Interlaken Full-Day Highlights Tour with a Local by Private Car

SUISSE Travel—-unhinged! Don’t.

Warning! Owner is unhinged…… We have reported him to GetYourGuide who we booked through originally. I have screenshots of him threatening to “find out who I am and it won’t be good for me” for leaving a review on Google. He called two days before our tour to explain he could not find a driver or a guide at the price that we paid through the third-party. He suggested we could book through him or just cancel. I asked a question which was why he did not already have this prepared as we had booked months in advance and he explained that people cancel all the time and that, “ doesn’t know me and I’m a stranger and could cancel”. When I said, but we did not cancel… That’s when he got super irritated called me a “Karen”. I said that we would cancel through GetYourGuide and I would be sure to let them know and leave a review. He referred to me as a Karen again and hung up. He then continue to send me 12 messages through WhatsApp threatening me and telling me how entitled I am. This is the short version. There are so many amazing tour companies in this is simply not it. There’s an internal of investigation on with GetYourGuide. This man should be removed off any tour platform that exist. If you do some research, you will find similar reviews through Google, TripAdvisor and Viator. Any tour that you see the provider is SUISSE travel simply skip.

via Tripadvisor

Don’t use Tour Guide Gavino Strebel

We were a group of 8 adults, age 62-73 with (4) men 6’2” - 6’4”. I booked the Private Tour to the Interlaken area of Switzerland and exchanged several emails with Tour Guide Gavino Strebel explaining how tall our men were and to make sure we had a big comfortable vehicle because it was a 10 hr tour. First off he wanted me to cancel with Viator and book with him. NO!! That wasn’t going to happen. I confirmed with him the week before our tour to make sure we had a comfortable vehicle for 8 adults. He assured me he had. We had done (2) Private Tours around Lucerne and Mt. Pilatus and had Mercedes Sprinter vans. Very comfortable vehicles. Gavino Strebel showed up in a 7 seater van. He said he thought we had only 7 people. We were crammed in this vehicle. Gavino is NOT a tour guide. He is a driver only and a bad driver at that. This guide can’t walk and chew gum at the same time. He would get right up on the car in front of us and slam on his brakes. Knowing he had a van overfull of people. He never talked to us about the history of Interlaken while we were driving over an hr tour to our first destination. He is LAZY. After 4 hours he had to take a NAP in the van while we toured on our own. This happened twice. This tour guide is a joke. We ended up cutting almost 2 hours off our tour because we were so uncomfortable in the van and we had had enough of Gavino’s driving and laziness!

via Viator

Amazing Full Day Tour with Willi

This was our favorite day in Switzerland! I was traveling with my two sons, 18 and 19. Willi met us at our hotel in the morning and we made a basic plan for the day. The main reason I chose this particular tour was the fact that it was customizable and Willi had a good suggestion how we could do everything we wanted to do without rushing too much. We first drove about 40 minutes to Grindewald and hiked up to Bachalpsee Lake. Willi encouraged us to go off the main path from time to time which got away from the throng of tourists and gave us some spectacular views that we would not otherwise have seen. We then drove about an hour to Oechinensee and took the gondola up and hiked down to the lake. Willi was kind enough to take lots of pictures of me and my sons for us. We then walked back down to the tram station along a path that we basically had to ourselves before Willi drove us back to our hotel in Interlaken. Willi was a kind, informative and fascinating guide, having lived all over the world and being very passionate about his homeland of Switzerland. The only neagive I could say about the tour was that in the email exchanges leading up to the tour, I was communicating with someone other than Willi who had instructed me to buy the cable car tickets with a specific time frame. This led to some confusion on the morning of the tour and cause us to almost miss our timeslot. It would have been much more effective if I had been able to email the particular tour guide directly. But the day was amazing and one my kids will probably never forget.

via Viator

A great way to see the Berner Oberland area

This tour was a great way to experience the Berner Oberland! Our guide Gavino was accommodating and considerate to the various needs of the 7 persons in our group. Flexibility in the itinerary made the tour unique to us. It was a beautiful and most memorable experience!

via Viator

Unprofessional tour guide

The guide emailed me the night before to ask to be a hour late. He gave me a lot of reasons. That he was going to have to go to Asia the next day. And that when we booked this 1500.00 excursion that he didn’t have enough money in it to dedicate anyone else. I said ok, see you at 10. The tour lacked history. The guide took us to lunch and sat down at the table with us. We thought he was just going to help us answer any questions. But he ordered and when the bill came he never asked to pay for his. Very awkward. Then we told him we did not want to walk anymore and we did not want to go through a town . He pushed and we got one more pic. We told him we were done with the tour. He then said two minutes please and drove to a dart to fill jugs with milk saying “my mom loves fresh milk” Very unprofessional and not recommended. I am not paying for the tour guides comfort or preference.

Response from the operator: Hi Mr Tommy Fisher from Bleachers & Seats company in Nashville, are you out of your mind? You are utterly embarrassing and a liar. I have never received such a ridiculous and mean review. Also, you are the fakest and stingiest person I have ever met on this type of tour. Why don't you talk about the problem you had during the tour instead of being so fake and pretend everything is allright during the tour? We could have sorted this out immediately. I did not even notice you were unhappy about anything during the tour. Let me reply your points: 1) You have not paid 1500 CHF but only 1050 CHF, why do you have to lie and pretend you paid much more than you actually paid? You are dishonest and stingy. Of the 1050 you paid we receive only 800 CHF after Viator commission. You have bought a tour with value of 800 CHF! It is not our problem if you happily pay a lot of money to Viator as commission. Complaining it is expensive when you wasted hundreds of dollars on commission fee is not very smart of you. 800 CHF is very cheap for a full-day tour by private car in Switzerland and of course, not with a professional tour guide but simply with a local person from Switzerland. This is very clearly written in the tour description. It is not our problem if you don't read, book something, and imagine things that were never promised. I don't appreciate at all your lie about 1500 that you supposedly paid, it was much less. 2) About starting the tour later: I asked you to start 30min later and then you said starting 1 hour later at 10:00 would be ok because at 9am it was raining anyway. We both agreed that it would be better to start later anyway because of the rain. Now you complain that the tour started late. But you agreed to it, and it was the better choice due to weather also, not only because I was tired to start the tour so early. You are a very ungrateful mean person that picks on small things like this. If you insisted on 9am we would have started 9am, but you wrote me that it is no problem to start at 10am. So keep your mouth shut and don't complain about it later. The decision when to start is yours. So if you made the decision to start 10am why complain about it later? Especially when it avoided the rain! 3) About you had to pay for my lunch: Food cost is not included (please read the tour description). We ate at a hotel in the forest with no other restaurant or supermarket nearby. Of course I must eat together with you if I don't want to delay our travel plans. Or should I eat insects in the forest because you are too stingy to pay for my 32 CHF meal (I chose the cheapest meal on the menu on purpose!). Honestly, I never had any client who did not want to invite me for lunch. If you did not want to pay for my food, why don't you ask to split the bill then? But you paid and after you complain behind my back that you had to pay. This is ridiculous. Did I tell you that you have to pay the bill? This is really bizarre and an embarrassing behaviour from an adult that has money to stay in 5-star hotels in Switzerland. But complaining about 35 CHF spent to invite the tour guide for lunch. Embarrassing. If you don't want to pay, no problem, you could have told me directly. But complaining about it after the tour is just embarrassing. 4) About "the tour lacked history": What do you expect? This is a tour with local person not with a professional tour guide. If you want to be lectured about history during the tour then book another tour. We never promised a tour guide that gives you historical background information about places we visit. And I don't remember you asked any questions related to history. You paid money and expected to be given lectures about history of places we visited. This is not what this tour is about. The tour was run exactly according to the tour description. If you don't read and because of that have wrong expectations, it is not our problem. If you were a decent person you would at least ask some questions during the tour. Every other tourist that has a genuine interest would do that. But what question related to history you asked? Nothing. 5) About pushing you to visit a town: What an utter rubbish is this? All places we went we agreed and you told me we can go there. I don't get what the problem is. We didn't even walk. Walk downhill for 2 minutes to take a picture in Lauterbrunnen. One of the most famous places to take a picture and it was a lovely view. At the river we stopped by car and walked down 10 metres to the river. And you complain about walking? Are you serious? You really are the stereotype of Americans that cannot even walk 10 metres. I don't mind that. But I clearly explained you how long we have to walk and you agreed to go there. And after you complain that you had to walk. What kind of dishonest mean and fake person are you? I am so disgusted. 6) About stopping for milk: That was on the way back to your hotel right on the road that leads to your hotel. 1 minute stop, there was no time wasted. I even asked you if you want milk too. I always do that with clients as some enjoy this and have never tasted fresh milk directly from the farm. But I also understand that you as American find it strange to drink fresh milk and are scared of it. You were really such a stereotype of American. How about you open your mind more when you travel and accept and learn how different cultures live? Instead of complaining around that you had to wait 1 minute in the car. If I had known that you were so ungrateful and mean I would never have come to do this tour for you. I have zero interest in your money and could have cancelled this tour for free. Would have been much better, especially as I had a long flight the day after. But I did not want to disrupt your travel plans so I came. But you are so ungrateful and only complain around. You don't realize I did not even want to do this tour, but drove a long way from Zurich to Interlaken so you could have your tour on that day. I could have cancelled you. So be nice when people are nice to you. This is seriously the first time someone is unhappy with this tour. Still very suprised. Why don't you ask me to refund you for the lunch or partial refund for the tour? Because you are mean and fake people, you prefer complaining online than saying what you feel directly. I thought you are adults, if you have a problem you could have talked about it immediately and we could have solved it.

via Tripadvisor