Beau Voyage

Audrey was most helpful in planning our recent trip through the South of France including the Luberon and Camargue, driving up through Beaujolais and Burgundy, and finishing in Paris. She made great suggestions for places to stay and activities and made changes when needed.

Learned a great deal about French wine with a great private tour in Burgundy

I very much like Kimkim's approach of using local travel specialists and Audrey came through Beau Voyage.

On to Egypt and Jordan through Kimkim next fall.

Activity Review

Wine tasting tour

France

Thomas, our tour guide, was a sommelier in a Michelin 3 star restaurant in Lyon. How could you have a more knowledgeable guide?? Learned a lot about French wine and he facilitated our buying and shipping some home.

Quality of Experience

Food

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Transport

Paris was delightful. It was fun to see the preparation for the upcoming summer Olympics.

Hotel Review

Hotel Le Cardinal

Paris

This property was on a quit side street, but the property was dated. Our rooms were poorly appointed and we were disappointed in the hotel overall. The carpet was very worn, rooms were very small, the breakfast was minimal in comparison to other properties. The location seemed far way from the other outtings planned for us.

Authenticity & Character

Rooms, cleanliness, overall quality.

Location

Staff

The manager was very pleasant and attentive to correct our concerns about the property. Desk staff was inattentive. They barely greeted us and then directed us to a closet to store our luggage with no assistance. We are fine on our own and fully capable, but this was unlock any other property we’ve stayed at with KimKim.

Cleanliness & Comfort

Needs updates.

Activity Reviews

Gourmet food tour in Saint-Germain-des-Prés

Paris

This was a fun experience and different than other food tours we have experienced. Lare did a great job teaching and guiding us. She was a fun host.

Quality of Experience

Interesting visits with shop keepers.

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Transport

Small group cooking class with a Chef

Paris

A highlight of our trip. This was a fun and unique experience.

Quality of Experience

Food

Delicious and experiential.

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Outstanding chef and guided through the market and entire experience.

Transport

They had Metro tickets ready and available for us to go from the market to the cooking school as a group.

A family trip to Paris and Normandy.

The trip went exactly as planned except for some things which were beyond anyone's control. The drivers were on time an professional and accommodations and quick pivots were made when necessary.

Vaseem was helpful and responsive during the planning of the trip. We were not easy clients as our dates changed and we were not always quick to respond.

During the trip I needed to be in touch with KIMKIM and using the numbers we were given had response back in very short order and problems solved.

Vaseem recommended a food tour in a part of Paris we had never been. It was a great suggestion. In fact all the guides arranged by Vaseem were top notch.

Well done.

Activity Reviews

Tour of D-Day Sites

France

the Canadian museum at Juno was informative. Our guide was well informed and new how to navigate the sites adn locations.

Quality of Experience

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Transport

Visit of the Domaine de Chantilly

Chantilly

An incredible place with an amazing collection.

Food tour in Belleville

Paris

The guide was knowledgeable, on time and fun! We learned about cheese , chocolate and the difference between a restaurant and and brasserie.

Quality of Experience

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Day Trip to Mont-Saint-Michel

France

The Abbey was closed! No one knew and no one seemed to know why. Our guide did a quick pivot and the rest of the day was still great.

Quality of Experience

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Transport

We had a wonderful time in France. Vaseem, Lucie, and Audrey took good care of us and helped us navigate our first trip abroad as a family of four. The highlight of our trip was Paris. We loved the guided museum tours and especially loved our Pastry Tour of Le Marais with Rachelle!

Hotel Reviews

Hotel de l'Amphithéâtre

It was very quiet and the staff were all friendly. A bit dated but charming.

Authenticity & Character

Location

Staff

Cleanliness & Comfort

Disney Sequoia Lodge

The lobby and restaurants with breakfast buffet were great. The rooms are very dated and the beds a bit uncomfortable.

Authenticity & Character

Location

Ten minute walk to the parks.

Staff

Cleanliness & Comfort

Activity Reviews

Visit of the Eiffel Tower with access to the summit

Paris

The views from the top are incredible!

French macaron bakery class for families

Paris

The location of the class was very cool, we had no idea we would be in Les Galeries Lafayette. It was nice and quiet in the baking room but not totally sure it was worth our time if I’m being honest. Not super interactive for our 5 and 7 year old.

Quality of Experience

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Louvre Treasure Hunt

Paris

The Louvre is overwhelming but we were thankful to have Claire as a guide. She had a fun game for the kids to hunt for specific parts of paintings which kept them engaged. We were not prepared and the kids were thirsty and hungry and water was not easily accessible in the museum. With that aside it was a great time!

Quality of Experience

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Guided visit, wine and olive oil tasting at Chateau Romanin

France

Lovely winery, knowledgeable staff and stunning scenery!

Quality of Experience

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Self-guided exploration of Aigues-Mortes and Safari in Camargue

France

While the driver was so sweet and friendly, this tour just missed the mark for us. The advertised photos are a bit misleading. There are no wild horses in France as our guide informed us, we drove around to fenced in horses, a very cool salt marsh, some flamingos, and a fenced in bull pen. There was no tasting of local products, we were late due to an issue with weather, but I don’t believe it would have been included either way.

Quality of Experience

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Day in Disneyland Paris

France

Half day visit to the Royal Versailles with transfers

Paris

Quality of Experience

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Transport

Pastry Tour of Le Marais

Paris

This was a hit with all four of us, Rachelle was kind, knowledgeable, and a not bit gimmicky. We had a wonderful time with her and didn’t want it to end! Also, the pastries were delicious!

Quality of Experience

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Transport

My granddaughter, and I just had an awesome experience with KimKim.

Our travel agent, Lucie, selected places for us to go and things for us to see in Paris that were specific to our interests and fit within five day timeframe.

The Mythic 2CV 3-hour tour that opened our trip was wonderful! It gave us an overall picture of Paris so that we could add onto it throughout the week. Our 9 Hotel Opéra had a great location and was very clean!

We would never have missed making macarons, chocolate goodies, and the gourmet food tour. Believe it or not, our food tour guide was gluten-free just like my granddaughter. She even went out of her way to buy gluten-free bread for her to use as we sampled so many goodies.

Of course, we loved the Dali museum, the wonderful tour by Alouise a Montmartre, the Eiffel Tower at night, the boat tour on the Seine river, and the Saint Chapelle Stain-glass windows.

I would recommend Lucie as a travel agent to anyone who wants to go to France!

Hotel Review

Le 9Hotel Opera

Paris

Very clean! Daytime receptionist was very helpful.

Authenticity & Character

Great breakfast

Location

Near many restaurants and a beautiful park

Staff

Cleanliness & Comfort

Activity Reviews

Visit of the chocolate museum with tastings

Paris

Besides, seeing the museum, we added on chocolate making. That made the experience 10 times more meaningful.

Quality of Experience

Guides, Drivers and Staff

Transport

Visit of the Louvre museum

Paris

Too crowded

This trip was several weeks in the making. There were some changes along the way and all booked and suggested experiences were spectacular. Vaseem was patient and took a lot of pride in making sure that my wife and I saw France through the same bright lens he saw through.
Each day was thoughtfully planned. Not hurried, we were able to explore at a decent pace. There was careful consideration given to daily and weekly activities. We used the underground, Uber, bicycles when we were not able to explore on foot.
All accommodations were excellent as were the ease of being able to download tickets or directions as we proceeded. Vaseem checked in on occasion and minor adjustments were able to be made in real time.
Thank you for a most memorable experience. Thank you Vaseem, thank you KimKim. Most professional.

We had a lovely trip. I do have a couple of reservations, which I'll talk about below.

First, I should say that Vaseem was very responsive and helpful. We probably contacted him more than he would wish while we were traveling! We did find one of the hotel rooms quite cramped, and we don't think 15 square meters should be called "spacious" for a couple, especially with a huge bed taking up most of it. But my main reservation is about the Kimkim model in which buyers get no breakdown of costs. This makes it very hard to tell whether we are getting reasonable value for the money, and to weigh and choose different elements. We chose to reduce the level of hotels, but in retrospect might have dropped some of the private pickups instead. These were very uneven in service. On the plus side, all the drivers were on time. But we expected help with luggage (being rather old), and while some were great about this, one young fellow in Lyon led us on a long bag drag without offering help, just peeking around occasionally to see if we were trailing along behind. We passed a line of taxis we would have loved to jump into instead.

We greatly enjoyed the Beaujolais wine tour with Eddie and Roman history tour with David. For each of the tours we were given inaccurate information about the meeting place and time, which led to some unnecessary worry and inconvenience. We liked most of the hotels, except for getting luggage up and down spiral staircases. The most charming was in Montpellier (luckily the kind concierge gave us a room in the portion of the hotel with an elevator, so there was only a little bit of spiral staircase). Our hostess in Avignon was extremely helpful with advice about sights and restaurants.

Anyway, thank you to Vaseem and the tour guides. To Kimkim management, please be more transparent about costs. I know we're not the only travelers who want this.