Looking to take a Trafalgar tour to Lima, Cusco, Machu Picchu in 2013. Has anyone used Trafalgar? If so, what has been your experience? Thanks very much.

Have you checked the forums on Trafalgar's website? I always love their trip reports, hints, etc. Usually someone has taken the exact trip you are looking at!

And, yes. We have traveled with Trafalgar and with their sister company, Insight. Excellent tours!

Haven't done that trip with Trafalgar but did two others with them in the recent past and have friends who have used them. Their trips are generally slightly above average. Large groups (up to 50 people) and they use pretty full coaches. Not a whole lot of time to wander around on your own and because they tend to have a lot of people there is a lot of standing around and waiting for the inevitable stragglers.

Their hotels are generally good but rarely in a good location. They select good hotels as much as 5 or 10 miles from the city to keep costs down so it's difficult to go into town for evenings. Also my experience was there were no other restaurants nearby so people were forced into the hotel restaurants which were, of course, barely average.

Their tour escorts are variable, from excellent to barely useful insofar as knowledge of the area and other general information is concerned. All we experienced were fine in terms of group/tour management and control.

But I would still use them if their itinerary were heads above the competition.