Planning your first trip to India? A guided multiday tour in India for first-timers offers the perfect blend of safety, insight, and stress-free travel. In this blog, you’ll discover why it’s the smartest way to explore one of the world’s most vibrant and complex destinations.
India is a fascinating place; many countries within a country due to its vast range of languages, food, and culture more generally. I have travelled reasonably extensively, particularly in Latin America, and for me, a middle-aged caucasian Brit, India poses more challenges getting around, even after nearly 20 years living here on and off.
I love travelling in India and exploring new places, but it’s so much more fun and easier when I do so with Krishna, my business partner. He books all the transport, does all the negotiating with the tuk tuk drivers or in the markets, and deals with the hotels etc etc. India, with its heat, crowds and pollution, can get tiring, and it’s a great relief not having this additional hassle.
For him, it’s water off a duck’s back, and I find it amusing how he’ll have an argument with a tuk tuk driver, then look at me and start smiling as if it was completely normal and as if nothing had happened! A good tour guide will be that barrier between you and the nonsense that India can throw your way.
Whether you plan to do a guided multiday tour privately or with other people, having a good guide is critical so that you can focus on enjoying what’s special about the country. This blog will give you 5 reasons why.
Key Takeaways
- First trip to India? This blog explains why a guided tour can make your journey smoother and more fun.
- With a local guide, you skip the usual travel stress and discover small, cultural details you’d otherwise miss.
- It’s the safest, easiest way to make your first India visit meaningful from day one.
Safety
India, on the whole, is very safe. I’ve always felt a lot safer walking around Mumbai (or any place that I have visited in India) at any time day or night than I have felt in my home town in the UK. Given the level of poverty in the country, that’s pretty remarkable.
You need to have your wits about you in some crowded places as petty crime can take place, but you don’t generally need to worry about going into the “wrong neighbourhood” as might be the case in other parts of the world.
However, being female makes things more complicated. Travelling without any male company can be a little tricky, and you might get unwanted hassle and attention from men. Generally, it’s nothing too harmful – such as requests for selfies (to show friends their “conquests”), but groping is something that does happen, and on rare occasions, something more serious than that.
There are men who unfortunately have the mindset that Western women are “easy”, plus being in a foreign country naturally makes you more vulnerable.
Whatever the level of your concern may be, hiring a guide for your trip will provide you with that extra security.
How a Guided Multiday Tour in India for First-Timers Helps You Avoid Scams
Having a guide will help you get a fair price for when you decide to buy items or services. In my experience, in India, the difference in price between what a local person and a foreigner pays is more extreme than in other countries, such as Thailand. It’s not helped that many shops and market stalls are small without the price displayed, and for Indians, this is not normally a problem as they are more familiar with the value of things and they certainly aren’t shy in haggling.
That’s why a guided multiday tour in India for first-timers is such a smart option — your guide can step in, translate prices, and negotiate on your behalf, helping you avoid common scams or overpaying. Even after 20 years living on and off in India, I fit into the category of a slightly awkward British person who feels a lot more comfortable when prices are on display.
I’m sure that the local market wallah (vendor) here would argue that they are being a smart businessman and if the stupid foreigner is happy to pay that inflated price, then what’s the problem? After all, the Indian government doesn’t set a good example by charging foreigners more money than locals when visiting tourist sites; at the time of writing, it costs INR 50 (US$ 0.60) for Indians and INR 1,100 (US$ 15) for foreigners to visit the Taj Mahal.
The bargaining can sometimes be fun, but after a while it can be tiring and in the tourist places it’s more relentless. The amount of money is not normally very significant, but it can certainly impact your mood and give you a distorted impression of the Indian people.
Staying safe and avoiding price-gauging and scams, as mentioned above, will certainly make your trip to India a lot less stressful. Having a guide with you will mean that you can completely drop your shoulders and not deal with any travel problems whatsoever.
No stress travel!
India is not the easiest place to travel. Despite English being one of the country’s official languages and 99.9% of signboards being in English, the level of spoken English is not that high, particularly in North India, where the Hindi language is king. So communicating (and bargaining!) with tuk tuk drivers and alike can be challenging.
Besides speaking slowly, you might have to change the way in which you speak because they can’t understand your “accent”. As a British person from middle England with no obvious regional or class dialect, I also find it amusing when Indians say that they can’t understand my accent as it’s them who obviously have one, not me!
If you have a guide, they will be there to communicate directly with the locals and will help with any language barriers on those times that you want to speak directly to them. He/she can even teach you some of the local language if you wish!
Your guide will also ensure that you don’t have to worry about getting to the train station on time (will there be traffic?) nor worry about figuring out what platform the train leaves from; this can relieve the stress for many, particularly in a country like India where your senses are being attacked in all directions.
Local knowledge and unique experiences
Visiting a place as a tourist is very different from visiting as a local or as somebody who is very familiar with an area. Finding good places to eat, visit and shop while traveling in today’s world is a lot easier given how much information there is available on the internet.
But this has its limitations. Some reviews are not always reliable, and in restaurants, it can still be difficult to know what to order, particularly when you’re not familiar with the food. While sightseeing, unless you have hired a local guide, you will miss a lot of information.
Besides filling that gap, a guide will also bring their local knowledge to find those unknown eateries where only the locals eat. They will show you those less-travelled sights.
With a guide, you will get a complete cultural immersion into a country that you’re visiting for the first time. As they are from the country, they will give you a unique perspective on the places and people whom you encounter
New Friend
Most travellers enjoy meeting new people, particularly those from different countries and backgrounds. I have thoroughly enjoyed meeting new people from this incredible country, particularly when it goes beyond just some basic interaction.
If your guide is good, they will understand that you are the customer and will make sure that your enjoyment and happiness are what is most important, but they should also have a warm personality, who you can joke and laugh with, and ultimately become friends.
Conclusion
Labour in India is much cheaper than in the Western world, so for a first timer to the country, it’s not that expensive to have somebody with you for your entire trip. A good guide will ensure that communication is clear and transparent, so that they are there when you need/want them and not there when you want some space.
However, you should make sure that your guide has had the correct training, as there are very few regulations and tour operators often do not think this is either necessary or important. Most tour operators also don’t use their own employees as tour guides, but instead use “freelance” guides, which means that there is less accountability
Assuming that you have done your due diligence on the tour operator that you go with, if you don’t want to sweat the small stuff and also want to experience the most that India has to offer, plan a guided private or small group tour, as it’s perfect for first-timers.
