Gibraltar & St. Michael's Caves Tour

This tour makes for a long day from Malaga! Our bus ride was over 2 and 1/2 hours. The coach bus company makes many stops along the Costa Del Sol, so it is very slow going. Once we got to Gibraltar, it was very interesting especially the tour of Gibraltar itself which was done by a local company once we arrived in the city. Our guide Eric had grown up in Gibraltar and was very knowledgeable. The Main Street of Gibraltar is EXTREMELY touristy and crawling with cruise passengers. Because it is duty free, there is nothing but liquor, perfume and jewelry stores. If you need a fix of the UK, you will get it here. There’s even a Marks and Spencer. The drive to the top of the rock is great and has an audio guide with information. The guide on the coach bus, Alice was not very friendly and a bit rude.

Terrible. Terrible communication that had to be initiated by the guest. Canned responses on Viator directed us to call their office whose operators seem woefully unprepared to answer the simplest of questions. Between the phone conversation and WhatsApp messaging, we received not one but three potential pick up points. It is no wonder we never picked up. We went to the point indicated in writing (bus stop at the hard rock Marbella) and waited well beyond the appointed time. We did call again on international roaming where the operator indicated they would contact the guide and call us back. Suffice to say this did not happen and has yet to happen at the time of this writing. I want to mention this was not failure of language as a member of our party is Spanish fluent and each agent contacted also spoke English. This is incredibly unacceptable and untrustworthy.

The minibus guide did not speak French; it was a recording! The driver spoke in Italian and Spanish with some clients and explained many things to them. We had paid for a guided tour in French, though! And the minibus only made two stops, so no photos were possible at certain interesting places on the road. We had very little time to visit; we were pushed to return to the bus. It was sad and stressful! They made us spend more than 3 hours in the city to shop, while only 20 minutes in the cave and with the monkeys!!! Ridiculous! And so much time to go to and return from Malaga... more than 8 hours of bus travel round trip. We do not recommend it.

Guild was pretty useless and did next to nothing during the trip. Impractical timing. People in coach were playing musical chairs and some were sent to the back of separated to elderly or young family members. She 1st did nothing when people complained to her. She then told everyone to sit where they were when I told her that I was going to make complaint to company. The local tour guide/ driver was excellent and really looked after everyone. I would recommend the tour but not the female guide

Too many stops picking up because they stopped at almost every hotel in Malaga so it wasted a lot of time. Then crossing the border was a nightmare with ridiculous long line and only 3 machines working. The tour of “the rock” was interesting and informative. The guide had to repeat his story 4 times for different languages so that could have been avoided by booking only 1 language per bus. Had some free time for shopping but again not very organized so had to rush to eat and shop too. Overall interesting to see but spent an entire day and quite a bit for the trip itself so probably wouldn’t do it again if I know all this.