G Adventures ‘Volcano Trail: Waves and Local Ways’ Review: What to Expect on the Central America Journey
Are you considering going on a G Adventures tour through Central America?
Perhaps you’re looking into the different options and have stumbled across the Volcano Trail: Waves & Local Ways’ tour.
Well, whatever your motivation for being here, we know you will find this review useful.
We recently returned from our epic adventure across Central America and we’ve decided to outline what we loved about the tour, and what we didn’t enjoy so much.
This article will give you handy advice on what to know before you go to Central America.
Hopefully, by the end of the review, you’ll be inspired to book the Volcano Trail: Waves & Local Ways tour offered by G Adventures - we know you won’t regret it!
So, let’s dive into: G Adventures ‘Volcano Trail: Waves & Local Ways’ Review
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G Adventures ‘Volcano Trail: Waves & Local Ways’ Review
Before we jump into all of the things we loved about the Volcano Trail: Waves & Local Ways tour, it is worth saying that we absolutely loved it! From start to finish, it was very well organised, the accommodation was always great (for the price) and our group was lovely.
Copan Ruins - Honduras
Benefits of the G Adventures ‘Volcano Trail: Waves & Local Ways’: Things we loved about the Tour in Central America
The Activities!
It will come as no surprise that a major reason why we decided to book this tour was for the activities that were on offer - and they didn’t disappoint.
While not many of the activities on offer are included in the itinerary (they are optional extras you pay for during the trip), we felt we still wanted to do most of them because many were once-in-a-lifetime activities for us.
Some of the main highlights were:
Copan Ruins Tour in Honduras
Masaya Volcano Tour in Nicaragua
Relaxing in Hot Springs in Nicaragua
White-Water Rafting in Costa Rica
Ziplining in Costa Rica
Worth noting: we didn’t do the optional Volcano Boarding in Nicaragua, but a lot of our group did it and absolutely loved it!
Scroll through our Instagram to see some of our videos from our amazing trip through Central America with G Adventures!
It was so easy and stress-free!
As people who are used to travelling by ourselves and organising every detail, we must admit that going on an organised tour for the first time was a breath of fresh air.
Every evening, we’d be given instructions on what time to get up, where to get breakfast, and what time to jump on the minibus. We didn’t have to do any thinking for ourselves, and it really took any stressors away from the trip.
The CEO/Guide - Rafa!
G Adventures refer to their tour guides as the ‘CEOs’ of their trips, and in reality, they act as a CEO because they take care of absolutely everything.
Our guide Rafa was more than just a traditional tour guide - he provided us with restaurant recommendations, organised group BBQs, helped people get to the local clinic, showed us where to exchange money to get the best rates, took us to cheap, local markets for food, on top of actually taking us to all the activities and giving us the recent history of each of the countries we visited.
We honestly can’t speak highly enough of Rafa - he was the best part of the trip!
Getting to visit 5 countries in a short amount of time!
One of the major perks of this particular tour is the chance to visit 5 different countries over such a short amount of time. While this obviously means you don’t get to visit any country in-depth, it does offer the chance to experience a little bit of each place and get a feeling for the differences between each of the Central American nations.
For example, you’ll notice just how rich and well-established Costa Rica is compared to some of its neighbours.
We only stayed in dorm rooms a couple of times!
Travelling as a couple on a budget-friendly tour with G Adventures means you’re likely to have to split up for the night from time to time.
Some accommodation options only offered dorm rooms, and obviously, these were split by gender. But thankfully for us, this was for only 1 or 2 nights of the trip. Don’t get us wrong, we’ve picked up plenty of tips for staying in hostels as a couple over the years, but we were grateful that we didn’t have to do it too often.
The rest of the time we had our own private room (and didn’t have to pay extra for this). We were very pleasantly surprised as we had fully expected to be sharing hostel dorm rooms more often than not.
This was the resort we stayed in by the beach in El Salvador
Negatives of the G Adventures ‘Volcano Trail: Waves & Local Ways’: Things we didn’t love so much about the Tour in Central America
While the benefits of booking this organised tour were incredible, we would be lying if we said there weren’t any downsides to this type of travelling. We think it’s important to be honest, so we’ve highlighted a few of the things we didn’t love so much about the tour in Central America.
Long Travel Days
When you’re travelling overland through 5 countries in 17 days, it is to be expected that there are going to be some long travel days.
While the majority of travel days involved bus journeys from anywhere between 3-6 hours, there were a couple of days where we were on the go for over 12 hours.
This included a 3am start in El Salvador in order to catch a boat across the border to Nicaragua.
Lack of flexibility - Even though this is expected
Again, this didn’t come as a surprise to us, but the lack of flexibility in the schedule can be frustrating at times on a group tour.
Sometimes we felt we could have spent a few more hours/days in a location (E.g. Ometepe Island), whereas other times we thought we could have just stopped off somewhere instead of spending the night.
This rigid structure is completely normal during an organised tour, but as it was our first trip of this nature, it did take a little bit of getting used to. Especially as Orla is usually the type of person to research everywhere we go and everywhere we stay.
Group Dinners take a long time
This was perhaps our least enjoyable aspect of the entire trip. When you go for a group dinner with 16 different people ordering different things, it is going to take a long time.
Our guide Rafa was an angel and always recommended an affordable, but good quality, restaurant for us to eat at, but sometimes the service was lacking.
On more than 1 occasion, it took over 45 minutes for our drinks order to come to the table, let alone the actual meals.
Each group meal would take well over 2 hours, which didn’t leave you much time to go exploring or do your own thing in the evening.
Worth noting: eating at the restaurants your CEO recommends is not mandatory. Particularly if you’re a couple, you could easily go off and find your own place and have a meal alone. We just didn’t want to be the only ones leaving the group in the evenings though so we just always ate with the group.
White Water Rafting - Costa Rica
G Adventures ‘Volcano Trail: Waves & Local Ways’: What to know before you go
Arrive into Guatemala early and do the Acatenango Volcano Hike
If you take only one thing from this blog post, please let it be this - the Acatenango Volcano hike is absolutely spectacular!
While the Volcano Trail tour with G Adventures doesn’t actually cater for this hike, we 1000% recommend arriving into Guatemala a few days early and booking yourself onto the Acatenango Volcano Overnight Hiking Adventure and be prepared for one of the most memorable travel experiences you will ever have.
Honestly, just book it. It’s absolutely incredible!
Acatenango Volcano Hike - Guatemala
CEOs differ from tour to tour
It may come as no surprise to learn that CEOs differ from trip to trip, even if you’re doing the exact same route as previous trips.
This means that the guiding style of CEOs is likely to change too. For example, people on our tour who had begun in Mexico told us their previous CEO was very laid back and let them do whatever they wanted in the evenings without giving too many suggestions.
Whereas our CEO, Rafa, would give us several optional activities/restaurants every evening and made sure we all had everything we needed before he headed to bed for the night.
Your group really makes the trip
It sounds cliché to say, but the group of ‘strangers’ that you travel with, will make or break your tour.
If, like us, you travel with a really friendly, sociable and down-to-Earth group, then you’re going to have the best time ever on your tour.
If however, you end up travelling with a group that you aren’t particularly fond of, then your trip isn’t going to be quite as memorable.
It’s just something to bear in mind before you go ahead and book the tour - or any group trip for that matter.
We will say though, that the majority of people who decide to embark on an overland tour of this nature will be very like-minded. They will want to have an adventure, have a laugh and make some incredible memories together. That’s what travelling on a G Adventures tour is all about.
Bring a book/download podcasts for the travel days
Really important to remember - bring something to keep you occupied for those long travel days when you’re cooped up in the van looking for some entertainment.
Some people on our trip brought books to read, some preferred to listen to music, others downloaded a few episodes on Netflix.
Whatever takes your fancy, just as long as you have something to keep you entertained for the longer travel days.
Ziplining in Costa Rica
Other Similar G Adventures Tours through Central America
Central American Journey: Rainforests & Ruins
Central American Journey: Rainforests & Ruins - as we discussed, the Volcano Trail tour is actually the 2nd half of an extended Central America route that begins in Mexico. This tour lasts just over a month, and according to everyone on our tour that started in Mexico, it is definitely worth it!
Something to consider for this tour is that by the end of the 3rd week (around 1 week into the Volcano Trail tour), many of the group were starting to run out of energy as they’d been on the go for a long time.
If you want to tick off all of Central America, though (Panama aside), then we’d highly recommend the Central American Journey: Rainforests & Ruins tour.
Mayan Sun Southbound: Boat Rides & Ruins
Mayan Sun Southbound: Boat Rides & Ruins - so, if you’re following along and we haven’t confused you yet, the Mayan Sun Southbound tour is the 1st half of the Central American Journey tour. This part of the journey takes you through Mexico and Belize.
This tour focuses on beaches, , snorkelling and swimming, so if you love nothing more than being in the water on your holiday, this is probably the tour for you.
According to the friends on our tour that started the Central America adventure in Mexico, the undisputed highlight of this leg of the tour was Caye Caulker. It’s a little coral island off the coast of Belize and is a true Caribbean paradise!
If diving and exploring coral reefs is your vibe, then the Mayan Sun Southbound: Boat Rides & Ruins tour is definitely for you!
Of course, it is possible to join a tour with G Adventures that explores 1 place. The advantage of this kind of tour is that you get to experience a country in-depth, and you can buy return flight tickets from the same airport - which is always cheaper!
Country-Specific Tours in Central America with G Adventures
Here’s just a few examples of the in-depth country tours that G Adventures offers throughout Central America:
Grenada - Nicaragua
Well, there we have it, folks, a conclusive review of the G Adventures ‘Volcano Trail: Waves & Local Ways’ tour we embarked on. We hope this review has given you some insight into the trip and inspired you to take the plunge and book the tour here - you won’t regret it!
