Tauck has operated its first tour departures since the outbreak of COVID-19 last spring. The company recently completed its initial “Wonderland: Yellowstone in Winter” itineraries of the new year, with additional departures of the eight-day Montana and Wyoming national parks tour scheduled for February.
The tour company says it is looking forward to restarting operations in earnest in the coming months, and according to company CEO Dan Mahar, the resumption of the Yellowstone tours follows considerable preparation. Mahar noted that Tauck has instituted comprehensive safety and health protocols across all its 2021 tours and cruises, including the mandatory use of masks, social distancing wherever possible and enhanced cleaning and disinfection procedures developed in close cooperation with its hoteliers, restauranteurs, transportation companies and other partners. In addition, and for the protection of all, Tauck is requiring each guest to complete and sign its Travel Well Pledge. This health screening form confirms that guests have tested negative for COVID-19 within five days of departure, are free of virus-related symptoms and have not been in close contact with anyone diagnosed with coronavirus.
Per feedback shared by the Tauck director guides who accompanied the first departures, the guests embraced the assurance and confidence the safety measures fostered. “Even with our robust COVID-19 precautions, our guest satisfaction scores for ‘Yellowstone in Winter’ have been consistent with our tour scores from prior years,” Jeremy Palmer, SVP for Tauck Land Journeys, said in a press statement.
Ken Burns, Private Departure Tours and a Look Ahead
“Yellowstone in Winter” is part of Tauck’s “Ken Burns American Journeys” collection and is offered in cooperation with the filmmaker Ken Burns and his longtime collaborator Dayton Duncan. Tauck’s partnership with Burns and Duncan is more than a decade old and includes more than 15 itineraries. Both have long maintained that winter is the best time to visit Yellowstone, as crowds are non-existent and the snow-white background and lack of foliage on trees and underbrush provide the best wildlife viewing of the year.
Each departure of the “Yellowstone in Winter” journey is limited to a maximum of 24 guests and spends four days inside Yellowstone National Park. The itinerary also visits Grand Teton National Park and includes an overnight at the Chico Hot Springs Resort, plus two nights at The Wort Hotel in Jackson, Wyoming. The itinerary is enhanced with insights and perspectives provided by Burns and Duncan, shared in several 10- to 15-minute filmed vignettes that guests view over the course of their travels.
Separately, the idea of traveling within a “bubble” of hand-selected friends or family is particularly appealing in the COVID era, according to Mahar. To that end, the company now offers Private Departures on more than 70 land journeys, spanning its Exotics, Europe, North America and Tauck Bridges family travel collections to groups as small as 10 guests. Noted Mahar: Tauck’s Private Departure bookings are currently 79 percent ahead of the same time a year ago.
The growth in Private Departures is one of many bright spots on the horizon for Tauck, and while Mahar declined to speculate on when Tauck would fully resume operations, he was upbeat about the future. “Well over 60 percent of our 2021 capacity is already reserved, we’re poised and ready for the upcoming year, and we continue to look ahead with great optimism as reservations are coming in for 2022 and even 2023,” he said.
Visit www.tauck.com.
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