This is one from Split, Croatia, a really nice coastal city that had plenty of older medieval style buildings to explore, including a castle that was walking distance from the Ship Port. The captioned picture for this was of "Anton" our guide and how he became our guide.
Furst thing to remember is that you can book a shore excursion with the cruise line in advance (if you really know what you want to do) or you can "wing" it like we do. The deals are better and you can use you skills in bartering on the spot. The big difference is, if you go for a "spontaneous" tour, they won't guarantee that you make it back to the cruise line on time, so be wary of that.
Back to my friend, Anton in the pic.
He was one of the 20 or so independent Tour Operators that wait outside of the port landing to see about doing business with you. They usually only accept cash, so make sure you have enough euros on you. The cruise ship should have an ATM (near the casino) that makes it easy to convert your credit card or debit card into euros for a small fee.
Anyway, we walked along the shore path and all of the tours looked the same, cars and prices UNTIL I spotted this huge golf cart thingy, they called a Tuk Tuk, but not like the ones you see in Asia that are like giant go karts. This one could easily seat 6 normal size people (under 200 lbs. each). A kid was standing next to it and I asked him(in English) 'how much?'. He answered (in good English) "I don't know, it's my uncle's and he's not here. He should be back in a minute." Well, I was with the same brother in law and sister (and wife) from the last adventure in Dubrovnik and my brother in law is a frugal man when it comes to "extra" trips so he wasn't interested in the tour. I told him to hold on for a minute while I looked into it just to see how much it cost (tightwad lol).
The man came back during this conversation and I went back to his vehicle to see about renting the Tuk Tuk for a tour. He very politely introduced himself as Anton, and said he would take us out on the guided tour for 2 full hours, stop for pictures, take the pictures of us, stop for food and take us to places not found on the paper maps the other tour guides where passing out that only the locals Knew about. I asked the price and he said 100 euros. I did the math. That's 25 each for 4 of us and cheaper than anything else there and man, the Tuk Tuk was cool, so I went back to my brother in law and explained it to him and he said no. I wasn't going to take no for an answer, and well, I was paying for it, let's face it so...
At this point, I was going to go on the tour myself, but since I couldn't do that, I asked Anton, if he would do it for 75 euros and he thought about it for a long minute and then said, since you talked your brother in law into going on the tour with him, he would consider the 25 euros difference my commission for helping him book his tour. I had to laugh and I told him "you got a deal, my friend".
The tour was more amazing than I could have imagined and he was very knowledgeable and personable about all of the sites he took us too, including this abbey that was sticking out of a cliff in a random part of town, that he said is not on any map. He even dropped us off on a cobble stone street lined with tourists and it was at the doorstep of the fancy medieval castle in the center of town.
So, the moral of this story is to take the chance, spend a little money and have some unforgettable experience.
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