Best Tour Guide in Vanuatu - In September 2024, my extended family and I (14 in total) had an amazing day touring Port Vila with our entertaining tour guide, Justin, and our driver, Charlie, from Atmosphere Tours Vanuatu. We travelled to see traditional performances by local villagers and learned a little about the island cultures and old traditional customs, then had a BBQ buffet for lunch at the beautiful Banana Bay Beach Club, swam at The Blue Lagoon Springs, and the cascade falls at Eden on the River, and visited some city landmarks and a duty free shop before being safely returned to our cruise ship on time. It was well worth the money. Justin’s knowledge of the area and his engaging and entertaining persona made for a very enjoyable day-trip. Justin showed much gratitude to our group for choosing Atmosphere Tours and he spoke fondly of his country and its people, and his employer, thanking us on behalf them. It was very refreshing to hear. When we returned to our cruise ship, he was smiling and waving until we were no longer in sight. With a clear love for his job and Vanuatu, Justin is a credit to Atmosphere Tours, and we hope to give him more business in future. Tankyu Tumas, Justin, Charlie, and Atmosphere Tours 🐗 Craig Barney Barnett - Australia

A great day out of Port Vila - highly recommended. - We're so glad that we took this trip. We had booked the 'Cultural and Snorkelling' tour, but ended up on this one. Saw a school, Cultural village show, river swim (beautiful!), had a great lunch, and then the Blue Lagoon. Justin and Charley were great guides - so knowledgeable and informative. We learnt so much about the island. It really was well worthwhile. Highly recommended.

Justin genuinely enjoys his job. - Perfect day in Port Vila for Cruise passengers. A little cultural and learning, water, Great food. Guides were wonderful

Great experience - The knowledge of the guide and the business is owned by a local family The place’s we went were lovely and as it was hot nice to have a cool refreshing swim at 3 places

Badly organised but good sights to see - The tour was very unorganised and our guide often seemed like they didn’t know where we were going, or what we were doing. I was Picked up on time, then waited 40 minutes in a car park for another bus. All the sights you see are good, but I think they tour could be run better, for example spending more than 15mins at Eden rather than 30mins at the duty free gift shop?

Bad experince with a very poor performance of tourist guide - We had Ana, the tourist guide from Atmosphere Tours, who seems to be a "substitute" for the day. She sat in the front seat of the minibus next to the driver. She talked to the front glass with an whispering voice without a loud speaker. All guests sitting at the back of bus could hardly hear what she was saying. No information on the country and/or places that we were going to visit. The first stop was to visit a primary school but she didn't know that there was no school so there is no visit on Saturday. She only learned it after being told by the school staff after arriving! We returned back to the bus and drove to BLUE LAGOON. Upon arriving, she told us to have a look of BLUE LAGOON for 15 minutes !!! We ask whether we can swim. Her replied incredibly "YES". We challenged her that 15 minutes was not enough for a swim. She then asking us back for how long do we need. Finally we agreed for one hour staying for a swim and exploring the Blue Lagoon. The above confusion was just the beginning.... she has no idea of what were places of stop for the day ! After we told her that next stop should be "Eden on the River" as per Viator's itinerary that we showed her. Her reply was that she needs to call the company to confirm the itinerary of our tour ! What a joke this is! After arriving "EDEN on the River", all guests stepped out of the bus and ANA told us we can go to swim for 15 minutes. We then asked which direction should we walk ? It seems to us that she has absolutely no idea of this place. She looked around and found one of the staff to ask and the staff pointed her to ticket selling area near the entrance. She arrived there before realized that she has to purchase entry tickets for all guest ! After more than 15 minutes confusion and finally she purchased tickets with instruction from the ticketing staff of which direction to walk. We then able to head off to the river and having a dip in one of water hole that the water was running fast with heavy turbulence. After finished the next stop Duty free shopping, the bus driver drove uphill to the nearby suburb, turning into lots of side streets trying to locate the next stop for the "KAVA experience" but FAILED to find the place. After a short conversation between Ana and the driver, the driver dove back to Duty shop and stopped next to an outdoor stalls area that is located only about 20 meters diagonally opposite the Duty Free shop that we had just visited. Ana bought every guest a "shell of KAVA" to taste in one of the stalls here ! All in all, Ana, the tourist guide is a total disaster of this tour experience. I read a lot of good review of Atmosphere Tour by former guests. Unluckily we had a bad experience on this tour. Although I hate to write a bad review but I have no choice this time since the experience of this tour was so bad.

Asking for refund. Tour had not started 1 hour and 15 minutes past the start time. My 5 year old twins were tired. We returne - Below is an email I sent to Atmosphere Tours outlining a request for refund for our excursion. Summary - we (me, my wife and 5 year old twin boys) arrived promptly at the designated time for the tour - getting up at 6 am so we were sure to be on time. However, 1 hour and 15 minutes had passed and the tour had not started. My children were tired and asked to return to the ship. Details are below, but I am asking for a refund of our $390 because we did not take the tour. My family and I have been planning a trip to Vanuatu for 2 years.  We originally booked this excursion in February 2023, but our ship was diverted from Port Vila due to cyclones.  We were looking forward to the excursion! Per the email below, your instructions specifically state that me, my wife and 2 5 year old children should arrive 45 minutes after the ship berths.   The ship was scheduled to berth at 7:00 am, so I paid an extra fee with our ship to get someone to escort us off the ship early so we would be on time.  I got my children out of bed at 6:15 am to get on the first tender and arrive at the Port Vila wharf by 7:45 am.   Once we arrived at the wharf, we were instructed to wait inside the wharf near some shipping containers.  Other tour operators had representatives in the area, but since no one from Atmosphere Tours had arrived by 8:06 am, I called to confirm we were waiting in the correct location.  I was told someone was at the gate and would come to get us. At 8:23, no one had yet arrived from Atmosphere Tours, so I called again and was again told to wait.  At about 8:35 Jerome (sp?) arrived with two others.  We were told to follow Jerome to a van.  We followed Jerome to a him to van marked Atmosphere Tours, but were instructed to wait outside the van.  Other passengers were loaded in the van while my family was instructed to wait outside the van. At about 8:45 am,  the van was full with other passengers.  Jerome's colleague told us to go back to the shipping containers, where we originally had waited, and William would then pick us up.  Then, Jerome and his colleague had a discussion and instructed us to pack into the van for a short drive to meet William.   The van did not have enough seat belts for me and my family, but we piled in around 8:55 am.  It had been an 1 hour and 10 minutes since we arrived at the wharf when we started driving.   We finally met up with William at 9:00 am, but he had other passengers in his car.   Jerome, seemed confused and called the home office.  My children were tired and asking to go back to the ship. My wife was not confident in the tour as things had been so disorganized up to that point.  Our new driver, William, told us the wharf does not open for the private tour groups until 9 am so he did not understand why we had been instructed to be at the wharf so early.   At 9:02 am 1 hour and 17 minutes after our tour was to have started, I called Atmosphere Tours and talked with Annie Boe.  Annie had sent me the original email instructing us to arrive at 7:45 am.  I told her since so much time had passed since the tour was supposed to start, my children were tired and wanted to go back to the ship.  I asked that a refund be sent for the tour.  She said she would talk with the "Director", George, and call me back. I called Annie at 9:19 am and again at 9:36 am.  Annie told me to write the email and provided me with the Director, George's, phone number. Our driver, George, took us back to the wharf.  I have William $50 cash for his time taking us back to the wharf. I tried calling Director George at the number Annie provided me: +67751520.  However, the number is disconnected.  I tried calling Annie (+67827870) again to reconfirm George's number, but that number now goes directly to voicemail. We are very disappointed that the experience was not as we expected and appreciate your efforts on our behalf.  As instructed by Annie, I am formally requesting a full refund of the $390 for your we did not take.  I paid our driver, William, $50 cash for taking us back to the wharf. Thank you, Richard 

Not what expected - First thing we waited around the docks for approx 45 minutes for the tour group that was very unorganized. Once the tour started our day our tour guide was very knowledgeable and entertaining, however the whole day things kept shifting around due to high amount if tourist or not going to Eden river due to rain the night before. The meal that was served was just average at best. Over-all I didn't find the tour worth the price point.

Huge disappointment, I wouldn’t bother. - Huge disappointment I will start by saying our tour guide Charlie was amazing. We booked this mainly for the waterfalls and Eden tour, which never happened. We found out as we drove past the stops. We never got to meet the kids. We paid a lot of money to spend 45minutes at the lagoon and a very very below average lunch. The cultural show was great, the locals are awesome people. Wouldn’t recommend, they seriously need to up their game as other tours we went on for the same price were exceptional.

Awful experience & even worst customer service - DO NOT BOOK THIS TOUR. The whole thing is a scam, my driver was conducting private tours throughout the day of my tour, he only works for this company on the side. This meant i was left alone for over two and a half hours at lunch so he could drive back into town and conduct his own tours. I was only allowed 20 minutes at Eden on the River because we had to go and pick up his private guests, despite my protest that this was not long enough. I then spent my last hour driving round to different locations picking up and dropping off all of his other guests. Tried to complain online but got nothing from the company as they said i still fulfilled all the activities. Only book this if you want to feel like an unpaid taxi driver for the day. Shocking experience.