To Know It All

When I first started as a tour director, I would be assigned to shadow a “more experienced” tour guide.  So I could see how that particular tour was suppose to be done.

Most of the time it was the same thing.  The TD would stand up in front of the bus and tell everyone at the beginning of the tour, what they were going to do and what all they were going to see.

And they were right.  That’s all we did and that’s all we saw. I never understood that mentality.  Where’s the excitement, the drama and the adventure of knowing it all up front?

So I started to NOT tell it all.  I like to always leave a little something for them to be amazed or surprised by.  Giving my guests something extra they can tell their friends and family about when they go back home.

As an example is when we are  coming back from Hoover Dam, I like to stop (unannounced) and see if the Big Horn Sheep have come down from the mountains to graze in Hemmingway Park.  If not, it’s no real loss because the park offers an unbelievable, almost picture postcard view of what all they just saw.

People love that extra surpirse, the bonus at the end of an already wonderful tour.  It gives them more things to talk about.  And isn’t that what we want them to do?  Talk about their tour?