Why Green Trails Tours are Private
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Are all Green Trails tours private?
All our Green Trails tours are private except two small group tours with a couple of fixed weekly departures: Meet the Karen People of Wang and Mae Wang Trekking and Cycling Adventure. All the other tours are private, which means that guide and driver are at your disposal for the duration of the tour. You can say that organizing customized private tours is our specialty.
Private tours are, of course, more expensive than so-called join-tours. Popular tours, such as a day tour to Doi Suthep, Doi Inthanon, or back and forth to Chiang Rai, are on a join-basis. Most of our programs are unique and don’t attract many people, making it impossible to organize a join tour.
Green Trails private tours vs. join tours
You can customize your Green Trails tour because our tours are private. Our website has accurate descriptions of our tours, but we can customize the tours on request. If you want a customized tour, please fill in the form on our website’s top menu of send us an email: info@green-trails.com
To customize a tour means to modify a tour to suit a particular individual. Other words for customization are “tailormade” or “bespoke,” but these terms are used in the clothing industry. Our private tours are more expensive than most of the so-called join tours, that are on offer in Chiang Mai. Join tours are group tours in which people book on an individual basis. The itineraries are typically standard in order to appeal to a broad audience and attract as many people as possible. These tours are the opposite of exclusive. Yes, private tours are more expensive than join tours, but there are a lot of advantages.
The advantages of Green Trails private tours.
What are the advantages of our private tours? Your guide and driver will follow the program, but this is your tour. In the end, you will decide what happens. In most of our tours, we have set the departure time at 0800 because our programs are packed with activities, and we want you to enjoy a full day of experiences. You can change this departure time and just let us know.
Operators of join tours usually set an approximate time because they have to pick up guests from different hotels. Picking up various guests can take between half an hour and 45 minutes, and dropping them at their hotels after the trip might take the same time. This, of course, depends on the number of participants and the location of their hotels. This means you might lose valuable time in the morning and the afternoon. There is usually no limit to join tours so you might end up in a caravan of several minivans with up to 40 or 50 people.
Private trekking or a group trekking
We try to keep the trekking groups to 10 people, but that doesn’t always work with school and university groups. Of concern is the impact of big groups in villages and the difference in fitness between the participants. In groups, there are always strong and weaker hikers, which makes it challenging to find an itinerary that suits everyone. The guide will then constantly adjust the route and the tempo of the trekking to the weakest person in the group unless you have two guides.
If you have booked private trekking, our guide will adjust the trekking route to your ability. They know many different routes in our trekking areas. This also means that you can ask us in advance to customize your Green Trails tour. Please let us know if you want to hike longer or shorter on any specific day. Don’t hesitate to ask your guide to adjust the itinerary during the tour: flexibility is our strength. This also applies to activities during the tour. If you prefer an elephant experience instead of a trip by bamboo raft, please let us know in advance so we can customize your Green Trails tour.
Customize your menu before you go on our trips
Our private tours are unique and exclusive experiences. You are in charge to a certain extent. Our guides select the food they prepare during the trekking, but also, in this case, we are open to suggestions. Please let us know if you have any dietary requirements or specific requests, and we can take care of them. Our guides have their standard menus but if you want, for instance, to have rice soup instead of toast for breakfast, please let us know. Soon we will publish a unique, updated section on local food and other options you have during our private trekkings.