Austin Adventures Avis 69

Four of us recently traveled to Yellowstone in early September 2024. We were part of a small 10 guest group. Our guides, David Whaylad and Kathy Powell were extraordinary! They both exuded such a love and appreciation for the area that it was infectious. They guided us to areas that larger groups did not have access to and often times, they surprised us with "treats" after our adventure was done. I highly recommend Austin Adventures and look forward to another trip in the near future. Thank you Kathy & David!

Our trip with Austin Adventures was great. I went with my Mom and Dad to Yellowstone. I really loved the guides, they always had fun facts and played games with us kids and told cool stories too. We saw a bear and there was lots of food and drink. The snasket (snack basket) in the vans was magically filled each day with my favourite snacks. I even got a special notebook to keep, with waterproof paper. Soooo cool.

Great itinerary with excellent logistics to maximize number of experiences. Grace and Megan were great while keeping everybody organized and demonstrating local knowledge and experience. Worked hard to meet request of everyone on trip. Whenever we had seen or done fantastic things, they would amaze us again. Added extra experiences such as after dinner wildlife excursion and early final day start to see more of Tetons while still getting everyone to airport as needed to make flights. Good quality and variety of meals and snacks."

"We had a awesome adventure. Our guides Katie and Kevin were excellent, knowledgeable, fun, friendly, and service oriented. We had a very nice group of fellow travelers. The trip exceeded our expectations in so many ways. Beautiful scenery, good accommodations, adequate meals and a comfortable van."

"We spent a week touring Montana/ Yellowstone with Austin Adventures. Everything was well organized, and the itinerary was great! They were so accommodating with our various food allergies and differing athletic abilities, and all three generations of our family had a great time! They had access to specialized excursions we never could have booked on our own, and being able to sit back and relax while they handled all the logistics was such a fantastic feature."

After signing up for a trip with Austin Adventures, 9 months in advance, I was told 3 months before the trip, that the trip was cancelled.
They refunded my payment. But, they also advised me to get travel insurance, which I did. When the trip was cancelled, I lost the $700 I paid for travel insurance. When I requested a refund for the travel insurance, they declined and said we don’t require travel insurance.
I also lost money on the cancelled airfares.
I told Austin Adventures that I lost over $1000 trying to do business with them and by following their recommendations. I asked if they were OK with that. They told me that they have been in business for over 40 years and they were highly rated.
Be very careful dealing with this company. Seems suspicious to me that they recommend travel insurance, provide a link to the provider, then cancel your trip and their provider pockets the non-refundable travel insurance.
I noticed at least one other review where a potential Austin Adventures customer had a similar experience and lost money. So, this is a systemic flaw in Austin Adventures business practices. I am sure many of their trips are wonderful. But be very careful about investing money in the trip until you are sure it will happen. They may pull the rug out from under you.

Getting schedules was a bit of issue with my schedule but I found a rafting tour that worked for me. I didn't grow up camping so that was new to me. Great experience I would raft again.

Let them know immediately if you can't swim. I wore a double lifevest

After booking the Mighty Adventure tour in Utah for May 2023 in October 2022, in January 2023 the company decided to change the dates of the trip after my vacation time, non-refundable flights and hotels were already booked. Their reason was that they didn't get enough hikers booked, over 3 months before the actual trip. As a result of them not going to make enough profit, I was out thousands. When asked about the new date they suggested, they couldn't commit to confirm it. What, I'm suppose to going this experience a 2nd time? At what point does the company live up to what they offer?

Ron and Ben were amazing hosts: knowledgeable, personable and adaptable. We had terrific bike rides, a fantastic white water rafting trip, and those that did the optional paragliding adventure called it their favorite activity of the trip. Our hosts were sensitive to individual needs and desires, offering less or more strenuous experiences for each individual, as they desired. They even got each of us small but personalized mementos to remember our trip with - this really went above and beyond. Truly great people and happy to have met them.

loved everything - very well run, delivered an experience to remember.

Buyer Beware! Austin Adventures sold me something that did not exist and then refused even a partial refund. This is because Austin largely resells other company's trips, at a markup, without independent local knowledge. In my case, Austin resold a Mountain Lodges of Peru trek from Cusco to Machu Picchu. The trip itself, as run by MLP, was fantastic. But using Austin as a reseller was a huge mistake. Not only did I pay more, I also received less in terms of information. Before the trip, any questions took several days to answer because Austin had to reach out to MLP behind the scenes, and I often received several different answers because Austin lacked local knowledge. But by far the worst part of the experience was my "added day" -- the only part not prepackaged by MLP, or the only part for which Austin was directly responsible. Austin sold me, in July 2021, a guided hike to the Sun Gate. But the Sun Gate had been closed since 2020 due to COVID, and I was not even provided a guide for the day. When I requested a partial refund upon my return, Austin refused. Do NOT use this company.

Awesome company to travel with. Traveled to Costa Rica w a friend and met two other groups to join our adventure. We had an awesome tour guide and driver (Marco and Warren) who know anything and everything and had an eye like an eagle.

We explored the rainforest, saw turtles hatch swam in an infinity pool, horseback riding, had dinner at some unique places, white water rafted, rinsed off under waterfalls, swam at the beach, zip lined and took part in day and nocturnal hikes.

Marco definitely went out of his way to make everyone feel important, taken care of and able to have choices on daily activities.

It was a great experience. Austin Adventures made our vacation fun. The guide was very helpful and friendly. I do recommend.

Honest review - Austin Adventures is awesome. To be honest i read some of the negative reviews and it use to be years ago that if someone was upset they would talk to the owner and the owner stood by "the customer is always right."

Leads me to believe that all these negative reviews on ANY business is more than likely a competitor!

So I say that anyone writing negatives is not a real customer or maybe they are a snowflake that doesn't have enough testosterone to confront the owner.

great fun! Well organized and great service!

Austin Adventures guides gave exceptional attention to all details which enabled all group members optimal enjoyment. Beautiful country, top notch accommodations and restaurants.

I found much to enjoy on a trip this summer in terms of the activities, however, we had several couples who dominated the trip in an unfriendly way. These couples knew each other and planned their trip together. What surprised me was that the guides made no effort to defuse this. At the end of the trip, the lead guide said the guides failed to present at least half of their commentary due to the loudness of the couples. (The couples also seemed to broadcast sexist comments almost continuously.) I've seen other companies handle group dynamics in a more proactive way.

The Good: I truly enjoyed my adventure trip to Montana and our guides were very knowledgeable and pleasant. I especially enjoyed the lunches prepared by the guides and the casual nature of them. It seemed like each and every view was more spectacular than the rest and I would definitely recommend this trip to those who are very active and enjoy hiking. It was challenging but worthwhile for the views and exercise. I really liked the horseback ride on the ranch and met wonderful people on our trip.

The not so good: I spoke with and emailed an Austin Adventure several times in planning my trip and believe the level of activity was more strenuous than what was described and would certainly not be for everyone. It was more challenging than I expected. The uphill bike ride was too much for many of us. I think I would have enjoyed staying in only 2 locations versus 3. I found packing and unpacking rather annoying. If you take this trip there are locations to do laundry and there was one night that was more formal attire and we didn't know that and didn't pack accordingly. For the money, I don't think we should have had to pay for our own dinner one night and one of the places we stayed had a cafeteria style breakfast area with trays, plasticware, and the food was not good - this was disappointing from the standpoint of the money spent on this trip and the atmosphere was dark and depressing, although there was a nice view from the windows.

As a person who has traveled with Austin Adventures twice I can say they are everything they appear to be. A great trip that is not for people who want to relax or take it easy.