Guardian Music and Group Travel 1008 Frances Parkway, Park Ridge, IL 60068

"Currently on a trip to Europe for WIASOM with Guardian, worst travel place ever. Do not use unless you want to waste time and money. Spent $6,000+ per person (~300 people). Didn't even get a travel guide. Most meals had to be covered on our own. Smd guardian"

"Eric has planned several fantastic team building trips for our company. Every detail is well thought out and there is always a “plan b” in place! Highly recommend!!"

"Our experience travelling with Guardian to Boston was exceptional. Our travel guide, Eric, was fantastic. He was well prepared, coordinated with ground transportation and hotel staff incredibly well and was flexible and spontaneous when alterations needed to be made to the itinerary. I have led groups on tours to three continents with four different travel companies, and none went smoother than our trip with Guardian. They are taking us to Hawaii in 2024, and their travel protection plan was a huge factor for our selection of them. It should be the industry standard, but none of the competing bids offered such a solid plan in the event we would need to cancel--something we never would have considered before 2020. I love that everyone I talk to in the organization is a music educator, and they get what we do. They also understand how complicated these trips can be with equipment, venues and rehearsal spaces. I have taken ensembles to China, Italy, Greece, Ireland, London and several places domestically in the US. I have worked with many solid travel companies. I am confident in Guardian for our next trip."

"Recently went on a trip with this travel company to Nashville. While many of the activities were fun with an exciting itinerary, there were problems at many if not all of the destinations and activities. Our groups were consistently behind schedule as a result of poor planning in advance from the guide. There were times when we would be sitting at a scheduled activity with an allotted hour and a half/ hour time for the activity for a majority of it as a result of an issue. While I do not know the extent of the issues at many of the places we went, it did seem like many of them were a result of the guide and tour company. Our guide Eric was at times unpleasant and rude. I do feel for the guy I could tell he was stressed and trying to make things work and the way he acted was most likely a result of that but he was overall unprofessional and just rude. He would occasionally yell at us in order to get our attention which makes sense if the venue was loud since our group was a large amount of people, but there were times when it would be unnecessary and scary. Me and other people on the trip have had negative experiences with him. Knowing one of us on the trip was a vegetarian it seemed like little thought was put into meal accomodations for them. The bus company that guardian hired also had issues as the buses were often late and the bus I was on had a variety of issues regarding sound, air conditioning, cleanliness, and more. The hotel guardian chose was not awful but the room I was in had a view directly into the indoor pool and vice versa which was strange, the curtains thankfully gave some privacy. While I did have a good time the trip was riddled with problems every stop of the way resulting in a rather unpleasant trip overall. Some of the issues were not the fault of guardian like traffic accidents and such, but poor planning resulted in many of us on the trip being stressed over constantly being behind schedule and upset as the schedule was constantly changing resulting in confusion. Easily 1 star. I would be highly cautious of booking with this company and the guide. Check every destination on your itinerary so you can be as prepared as possible since the guides and company provide little information on policies and necessary information beforehand."

"I recently went on a school trip to Nashville. Our tour guide, Eric, was completely unprepared in every activity. We waited constantly at every location because there was always a problem with planning. Our tour guide was unprofessional and rude at times. He seemed to never know why was going on. Our buses were constantly late and there was a large delay on the way down. The policy for cash back was confusing at best. Overall this was a poor experience and I would not recommend this company in any situation."