for families, like you would be if you bring your two 17 year old grandchildren. I believe the Tauck Danube River Cruise that I was on (not a Bridges tour), which had a land component on each end of the cruise, would have been extremely boring for 17 year olds. There was no entertainment on the ship oriented towards teenagers.
There may not be Tauck Bridges cruises, small ship or river cruises, period. For Tauck, cruises may all be oriented to more senior clientele.
If you can handle a land tour and want to make it the most enjoyable for the teenagers, then I'd recommend looking into a Bridges tour, in an area the teenagers expressed an interest in seeing. They may prefer more wilderness oriented tours vs European city tours. You'd have to ask. On the other hand if you, the grandparents aren't up for the Bridges style of tour or wilderness type of tour, then you have bit of a dilemma.
Good luck.
We did the Tauck Bridges Rhine River cruise when our twins were 16 yrs old. They had a great experience and met some friends that were near their age. When they were 17 yrs old, we came back and did the Tauck Bridges Danube River cruise. We booked our trip with two families that we met on the Rhine cruise that the girls made friends with. Tauck really makes the trips fun for the kids on the Bridges program. (including the teens) Also, Tauck sends the kids a surprise gift before the trip when you book Bridges.
We have since booked other trips with our Tauck friends. You really can't go wrong with any of them!
I would never dream of taking two 17 year old people on a Bridges tour, as far as I’m concerned they are adults. We have had teenagers on a few tours and they and us mature travelers have had an excellent time together, learning from each other. Only once did we have a teenager when it did not work out... it was on a Tauck US tour, the parents and teenage son turned up a day late, they were late the next day and the son was very sullen, after a couple of days more, we never saw them again.
Our own children at that age would have been interested in everything and been fine with adults. I guess you have to know your grandchildren. If they are excited to be with seniors, you have your answer. Amd really, by the time you get to do a Tauck tour with them, they will be 18.
We asked our tour director on our last trip about the Bridges Tours cuz we want to do that with our grandkids. As said, you have to know your grandkids. Our tour director said he hated doing the Bridges tours because many of the ‘kids’ spent most of their time buried in their cell phones, or talking strangers into buying them cigarettes. Don’t expect the tour director to be a substitute parent, and the electronics probably need to be closely controlled. As I always said when I was working, “never take a known problem into the air”. I had a number of ‘passengers’ who watched us taxi away from the terminal ... from the terminal. If the ‘kids’ can be a problem, it won’t get better when they are thousands of miles away from their parents.
The Alpine Adventure Bridges tour would definitely appeal to 17-year-old grandkids. From my experience on this tour, the majority of kids were in the range of 13 to 15. The tour was great for the kids and enjoyable for the adults on tour. We are doing Italy as this will be with our 13-year-old granddaughter who was only 3 years old when we took our whole family to Italy, We think she will enjoy this more than the physical challenges thrown at the kids on the Alpine Adventure.
Sandman - I'd think an Alpine Adventure tour would be much more appealing to teenagers than a river cruise or small ship cruise. There is almost nothing for teenagers to do on either the river boat or small ship, like there is on some of the mega-ships.
Bottom line you need to know the teenagers and have a real discussion with them about what to expect before booking anything. I'd explain the activities of the Italy tour to the 13 year old. If it isn't a Bridges tour, I think she would be bored out of her mind, since the likelihood of there being anyone else her age would be close to zero. She could just be enamored with the thought of the trip, not the actual reality.
Yup- it is all about the individual teen. A teen (17 year old?) traveled with his grandparents on our (non-Bridges) Ultimate Alps and Dolomites tour years ago. There were no other teens or likely anyone else under 50 on that tour! His older siblings and cousins had traveled with the grandparents before him and they got to chose where they wanted to go. It was his turn and he chose the Alps and Dolomites tour. He was quiet, polite, but able to converse with adults. He was intelligent, and interested in history and Europe. We were initially skeptical, but he had a great time - not all teens would. I don't recall him ever looking at a tablet or smart phone.
Hi Sam; I started this thread to say how glad I was to finally book a Tauk tour - the Bridges Italy tour. I agree with you, that traveling with just our 13 years old would be tough for all of us.
We have taken our 3 oldest grandchildren on the bridges tour to Italy (2 on one trip together and 1 by himself) and are now starting to plan the trip for our fourth.
We have never seen any of the children on the tour scavenging for cigarettes or spending excessive times on electronics.
That is one of the reasons we take a bridges tour. The children all hang out together and have a great time.
We are very capable of taking them ourselves but then they probably would be on electronics. We do temples, etc. on our own time and all in all they get to see a lot while really enjoying themselves.
We can’t wait for our next trip.
Hi Jowell; what are you looking for date-wise for the fourth grandkid? Are you still thinking of Italy? We have June 10, 2022, booked, and I see tonight it is sold out! The first trip to sell out for 2022, so I am glad we booked when we did.
Hi Sandman.
Though we are excited to start planning our trip we don’t have any idea of dates until we coordinate everyone’s schedule.
We are still planning on Italy so that he will have similar memories as his siblings.
Other trips can always follow later.
Looking forward to traveling opening up -hopefully in the near future.
Stay safe and well.
We are disappointed to see that the itinerary no longer includes a gondola ride as that was a highlight of past trips. We will have to set it up on our own.
We were also VERY disappointed to see we no longer stay in a hotel in Venice but on an island outside Venice. We almost decided not to take this tour because of that.
We are still up in the air over this tour because of that. Will let you know what we decide.
I guess I never knew about the gondola ride so I have no reason to be disappointed. I agree about the hotel, but every one of those off mainland hotels have frequent complimentary taxi service to St. Marks square, so you are only 15 minutes away. Can look at this as a benefit with extra boat rides!
2022 is so far away, there is always a chance the hotels could change post covid
Tauck formally opened the Italia Bella Bridges tour for 2022. We switched from June 10 (pre-booked) to June 8 which now became available as it will allow us to do a stopover in London with our granddaughter at the end of the tour before she has to be home for summer camp. Only hope covid is an unpleasant memory by then and we can go on this tour and enjoy ourselves.
Hi. Well we just booked our bridges Italy tour.
We are holding June 15, 2022 with extra days before and after.
Hopefully the world will be normal by then.
Hi Jowell, glad you put this in the books. We will be doing this tour a week before you, so I doubt I can post any comments that will be beneficial to you, but I will try! Can't wait until I can start my scavenger hunt for frequent flyer tickets for this trip. I have been successful in getting business or first-class tickets for almost all my overseas trips, but not sure what will be available when I start looking this summer.
Good luck with flights. We will wait to be sure those dates work. Not sure yet when school is ending in 2022 and when camp will be starting.
🤞🏻🤞🏻
Please post any information you can. Even a week before can be very helpful.
Hoping you have safe travels and that your trip is everything you hope it will be.
Sandman and Jowell,
Congratulations on your booked trips! Isn't it wonderful to be able to travel again? 2022 is not that far away!
We squeezed the trip into the short window between the end of school and the start of summer camp. Kids today have so much stress with their schedules. For me, summer meant more time in the "street" and at the playground!
For sure Kfnknfzk.
We had to cancel a tauck tour to Egypt (twice)
and now can’t wait to do this trip with our grandson.
His siblings have told him what a great trip it is so he is really excited- so are we.
I do so hope we can travel in 2022. Right now, we Americans are ready to travel but most countries won’t let us in because our Covid numbers are increasing.. I do hope more people an ve persuaded to be vaccinated. Stopping the J and J vaccine is a disaster.