Alain Dream Tours Villefranche/Nice

[ILoveMyDogs]

On October 4, we toured Nice, St Paul de Vence and Monaco with Alain from Dream Tours. He was awesome! I rate him an A plus. He was an excellent driver, a very knowlegdele guide as well as an entertainer. His english was excellent and he was very conversational. He was consistently professional and we felt very comfortable in his hands. He was always waiting for us exactly where he said he would be. He gave us excellent recomendations on where to eat lunch and shop. We plan to use him again when we return on the Brillance of the Seas in September 2006. :) Lisa

[Judyumcer@aol.com]

We were 4 couples that hired Sylvie and loved her. Her English is perfect, she is charming, funny and a real pleasure to be with. She picked us up at the ship in Monte Carlo. One of our highlights was when she took us to see Rothschild's Villa amd we had lunch i the tea room. What a beautiful settings. The home, the gardens, the view. She took us at our request and all 8 of us enjoyed it. She took us to little French villages, Monte Carlo itself and we saw where the rich and famous live. Drove by Bill Gates estate. She is highly recommended. Her address is: sylvie.di.cristo@wanadoo.fr

[PoohUnderstands]

Hey "Dogs"!!

 

When are you going on the BOS in 09/06? We will be on the Barcelona RT leaving on 9/20/06. You?

 

Pooh

[dbh62ark]

My sister lives in San Antonio. :) We used Dream Tours last year and had Jean Marc for a driver, but I communicated with Alain a lot. It's a great tour operator that I also highly recommend.

 

Donna

[Sandy R]

We used Alain two years ago. He was indeed awesome. He took us to St. Paul de Vence and Eze during our port stop. I definitely recommend him!

[stingraynz]

Another Kudos from me too!

 

We used Dream Tours In April 2004. Lots of correspondence with Alain - I knew right away they were the tour op for us.

 

Our guide was Frederick and you would be too lucky to get him. We had the best time with him. Would love to go back to that area and use Dream Tours again sometime soon.

[alinehu]

How can I contact Alain?

[NH Cruiser]

We used Dream Tours on our 2004 cruise and they were excellent. We visited Eze, where we walked to the top of the mountain for a breathtaking view of the Cote d'Azur; St Paul de Vince, which was a beautiful stop; Monaco where we saw the changing of the guard and also did the self-guided tour of the palace; and Monte Carlo where we went inside the casino, walked around the square, and visited the harbor behind the casino. Our planned stop in Nice turned into a drive-through because everyone was really tired. Pictures of this excursion can be seen by clicking the Webshots link in my signature and then clicking on page 3.

 

Just a caution: we had 8 in the van, which requried two of us to sit in the front seat with the driver. It was a little tight and not very comfortable in the hot weather. I wouldn't book the van with more than 6.

 

You can reach Alain at infos@dream-tours.com. Here's a link to their English-language website http://www.dream-tours.com/layout.php?page=106&lang=us.

[alinehu]

Thanks for the info

[quetzal1958]

Hi I have Dream Tours reserved for our cruise in October on the Carnival Liberty - can anyone who has taken the tour tell me what are the highlights what would be good t skip so we could spend more time in another place. I would like to see the changing of the guard but it seems like they only do it at noon am i correct? It seems like St Paul de Vence and Eze are pretty small to walk around in - so where would you spend the most time? any info would be great. I relize everyone has their own ides but i wouldlike to hear them! Thanks so much!

[dbh62ark]

My favorite stop was St. Paul de Vence, so I would suggest making that your longest stop. The perfume factory tour is optional, so that would be a stop you can skip if you don't have any interest (we didn't tour but did stop to shop there). Eze is very small and is smaller than St. Paul de Vence. The changing of the guard is not that spectacular in my opinion, so I wouldn't schedule my day around that. I don't know whether or not Nice is on your schedule; opinions seem to vary widely on Nice. Mine is that I can go to the beach in the good ol' U.S.; other than the flower market area, I'm not really crazy about Nice, so I personally would not spend a lot of time there. We went to Cannes at the beginning of our tour because one of our tour members was just dying to go to Cannes. I wasn't crazy about that idea because I had always heard that there was nothing there to see but to take a snapshot of the film festival area. Well, that was correct in my opinion, but I did very much enjoy the scenic roads (corniches) on the way to and from Cannes. So I suggest that you could skip Cannes but make sure you get to ride on some of those scenic roads anyway. We are very active in port and don't like to spend two hours eating lunch, so there's another place where you can save time. I know others may choose to spend their time that way, and that's fine, but we're just too active to sit around like that for that long. Also, if you have a long port day, you could ask your guide to drop you off in Monte Carlo at the end of the day to make you own way back to the ship and then you could use a guidebook like Frommers to see Monte Carlo on your own.

 

Have a great trip,

Donna

[LadyoftheLake]

We also used Dream Tours Jean Marc was our guide and he was one of our favorites. We really enjoyed his sense of humor along with his stories. It astonished me that we saw so much in one day. We started out driving to a local market which I adored and then a scenic view of the med along with a view of our ship at Villefranche. We then headed off to St Paul where Jean Marc allowed us to get out at the entrance (another time saver and few less steps so we were not warn out) Enjoyed a leasurely hour in St Paul along with some extra time to have a wonderful lunch outdoors on the terrace. Then we went to Eze and again we were saved the long walk up the hill because Jean Marc dropped us off at the entrance. We walked through the wonderful little stone stairways and into the adorable shops. Purchased a hand made necklace with dried flowers from a charming shop keeper. We went from Eze to the Parfume factory that is next to Eze (Fragonard). Actually enjoyed the staff as much as anything, they were delightful. From Fragonard we moved on to Monaco and the Palace, went inside the Church where Grace was entombed and to the Palace. From there we went to the Large Hotel and Casino at Monte Carlo. Then back to the ship. It was a lot to see in one day but Jean Marc made it easy and lots of fun. I cannot say enough nice things about Dream tours.

[Sandy R]

Four of us used Alain a few years ago. We visited Eze and St. Paul De Vence... one of our highlight days during our cruise! He was great... knowlegeable and personable and his van was very comfortable.

 

Sandy