Auschwitz and Birkenau tour - We went on a group trip as a family of four with Cyprian as our host. He was very informative and helpful. Barbara, our tour guide was a knowledge of information and delivered the tour brilliantly and with sensitivity. We would highly recommend your company to anyone that is wanting the memorial tour.

Excellent trip - Very easy to find pick up location- very central! All very organised, made the trip easy. Marcel our guide was brilliant!!

Very good tour company - We booked in the UK using the website, which I would recommend at it`s incredibly busy at Auschwitz. The cost was around £38 per person, which included return private transfer from your hotel in a nice mini-bus and a guide at both sites. The travel time is around 90 minutes and on arrival at Auschwitz the car park is extremely busy, however if you book the same tour as we did, your driver will want to exchange numbers with you to avoid him having to enter the car park when you finish at Auschwitz then travel on to Birkenau, which takes around 10 minutes. The driver will introduce you to an organiser at the entrance, who will shout out your names, as each ticket is specific to the visitor. You will then be introduced to your guide for the tour and go through airport style security and the security staff will want to see a form of identification before entry to match your ticket to, a driving license or bank card with your name on is sufficient. We took a backpack, with a thermos full of coffee and snacks, which you will need as there is little opportunity to eat and drink. We found benches outside of Auschwitz when we had finished the tour and had 10-15 minutes to eat and drink before travelling to Birkenau. Our guide was excellent and travelled to both sites with our group. Auschwitz is very somber, quiet and sad, however some of our group seemed to think it was a selfie opportunity throughout the camp. Birkenau is open to the elements and was bitterly cold during our visit. Having the right clothing is essential as much of this tour is outside and on uneven ground and involves miles of walking, we had thick snow & ice when we visited and some people had canvas shoes and no socks and really struggled to get around. This tour is very well organised and provides an experience which is both emotionally difficult but essential.

An unforgettable impression! - We traveled with a very nice driver who arrived on time. A movie was being shown in the car, so the road passed unnoticed. On the spot, we were met by a representative of the Open Krakow company, who was very friendly and helped us with all our questions. The excursion itself was very interesting. I will definitely come here more than once!

Impressive Auschwitz. - Very impressive. We had booked this from the hotel and a good guide. The tour including round trip from Krakow takes more than 7 hours. This tour makes such an impression that it is better to do Krakow on one of the first days and do fun things on the next day

Auschwitz tour - A really good guide is needed for this tour. I was lucky our guide was excellent and his family were involved with the camp during the war.

Terrible communication - The tour was great but we do not get a Ticket for the tree museen and the communication with viator and also with the local guide was terrible and in the end we have to pay for the Ticket.

Auschwitz Birkenau - The only reason I gave it a 1 was because when we booked it we was all happy to go and even got our tickets, they decided to cancel our guide - terrible service. Yes we got a refund however we took time off work, and wanting to go to this for years. I tried calling them but no answer ! Now we have to pay more money to travel back to see it !

Do not travel with these guys - DO NOT BOOK WITH THIS TOUR COMPANY!!!! The company took us out in their bus and then on arrival we were told that we were on our own as there wasn't enough tickets for my child and I to go as part of a group. So we had to find where the tour that they put us in and then worry about getting the bus back. And when we got the bus it took almost twice as long and then dumped us further out of town. We then had to pay for a taxi back. Tour was booked as I didn't want all this stress!!!!

Avoid - Please avoid Discover Cracow Tours via Viator for any trips you have planned. Save your money, experiences, and if nothing else your sanity, and go to a competent tour operator. Viator’s mission statement is: “to help you have an unforgettable experience every time you travel”. Well they did fulfil this but for absolutely all of the wrong reasons and I wish I was kidding when I said it was the worst “trip” we’ve ever had. Apologies for the long review but very helpful for people to understand the entirety of this. By way of background, my partner and I booked a tour of Auschwitz and Birkenau with a guide tour. Our picked up time was at 10am and we were told we’d get there in an hour and 30 minutes. We were messaged the night before and advised pick up time was now from our hotel at 10.30am with no explanation, but we thought “ok fine”. The day of our trip arrives, at 10.30am, no one arrives. We thought, maybe they were running late, Krakow traffic in the morning. 10.45am arrives, still no pick up. My partner messages the driver to advise we are outside the hotel and asks if everything is ok. We were advised to wait. Another 10 minutes go by, no one has turned up. A further 5 minutes later our driver calls us and tells us his boss told him the wrong hotel and he’s on his way. Ok we thought not great, but these things happen, and at 11.15, he finally shows up. We met another 6 people joining the trip, fantastic bunch who we spoke to along the way about their travels. We then stop off at a petrol/gas station for “15 minutes” for a bathroom break, and to stretch our legs around 12.30pm. Ok we were all happy to carry on but fine. Meanwhile our driver is on the phone to his boss who is consistently phone. 1pm comes and we are told we can continue. We finally get to Auschwitz at 1.20pm and are taken along a side road past both Auschwitz and Birkenau so our driver can “show us something”, a few of our group commented that the driver was “stalling us”. After this, we went back to Auschwitz to meet our drivers boss. Who proceeded to hand out tickets 4 members of our group and then told 4 members of our group (including us) that we had no tour guide as “no one was available”, even though we had paid for this and to “call Viator customer service as they’d want to hear about this”. No alternative was offered, no explanation, nor date, no refund, and we weren’t entitled to a headset. It was just a case of “here’s a guide book for your self tour”. The tickets had also been printed at 11.29am that morning so there could have also been an explanation to us prior to this. At this point the other 2 members of the group who were in decided not to proceed and wanted to return to Krakow. After deliberation with my Partner, we decided we had wasted half a day to get there, and would be as well attempting to self tour even though this is not what we had paid for. We were told to get on the bus that goes back and forth every 10 minutes to Birkenau to see that first then be back at Auschwitz for 3.15pm or else we weren’t getting in. This was at 2.30pm, this we had less than an hour to see Birkenau (unguided). This was not nearly enough time. At this point my Partner and I were furious, and it’s not a location where you want to be in a furious state of mind, but to rather learn the history and honour your respects. We were in two minds but decided to cut Birkenau short and return to see Auschwitz for the 3.15pm. We tried to see Auschwitz as best as we could and when we finished, there was no driver waiting for us. My partner got a message saying “let me know when you’re finished”, to which my partner responded to let him know where we are. Our driver responded to let us know we’d need to wait on the others finishing their guided tour at Birkenau then could return to Krakow. This would mean we’d be waiting at least 1.5 - 2 hours in the cold, in October outside Auschwitz on a bench, no offer to collect us or wait in the mini van. By that point we were at the end of our tether and paid over £100 for an Uber back to Krakow. Our uber driver had us back in Krakow via a quicker route, and we arrived in Krakow around 6.30pm (so in 1 hour). We later found out the group who had the guided tour arrived in Krakow at 8pm. This overall experience put a complete dampener on the end of our lovely trip to Poland. Our group was segregated with no explanation, others who purchased tickets later than ours were given guides when we were not…the list is endless. Viator refuse: to speak to their tour operator Discover Cracow tours, and to take any responsibility, provide a refund, or partial refund, and have decided they cannot uphold our complaint. Please save your sanity if nothing else, and avoid at all costs.