How we collect tourists for a tour

50% of all trip Incidents happen during this small but very important phase. But let us talk about it a bit later. It is a different story.

First of all, we need to describe the place where the mentioned events take place.

So, what is Cyprus? One has to understand that Cyprus is not a typical European country. It is a cocktail of various cultures and ways of life. This fact affects virtually everything.

Traffic is left-handed (like in England). Houses are mostly built low (as in many rural areas), towns are not much different from villages, and roads are narrow and mostly winding. There are practically no addresses. All the locals are guided by the names of the facilities. For example – next to the Time Out kiosk etc.

Thankfully, there is the Internet and GPS, as well as many navigators equipped with maps, which in combination with Google maps show the area quite well.

Therefore, the question about the choice of a pickup point is not as simple as it seems at first glance, and there are several factors that influence a particular choice of the gathering point that we offer you for a given tour. And trust me, it’s a rather complicated and time-consuming job that won’t stop for a minute. Roads, hotels and other events have a life of their own, so we constantly have to adjust to the situation.

Thus, the following factors influence the choice of a gathering point you are offered:

Firstly, the access roads to your location. If it is far away from the main roads, a large bus cannot get there at all, or it will take a very long time. A private tour, of course, does not involve these complications, and you will be picked up from any location of your choice. However, it will also cost you significantly more. Therefore, the pick-up location depends on the transport that carries out the task. Group tours (for instance – A Day Trip at BLUE LAGOON (Akamas) from Paphos and Limassol), which are operated by a large 55-seat bus, only collect tourists along the main roads from public stops (for instance – PickUp PA07 – Bus Stop Outside “Tea For Two” restaurant “Poseidonos Ave, 56”). For a smaller bus, which has more manoeuvrability, more difficult pick-up points are available and other excursions we do by minibus pick up tourists mainly from the reception of a certain list of hotels.

Secondly, it depends on the location of your place in relation to the collection direction for the tour. Usually, if your hotel is on the other side of the road, it might take the bus 10-15 minutes to find the nearest U-turn, drive up to the hotel and turn back in the direction of the main route. So, for big bus tours, we choose points that are not only within walking distance but also located along the bus route.

One last thing. In order to collect people more quickly, we group several hotels and offer them the same consolidated collection point. Of course, this applies mainly to a big bus, but partly also to a minibus.

A few words about our collection times.

The time that we indicate in the pickup information is the bus departure time from the given point. Therefore, we always suggest being at the indicated location 10 minutes before the indicated time. This is also feasible because a number of locations have the same departure time. It is the only correct approach, as we cannot know in advance (at the time of your booking) the actual number of tourists at each pick-up point.

An early arrival or a slight delay of the bus is therefore understandable.

The average collection time for a tour on a large bus is about one hour.