Ronda & Setenil from the Costa del Sol

This tour was practical and convenient for us because we are “easy going” customers. However, it offered nothing much than just the transportation. The provider made arrangements for us to be picked up at closer location to our apartment and we appreciate that. The tour guide did what he could it terms of providing us with guidance at the sites. When I booked this tour it was advertised as Ronda and Setenil with Wine tasting. Not sure what happened in the booking proceed with the provider but there was no wine tasting at all. I would encourage future customers to inquire more about what is covered to avoid misunderstanding and if this was a mistake by Julia Travel, Bravo Tours and/or Viator, please pay more attention to such details and make sure your staff is train to avoid these little issues that can affect your reviews.

Where to start to describe this nightmare tour? It was stated that there us no hotel pick up and there was a meeting point at 6:55 am. However, what was not said anywhere is that the bus will drive for two and half hours next to the beach from Malaga to and past Marabella picking up other passengers from the resorts. Then finally, somewhere past 9:44, we headed to Ronda (every single seat was filled amid pandemic). Twenty minutes before Ronda, the bus pulled into some dirt put for coffee and restroom, like we could not do such in Ronda. At that time bus broke down and could not restart, so we got stranded there for an hour. The bus driver fix it. It took us FIVE Hours to Get to Ronda (1h23min trip). At noon the “tour guide” gave us the map and said go for three hours and figure it out for ourselves. The only thing that she explained in detail was where bus parking was and how to get back to it on time ( how is this guided tour?!). The bull ring tickets and wine tasting are included, but there were none. When asked about wine-tasting, they stated that due to covid, they can not do it and had no answer as to why we did not get tickets to visit bull ring in Ronda; however, we were charged for all and bus was packed to the last seat. Next, we were driven to Sentinel and given only 40 minutes claiming that that is the time we would usually get regardless of the bus being broken for an hour!! LOL Same thing happened as in Ronda; our guide pointed to the street and said to go. We returned to the bus at 4:15 and then traveled for three hours before, arriving in Malaga at 7 pm dropping people around. We all work hard for our vacations, and the time we have for them is precious. It is disrespectful to treat and cheat people like this. If you add all the time, we spent EIGHT hours riding the bus!! This morning I called Viator requesting a refund for it.

I booked a tour with wine tasting and included Entrance fee for the Bullring. Well, it was not wine tasting and bullring visiting. I choosed and paid this trip for this experiences also, but we didnt get it. It was only transporting, nothing else! We didnt get explanation why i got less program what i paid!

We have to spend 3 hours to get There and 3 hours back. The guide was a angry person, very bad mood. Because he didn’t get a good tip He spoke badly about The Tourists. Paco was The Guide. Very bad Treatment.

Absolutely beautiful and a must see. Its so impressive i advise everyone to see this. It hard to see how deep it is wow.

Ronda is a beautiful city, the old bridge impressive when you go down the cliff for a full view of the gorge and the whole bridge.

The coach ride was comfortable and we enjoyed looking around Setenil and Ronda. Unfortunately the guide assigned to us well and truly took the shine off the experience for us. His demeanor was churlish and at times he was rude. When asked a question he answered it grudgingly. The tour was conducted in several languages and I happen to speak 3 of them and I understand a fair bit of a fourth. It really troubled me to hear this man's very mangled German. I am a native speaker and if I had had to rely on the guide's commentary I would have understood very little. Pronunciation was so awful, I only knew what he meant because I understood his other renditions. The grammar was all over the place. I also noticed (and I probably didn't need to actually understand the content of what he was saying) that he did not translate equally....by that I mean he only translated some things in some languages. It was quite obvious that some translations were much shorter than others. I also found on several occasions that the translations did not match. A particular building had a certain number of rooms in one language and an altogether different number in another language. Dates were not always the same. (etc etc). When everyone wanted to take photos of a particular sight, the guide would often stand at the best vantage point, with his back to the sight, preventing us, the guests, from seeing and being able to take photos. Outside of the coach, he did not use any device to enable everyone (it was a large group) to hear, unless we managed to stay in very close proximity. Towards the end we really just wanted to get it over with.

I have booked thus excursion via Viator and the actual tour agency is called Julia travels. Our bus was full of tourists, about 45 people and the guide should speak in 5!!! languages. It was awful!! I do not speak German or Italian but in my opinion his talk in that languages was much longer. When we were in Ronda then we were separated into 2 groups - English and German in one group and other languages in the second one but it actually did not help to improve the service :( We had breath overview about Ronda (gorge, bullring) and after that there was a free time. Actually I would prefer excursion with guide not to investigate the town by my own.

Lovely day at Setenil and then the beautiful Ronda where we spent most of the day. The day was quite relaxed. We had time to roam about, shop, tapas and vino, take pictures. It was all very picturesque and scenic. The bullring was a very interesting tour and the guide was excellent with alot of enthusiasm and knowledge. Overall a lovely day, well organised. Really enjoyed it.

We would never recommend this tour to anyone. The guide kept repeating the same information over and explanations were limited to a few facts. So many stops to get everyone on the bus. Limited information was provided by the guide when we got on the bus. He did not tell us about the visit of the bull ring. Not a good experience. Rhonda was beautiful and would go with an alternative tour compagnie.