We discovered a couple of threads on Reddit where tourist guides have been sharing the funniest, strangest, and most infuriating things they've seen their groups do and say. From baffling questions to outright reckless behavior, these stories show that leading people through new places isn't just about showing them the sights, it's also about managing chaos, keeping everyone safe, and sometimes just trying not to lose your marbles.
#1
I worked at a living history farm museum. I had a kid that was climbing on stuff the whole tour in the farm house and trying to get behind the Smith in the blacksmith shop during a demo.
After the tour when people are allowed to roam the grounds, I hear his mom screaming and look over to the barn and this kid has climbed the fence into the field with our long horn oxen and is trying to poke them with a stick. I walk over and calmly told him to get out of the field before our lazy oxen decide they've had enough, but this jack off decides to look me in the eye and smack Ted on the a*s with the stick like it's a riding crop. Ted, bless him, just kinda jumps a little and whips his head around with a WTF dude look on his face. But seeing as he's a long horn, he just wipes this kid out with one of his horns when he turned his head. Kid goes flying into the dirt and is having a melt down. Mom is freaking out. I'm like dude, get the hell out of the pen before Ted actually gets mad.
So this kid is crying and trying to climb the fence out of the field and Bill, who has been watching this whole thing waits until the kid is almost over the fence and walks up to him and nudges him in the a*s with his nose and pushes him off the top of the fence. It was everything I could do to keep from laughing.
Kid was fine, Ted was fine, but the kid and his mom were promptly kicked out of the museum. Their dad and little sister were allowed to stay because she was well behaved and was just enjoying petting the goats at the petting zoo. So since the kid had to leave but his sister didn't there was a temper tantrum in the parking lot that could be heard all the way to the other side of the farm. But the oxen got some extra grain that night, so I guess they won in the end.
Image credits: PtolemyShadow
#2
My uncle was a tour guide in Iceland, some time ago. He once guided a group of Americans around the country and stopped at a glacier in the middle of nowhere. He explained to the group that this glacier had been here for thousands of years and that it doesn't melt. The group then went back to the bus to carry on, but my uncle notices that a woman was carrying a big piece of the glacier towards the bus, so he stops her and says:
"I'm sorry, you can't bring that onto the bus, it will melt." The woman quickly responded:
"But you said it doesn't melt." My uncle stood there for a while, dumbfounded by the amount of stupidity that was in that answer, before finally saying:
"Okay, but you'll have to put it in your backpack and keep it in there for the whole journey." The woman readily agreed and started to empty her backpack to make space for the big block of ice.
Needless to say this didn't end well for the woman, as the ice obviously melted in her bag.
Image credits: sindrimars
#3
Couple of guys I used to play cricket with went on a school trip to Auschwitz and decided to steal a small pair of glasses and some buttons they found half buried in the ground.
They were detained by Polish police while they were leaving the site.
Hard to know what goes through people’s heads sometimes.
Image credits: manbearnoodle
#4
My cousin is a tourist guide and biologist, most of his tours are in Africa. He instructed his group of 20-25 people including kids not to wear any type of earrings or collars especially shiny stuff since they were about to go into a thick forest to try to see a bunch of animals. This is very important because 20-25 make a lot of noise which makes wild animals run away or hide, it's even worse if they're wearing shiny stuff they can spot from far away. Ok so this woman complains, decides to wear shiny earrings anyway, cousin tells her to get rid of them or she ain't coming with the group so she obeys but puts them on a bit later.
Some species of monkeys in that area LOVE shiny stuff. They ripped the earrings from her ears.
Image credits: shave_your_teeth_pls
#5
I was a whitewater rafting guide and we had a trip of about 5 boats. One of the clients only brought nice high heel type shoes (not very high but those type of lady nice shoes, not sure what to call them). We require shoes on the trip so thats what she wore. About an hour into the trip it was like 100 degrees so the guests start a water fight with their paddles and all of a sudden I hear this lady screaming "Stop it! Stop it! Stop it! I didn't come here to get wet!!". On a whitewater rafting trip....
Another guide later told me a little girl in his boat said, "that's my mom, she is always like this".
Image credits: Qweniden
#6
On an open topped tour bus in London - woman tries to dangle her toddler over the railing, then starts saying she's going to complain to my manager when I told her to stop. Caught her doing it again and company policy said that anyone endangering their kids like that was to be removed from the tour, so the driver had to come up and march her off. She still insisted she did nothing wrong. Like, she literally had the kid's feet on the side rail of the (moving) bus and was just holding him loosely round the waist. One low hanging tree branch, of which there were many on the route, and that kid was gone.
Image credits: QuokkaMocha
#7
I wasn't the tour guide but I was on a tour of Namibia and had a Zimbabwean guide who was telling us his craziest stories. He had a couple that was married who were on their honeymoon who were on one of his trips. One night, everyone is sitting around the fire and chatting (just as we were) and this couple gets up to go to the bathroom. This is a campsite so they walk off into the darkness towards the toilets. A few minutes later the guy runs back alone, crying and panicking. Everyone asks him what happened. "I think my wife was k**led by a lion."
Gasp, shock. Everyone is freaked out, asking him what happened, and as he's trying to explain, the now-irate wife walks up to the campsite and starts yelling. So what had happened? Well, they'd walked off, and at some point near the toilets, they both heard a kind of snuffling noise in the underbrush, clearly an animal rooting around. The husband completely freaks out, pushes his wife towards the noise and *down to the ground*, screams, and runs away. Spoiler alert, it was not a lion and the wife was not pleased at the attempts at being sacrificed. The guide told us that they didn't speak the entire rest of the trip and they he believes they got divorced. Hilarious.
TL;DR; don't shove your wife into the ground if you think there is a hungry lion in the underbrush just to save yourself.
#8
Former whitewater rafting guide. There's a calmer section of the river people can, if they choose to, hop out and swim through. They are wearing life jackets so you can just float through it.
This woman decides she wants to try it and hops out. After she pops up she slowly tilts forward until just the back of her jacket is out of the water and she's completely still. After 5 or so seconds of this I start to realize this might not be intentional and paddle over and physically pick her head up above the water followed by her gasping for air. I haul her in the boat and ask what happened.
She said she didn't know what to do as she'd "never been submerged in water before". 1) why are you on a whitewater rafting trip? 2) why didn't your strategy involve moving your body?
Image credits: b771
#9
I was working on a tourist island in Australia when this man pulled out almost all the back feathers of a peacock because he wanted to keep one. He sneaked up behind it, and grabbed a huge handful and yanked them all out. He was immediately escorted off the island. The peacock had a huge bare patch and most of its beautiful feathers were gone :(.
Image credits: mugsandcoveve
#10
Saw a kid knock over a set of replica civil war rifles that were on display, and then his mom got mad at the tour guide for yelling at him. The kid and his mom were kicked off the civil war tour.
Image credits: yeerk_slayer
#11
Not a tour guide per se (Park Interpreter), but once had a lady with a thick New York accent try and pet a black bear.
Image credits: rangerspruce
#12
When I was in Paris I witnessed two older American women aggressively trying to force a store clerk to accept US dollar bills. She was like, "Just go to the kiosk down the street, they will change these bills for you and I'll be happy to sell you what you want." They were like, "This is GOOD AMERICAN MONEY."
Image credits: anon
#13
Not a tour guide, but a park ranger in Banff told me a story about a couple of European tourists who asked him where they could see some bears. The ranger mentions a few spots where bears are known to be and cautions them to be careful. The next year he saw the same couple and they thanked him and showed him some pictures they had taken. In one of them there was a picture of the wife holding a black bear cub and smiling. The ranger kinda lost it on them.
Image credits: dano_bannano
#14
Was at a reptile show and they let out some mini crocodile iguana type thing. I think it was called a dragon something? Anyway some kid decides to take his shoe off and wiggle his toes through the small rope gate we were against. Presenter says “watch your kid, these will bite”. Kid removes his foot and immediately puts it back in when presented turns around, wiggles his toes again, and this dragon thing *surges* forward and clamps down. Kid starts screaming, presenter just looks on like “well I told you so” and removes it. Kid stops screaming, no-one says anything, and presenter moves on.
That’s what you get for ignoring instructions, and also for not parenting properly.
**EDIT: okay guys I really doubt it was a Komodo dragon since the presenter really wasn’t worried about it, please stop commenting saying the kid is dead or something. As others have pointed out it was probably a monitor, a Chinese water dragon, or a bearded dragon. It was big enough so a monitor sounds correct. I don’t need anyone else commenting about whether it was a Komodo dragon and whether the kid got help or not. His sock almost came off and he got a fright, that’s all, kid was fine**.
Image credits: Blue_Seas
#15
Guy peed on the side of an Omaha Beach bunker. Not out of spite or something, he just didn't want to walk back to the portapotty, started peeing on a piece of history. Obviously not the worst thing that'll be in this thread, but certainly made the rest of our group turn to him and ask what in the absolute f**k he was doing.
Image credits: anon
#16
Not me, my best friend's tour guide on an island off the Australian coast- he saw one of the tour ignore the huge signs warning people not to go to the edge of the water.
Predictably the tourist gets hit by a huge wave, swept out to sea.
I know it was the worst thing the tour guide ever saw because he and my best friend both went into the sea to rescue the tourist.
And they both died.
Funniest guy I ever met. Miss him most days.
The tourist who caused it all? Predictably he survived. Pretty sure he doesn't feel too good about the whole thing.
Image credits: ScreamingPict
#17
I had a guest, snorkeling try and grab the tail of a barracuda as he swam up behind it. Luckily I was able to hit the guest with a dive fin from the boat to stop him before he got ahold. If he had grabbed on, I’m sure he would have been ripped to pieces by that fish.
Image credits: fkirwan82
#18
I work at the National Cathedral, and a tourist took a small votive candle, and lit their friend's hat on fire. It didn't spread or set off any alarms, but it got through most of his hat and almost caught his hair on fire. He was also really overreacting, and he threw his burned hat *into the organ.* The Cathedral suffered from earthquake damage in 2011, and we borrowed one of their ladders to get it down.
Image credits: not_hacking12
#19
Was on a tour at Dachau Concentration Camp and I needed a moment to myself so I took a quiet walk through the unmarked graves (they’ve made a walking path with trees and flowers). As I’m starting to get myself under control I turn a corner on the path and stumble across two a**hats taking a piss - apparently they thought it was a great place instead of waiting until we got back to the main building.
#20
I did tours in the Canadian north as a pilot. Usually it's a C206-C207 but if you only have 2 customers I'd take the C172 (Cessna)
I took a couple on a 45min sight seeing aerial tour to end up at the next reservation to go on a 3hour walking tour
Something about them seemed a little off but I just chalked it up to nervous flyers
We landed in rather gusty conditions that kept trying to push us off the runway so I'm already annoyed
I let them exit out the passenger door and then go to retrieve their bags
I open the small cubby door at the rear to retrieve their backpacks. As I lift the first backpack the tail of the aircraft slams violently into the dirt. Not knowing what the hell happened I look up over the tail to see the woman I just flew here sitting on the tail of my air craft
Apparently she thought she could get a nice selfie sitting on the tail of my airplane
I proceeded to call her every name in the book and threw their stuff off to the side
Thankfully the tail wasn't visibly damaged but I had to fly it back wondering if I was correct
It held
F*****g tourists.
#21
I used to do vineyard and garden tours for a pretty well known winery. I had a lady ask to see any merlot vines we had so I walked her over and she proceeded to dump ash all over them and yell "We love you Nana! Rest in peace!" Needless to say you are not allowed to dump human remains on food goods.
Image credits: Cheese_and_krakens
#22
I’m a bush pilot in Alaska and occasionally do glacier air tours of my boss asks (I’m not a fan of doing tours)
One day I’m doing a glacier tour and had probably 7 people onboard and the dude sitting next to just looks at me and says “I’m de captain now” and yanks the plane 30 degrees to the right and then lets go and laughs saying he was just kidding.
There was yelling to follow via my mouth.
Image credits: OngoGablogian5
#23
Tour guide/boat captain in the Caribbean.
We had about 40/50 people on the boat, got off. We would normally go feed swimming pigs which someone would get nipped from them from doing stupid s**t but nothing too serious. Well the next stop after that was another island where we would hand feed turtle, sharks, and stingrays. So we would tell the people to hold it with the the palm open and food in the middle for the stingrays and they would come over the top and take it out. The turtles and the sharks put it in the water holding it in the tips and when they are coming for it let go. Well of course, this dingus decided he would be tough and feed this baby shark, no longer than your forearm without letting go. Shark proceeds to bite his fingers, he screams and jumps up out of the water and flicks it off of his hand, pulling one of his finger nails off in the process.
So that's one I always remember.
Image credits: SketchyMedicalAdvice
#24
Not a tour guide, but I was on a tour of the Everglades and our group (including guide) witnessed a French woman sit on a 16-foot alligator thinking it was a statue. Thank god nothing happened to her but everyone realized she was doing it as it’s head started moving and it was absolute chaos. The tour guide ended up kicking them off the tour for not staying on the path.
Image credits: lcat729
#25
When I was in Yellowstone National Park, a tourist (or touron def:a mix between a tourist and a moron) was trying to take a picture with some buffalo. He had his child, probably three years old with him, and he was walking towards the buffalo. His wife was holding the camera, ready to take the picture. I knew that he was trying to put his kid onto the buffalo or pose with it or something else immensely idiotic. Fortunately, a park ranger stopped him before anything serious happened. Apparently this is fairly common in Yellowstone and most people are maimed or k**led.
Wild animals are wild, stay away.
Image credits: IamDekDomino
#26
I watched a man run up the side of the platform the Winged Victory statue is on in the Louvre and throw his arm around it for a photo. Security got him down pretty quickly, I'm shocked he actually made it up there.
Image credits: littlemissemperor
#27
We're pretty good at stopping tourist from doing too much damage. After being in the industry for a while you get a spidey sense for when people are going to do dumb things and can often steer them away from doing anything too bad. That being said, here's one of my favourite stories to tell.
I was 7 months pregnant and it was the week before I went on maternity leave. I was driving out to one of our sites and to get there I had to drive (on the road of course) through our penguin colony. This particular species of penguin burrows underground and stays hidden in their burrow during the day, and comes out at night when birds of prey and other potential predators have gone to sleep. As I'm driving out to the site I realise the parking lot up ahead is full and people have started parking up and down the road. And that's when I see a giant SUV pull off the road, drive between the bollards and into the penguin colony. I pull over as what seems like 20 non-English speaking tourists start to pile out of the vehicle and take selfies with the ocean backdrop. Staying as calm as possible and using sign language I point out the no entry signs of the bollards they drove past, the burrows they have just collapsed, inform them they may have killed penguins, and to get their f*****g vehicle out of the f*****g colony.
Once I got them out of there I started digging out the collapsed burrows to check for penguins. The first four were luckily empty but the last one had a breeding pair. I get the girl out, check her over for injuries, and having no where else to put her I follow protocol and tuck her under my left arm against my side. I get the boy out and put him in the same position on the right side and start to check him over. Remember how I said I was pregnant? Well normally, you hold a penguin down low almost on your hip, but because of my round tummy I was holding him more at the bottom of my ribcage. So when I turned my head to start my health check, the b*****d reached up and grabbed my top lip with his beak and ripped straight through the middle.
It was about this time that the tourists walking along the road realised this ranger was holding onto two penguins. I had five or six tourists sprint through the colony towards me and start snapping pictures. While at the same time potentially collapsing more burrows. If any internet sleuths stumble across a picture of a heavily pregnant, pissed off looking ranger, holding two penguins with blood pouring down her face let me know. I've been waiting for that picture to show up for 3 years and haven't found it yet.
Happy ending, I chased away the photographers, popped the two uninjured penguins in a nearby unoccupied burrow, and radioed for back up to help with the parking situation. My lip healed without a scar, and both penguins left the following morning for a well deserved day in the ocean.
TL;DR Signage is there for a reason. Rules are there for a reason. If you don't know what the reason is, doesn't mean you should break the rules.
EDITS:
Real TL;DR Tourists drove over penguin burrows. No penguins were harmed in the making of this story. Just.
Glad people seem to appreciate the work we do with these super cute (vicious, and smelly) animals. They're worth every ounce of blood, sweat and tears!
#28
I work in a castle with some incredible old and delicate books and furniture. This b***h of a tourist let her bratty kids run everywhere and grab/pull at everything. I had to get a child out from under one of the beds and she just didn’t give a s**t.
Image credits: IceyLemonadeLover
#29
Used to be a tourguide at a primate sanctuary with a strict 'no touching policy'. At the end of the tour there's a suspension bridge, tourists go first, guide goes last as per the rules. I always warn the tourists that the other side is the territory of a Hanuman langur and he doesn't f**k around, keep your distance etc. He doesn't attack people out of nowhere, but he likes showing his teeth and screaming, which scares tourists.
Anyway, one tour I get to the other side of the bridge, and a tourist got bitten. He says a monkey just bit him out of nowhere. Asked the other tourists, no he tried to f*****g pet the Hanuman. D*****s got what he deserved.
#30
I was on a tour at Pompeii and the tour guide nearly had an aneurysm when some American parents let their children start picking rocks out of one of the historic houses. He was Italian and was screaming “these houses survived a volcano blast but they are going to be done in by your children while you do nothing!!” The parents were still did nothing and the children were climbing and destroying things the entire tour.
#31
I work at a brewery tap room and take people on brewery tours. During fermentation CO2 is produced and excess comes out through a run off pipe and into a water bucket. One of the attendees (who was being a pain and trying to be funny but nobody was laughing) asked me what the pipe was for, so I gladly explained. He then asked what would happen if he breathed it in... in disbelief of his stupidity I told him he would pass out/damage his brain, he then proceeded to grab the pipe and take a breath. He was then ejected and barred. Some people are just beyond belief.
Image credits: tedandrassy
#32
Not a tour guide but i was on a tour around Auschwitz once where two youngish (18-20 year old) Italians were taking selfies.
A second thing that happened on that tour that wasn't particularly bad but was humbling was that there was an older English lady, who used a portable mobility scooter when the walking was too much, complained that some of the buildings didn't have access for it. The tour guide pointed out that that was because people who couldn't get up steps would have been gassed on arrival.
#33
I'm not a tour guide, but I once seen an American tourist sit down on a 15th century armchair at the Palace of Versailles in Paris. I was around 8 years old at the time but I still knew it was wrong! The tour guide freaked out when she saw her.
#34
Saw a kid chip off a piece of an expensive sculpture, he was playing within the restricted area and his parents didn't bother.
Image credits: kaarlsson
#35
I used to work at a heritage site. It was an old military installation with a lot of remaining original structures (bunk beds, cafeteria equipment, computers etc.).
Everyday it was a constant effort to remind people (read: kids) NOT to jump on the beds, not to slam doors open, not to punch every button like it owes them money.
The absolute worst was a group of kids on a school trip. Within the first ten minutes we're walking through the tech portion of the exhibit, where we had a wall lined with Burroughs large systems machines (B5000's), all behind this little fence about waist-high. I turn to demonstrate some of the pieces, and when I look back at the group one of them had jumped over the barrier, opened one of the units and started pulling out handfuls of digital tape from the reels inside.
I just about jumped on the kid when their teacher did just that. She jumped the barrier, smacked the kids hands and took him outside. I immediately ended the tour and had them all refunded, as I couldn't imagine what else could happen.
Image credits: anon
#36
I used to give walking tours of Old Vegas back in the day. During one ill-fated March afternoon I had a group consisting of a Mother and Son, a British Couple, a pair from Indiana, and a middle aged man from China. Long story short, the Chinese man dropped his trousers and took a s**t right on the sidewalk infront of the Golden Nugget without saying a word and carrying on as if nothing had happened.
Image credits: anon
#37
When I visited Auschwitz there were people taking selfies in front of the wall of death, where people were e**cuted.
#38
Technically not a tourist guide but I was doing a tour of our production facility to some people from head office. As we got to one of the pallet out-feeds, I mentioned the light curtain which was a safety feature that stopped the conveyors once the light was broken, and so for some d**n reason one of the ladies decides to stick her hand through the light to test it, stopping the production line and also risking her safety by doing it in the first place.
I asked her not to do that again and went about resetting the machine to start up again. No more than 3 seconds after doing so she stuck her hand through the curtain again stopping everything. She looked at me with the most stupid expression on her face as I basically said "what the f**k". To this day I don't know why she did it or what her deal was.
#39
I used to give tours at my university. There was a group of middle schoolers I was giving a tour to (to show them why they should want to go college...yatta yatta).
There was this one kid who kept trying to sneak away and was whistling at just about every girl who walked by. Weird. Okay, whatever, he thinks he's a big shot.
Then a very attractive girl comes jogging by us, and he tried to GRAB HER and starts AIR H*****G while he watches her run away from us. I was mortified.
I ended the tour. I was done with him. The teachers didn't even care, that was probably the worst part.
#40
Oh cool something I can respond to.
I was at some resort location in Mexico I was invited to. A kind of tourist activity island and I was invired the day of. I didn't really want to to be there and everything was a million times out of my price zone.
The one thing I was interested in, a 20ft cliff jump attraction I was in line for was surrounded by coati. Which are Mexican raccoons. They kinda act like monkeys and walk on two legs and reach around with their arms, I guess to make humans give then food.
Anyways a young girl was tracking one and pushing up all across the line when she got to a spot where the rope met the ledge, gave it food and was immediately bitten on the hand. My brother tied his shirt around her wrist(she was bleeding bad) and walked her to the bottom where they had a safety officer waiting.
They had many signs saying not to feed animals and even a life guard told her to stop. Some people just do not listen.
#41
Not a tour guide but was on a tour in South Africa last year and a girl yells to stop the bus and proceeds to step out of the middle door to go take pictures of a pair of wild Ostriches and a chick. Tour guide screams for her to get the hell back on the bus because apparently they will rip you to shreds with their razor sharp claws, especially a mother protecting her chick. I would have preferred nature take its course.
We will never tour with other Americans again, while obviously this is a generalization, too many treat the rest of the world like a theme park or zoo. While we were at a wine tasting half the group proceeded to make click sounds as the local staff served us (for those who don’t know there are consonantal chicks in the Xhosa language). Several people also berated the tour guide because he used the world colored and blacks but he put them in their places immediately as the bus driver was colored and other staff were black and jumped in to say that’s exactly what they called themselves and to stop projecting American identity politics onto their country. There were a ton of other similar stories such as a someone from our group telling another tour guide and tour group to speak English (it was a separate Dutch group), but it was frankly just embarrassing.
#42
During my summers in college, I worked as a raft guide on a whitewater river in the southeast. It wasn’t a difficult job; the two biggest things we were responsible for were running our trips in a timely manner and ensuring that the guests in our boat had a fun and SAFE trip down the river.
The safety part is important, because people visiting the river frequently forget that it is a natural wilderness feature and carries all of the associated dangers. We frequently received questions about whether the rafts were on tracks, whether I actually had to do anything in the back, and (my personal favorite) whether the river went in a circle and we would end up back where we started. This last question was particularly funny because we TOOK A BUS from the rafting outpost to the put-in of the river — why bother if we were going in a circle?!
One summer afternoon, I had a boat with three groups of two people; one of those groups was a mother and son. The mother seemed nice, if timid, as did the son. However, as I was going through the routine of explaining the safety concerns and paddle commands, it started to dawn on me that he was not very bright. There was nothing wrong with him — he was just dumb as s**t.
Once we were on the river, he almost immediately developed a habit of checking the depth of the water with his paddle. He would incessantly plunge the blade into the water without care nor concern for his surroundings and circumstances. The water on this river is pristine. Almost crystal clear. The riverbed is visible almost constantly, and still, this young man felt the need to verify the veracity of his own eyeballs by shoving his paddle into the river like some sort of deranged perpetual motion machine.
Of course, I warned him against his actions. At first, my concerns were that his depth-checking interferes with his ability to follow my commands and paddle. Eventually, however, my pleading grew more desperate as it dawned on me that this child paid no deference to my authority. He answered only to chaos.
It finally came to a head when, in a portion of the river that was extremely shallow (probably no more than a foot deep), he plunged his paddle into the riverbed with a force that shook the surrounding countryside. Like Excalibur, the paddle wedged itself among the rocks, perfectly erect. The boy, with a staid iron grip that could only be wielded by someone incredibly dense, kept his hand on the paddle as the rushing water carried us away from its new location. In one swift motion, he was wrenched from the raft and landed in a foot of water. He wore a face of bewildered idiocy.
It was quite satisfying to keep his paddle in the back with me for the remainder of the trip after I returned him safely to the raft. All he could do was stare wistfully at the riverbed, his p*o brain longing to verify its depth.
#43
Was on a tour of a small cave system somewhere in west Texas. It was really beautiful and right after the guide told us how long it took for all the stalagmites and stalactites to form she turned around to move on and some guy leans way over and snaps off a small one and shoved it in his pocket!!! I was so surprised I just stared at him and he smiled and winked at me like we had really gotten away with something and I was a co-conspirator or something.
Image credits: Sonsea2
#44
Not a tour guide but went on a bicycle tour in Indonesia with my partner and in discussion with our guide he said that people go on the tour without being able to ride a bike. On a bike tour. Apparently the 3 hour tour took nearly 5 hours.
#45
Not a tour guide, but my family and I took a tour in Dominica that took us through a cavern. The highlight of that tour was to show us a beautiful waterfall that has sunlight peeking through. The tour guide told us a million times before going into the cavern and when we were inside to stay on the edge and NOT try to go too close to the middle because people have been sucked under and died there.
Some idiot ignored him regardless in hopes to take a selfie there and couldn’t get out, so the tour guide in frustration had to risk his own life to save that moron. I hope that jerk tipped him extra at the end for saving his life.
#46
Not a tour guide but I was recently on a tour of Dachau concentration camp and this family in our group (two girls in their twenties and their parents) started taking selfies in front of the crematorium ovens. It was literally the most emotional part of the tour. The guide was reading witness accounts. And we look up to these two girls having an Instagram photo shoot with an oven in the background. When our tour guide told them they were being inappropriate and tried to make them delete the pictures, their mom got in his face and started telling him that he had no right to make them delete the photos.
#47
White water rafting guide in Alaska. We stopped for lunch on a gravel bar. Getting back in the boats a guest took one step into the boat and then a second step right out the other side and into roaring rapids. She didn’t fall, she just calmly walked right over the edge. She ended up pinned under a partially submerged tree 300 yards downstream. Took 5 guides to rescue her. I leant her an expensive jacket from my dry bag after fishing her out. She stole the jacket.
#48
I worked at a not so little Australian zoo. Anytime a bus full of Chinese pulled up we would subtly have more keepers around the kangaroo petting area because they would repeatedly try and pull joeys out of pouches. So lucky our Roos were lazy, over fed bastards.
#49
Was on a tour in New Orleans. Guy gets drunk and basically makes a fool of himself and slaps his partner. Everyone else on the tour is like ‘whoa not cool, take a hike’. Gf leaves with him. Next morning we’re all on the bus waiting to roll out to the next destination and we’re not moving. 30 minutes later we’re all getting pissed off, then the couple get on the bus looking sheepish.
By the next stop we learn, the drunk guy ran a bath at the hotel, passed out and it flooded the bathroom, and four floors below into the hotel lobby. The hotel wouldn’t let them leave without paying thousands of dollars.
Karma for him.
#50
I was a curator of a castle in the UK. The keep was mainly a ruin but still stood 4 storeys high and was on the edge of a cliff. The amount of chinese tourists that used to climb up the crumbling stonework right tothe too just to have their picture taken was unbelievable! It was a 300ft drop onto solid stone.
We also surprisingly had a lot of Americans try and prise bits of the stonework off to take home as a souvenir. It got so bad that when we did repair and restoration work to the stone we kept all the extra chippings in a big bin near the gate with a sign on it saying if you want a bit of castle please take some of this and not hack it off the buildings.
#51
I was on a tour of the Vatican and one person seriously kept asking when we get to meet the pope.
#52
Friend of mine does tours of whiskey museums in Dublin. Someone took a s**t in one of the exhibition rooms.
Image credits: Eoinoconn
#53
Technically not a tour guide but saw a kid throw a whole bag of chips in a dolphin pool, like almost a full bag. You weren't actually supposed to have food in the dolphin show but this m**********r brought a bag of chips nonetheless.
They had to stop the whole dolphin show after he did that and I can't remember but I think him and his parents got kicked out afterwards.
Edit: I don't endorse dolphins being captive or anything, this is just my experience. Please take your animal rights comments somewhere else. Simply answering a question.
#54
I’m a boat tour guide in a famous tourist city and most of my horror stories involve Chinese tourists! I once had a very old Chinese lady on my boat, she was baiting the ducks and geese towards here with bread and as soon as this poor duck got close enough she snatched it out of the water like nothing I’ve ever seen! She then opened her purse and tried to start stuffing this duck into it! I start yelling at her trying to get her to stop - as I do the younger males in her your group started shouting at me for shouting at this v old lady! In the end she released it but not without the duck losing half its feathers!
#55
I was a tour guide at a historic village museum (similar to Colonial Williamsburg). The worst thing was the blatant sexual harassment by some older male visitors towards our female guides (some who obviously look under 16) who wear the old fashioned dresses. You'd be surprised how many men on group tours openly ask our staff members to show them what's under their dress, talk about how it used to be acceptable to marry girls under 16 and how they wish it was still acceptable, or make pretty gross sexual remarks about our staff members in front of the group and I. When you would call them out on their behavior as being inappropriate they would act like you were wrong for getting offended by it and that we should accept it since we were demonstrating life in the 18th century. I heard and saw some pretty bad stuff which would make both the other guests and staff uncomfortable.
It also wasn't uncommon for people to sneak away from the tour group to go into restricted areas in an attempt to hunt the ghosts which are supposedly on the property. Theres a reason those places are out of bounds, there can be irreplaceable artifacts we don't want accidentally damaged, tools, or the area hasn't been cleared by the fire marshal to allow guest access. Small things have been broken by people doing this. People love to get confrontational about being told they can't go into restricted areas or touch the artifacts despite all the signs hung up.
#56
Not a tour guide but -
I spent about 6 months living in Melbourne and at the end of the pier at St Kilda beach there’s a small colony of penguins that go out to fish during the day and come back once it’s dusk. The penguins are a HUGE tourist attraction and always draw a large crowd, there’s signs everywhere saying to stick to the walkways and NOT use any flash when taking photos. So anyway I’m down there watching the penguins come in one night and this South American lass starts taking picture after picture with her flash on on her little compact camera, there’s about 5 or 6 volunteers that stay where the colony is to stop people using flash and going off the walkways etc and when they see this woman they go over and tell her to stop, she then begins to run away from them still taking photos and firing her flash off in random directions, then comes back round the bottom boardwalk and tries to flash as many penguins as she can shouting she should be allowed to do whatever she wants because there’s no signs (?) must’ve been blind.
TLDR idiot tourist blinds penguins with camera flash.
#57
Not a tour guide but I was on a tour of Auschwitz a few months ago. As you can imagine it's a very solemn place. Because it's the final resting place of so many people, they ask visitors to stay respectful throughout the whole place - no selfies, no joking, no phones, no talking above a whisper, even no talking at all in some areas. Because of this the whole place has has a very somber feel, almost like a funeral.
A group from another European country that was going round at the same time of us didn't follow these rules. They were shouting to each other while walking around the concentration camp, talking on their phones, one guy through his gum on the floor, talking loudly even inside one of the still standing gas chambers (where ask you to be the most respectful), taking photos of each other posing outside the gas chamber, barbed wire fences and other macabre backdrops. When a tour guide would ask them to stop, they would for a time and then resume.
It was an infuriating experience. Our tour guide said that unfortunately it happens all the time and groups from that country specifically are the worst offenders. She'd personally had to stop a picnic on a grassy patch outside of the gas chamber.
#58
I was on a tour with my family in Cambodia and we visited Angkor Wat. Now as everyone knows, Angkor Wat is teeming with tourists day and night. There was a long line to climb the Bakan (basically the topmost tower, wherein the steps are very steep). It was a hot day and when it was almost our turn, a middle-aged man took two steps, fell backward and started having a seizure.
People came to his help immediately. However, one man who was also crowding around him did nothing but pull out his cellphone and start recording. Thankfully, everyone noticed and started yelling at the guy to put that s**t away. He acted like the victim though and he said he was "just trying to help".
What a t**t.
EDIT: People are saying the guy was probably filming it to show paramedics but a) the victim's family was there and if anyone had the right to collect evidence, it's them and b) recording dude was grinning widely until he was called out so I seriously doubt he had good intentions despite his claims.
#59
Tour guide at my university.
I led a tour with a very overbearing father and his quiet daughter, among 4 other people. As I led the tour, I tried my best to gear the information toward the students' interests and chosen programs to make sure they got the most information.
In the middle of my tour, I referred to the daughter's program and the dad just blew up, yelling at me that his daughter is underage and it's unprofessional that I hit on her on the tour.
He asked to speak to my supervisor, who helped me explain to him that I'm gay and I had had a boyfriend for almost a year at that point.
#60
We were in Australia, visiting Uluru. There was a section where it was so sacred that photographs were not even permitted; I leave this couple alone to take in the scenery and I come back approx 7 minutes later to see them full blown naked f*****g the brains out of each other.
TL:DR: Had a break, couple started f*****g at sacred site.
#61
Not a tour guide, but when i was at Ile de Gorée (old slave island infront of Senegal) there was a building where the slaves used to be kept and one big door that opened to the sea. All the slaves used to go through that door and into the boats to get shipped away. So a very loaded place with bad memorys. And this one dude is posing in the door, low v-neck with sunglasses on, smiling into the camera! Like wtf, he was leaning on the door and throwing up peace signs. So disrespectful.
#62
Not a tour guide, but in a tour of the Parisian catacombs, we had a pair of people wander off twi or three times. The tour guide spent so much time minding them, that see cut it short.
Then we get to the part with the bones, and they start picking up skulls to play with and get selfies. Tour guide didn't even see that one.
#63
Was a part time tour guide. There was this chinese couple from mainland China who went to a top-end hotel buffet, where there were top dignitaries and VIP guests around. They took one plate in each hand (that's 4 plates in total) and swaggered up to the prawns section, cutting the queue of about 10 people along the way while seemingly oblivious to the glares they received.
That's when the real shocker came. Instead of using the tongs provided, they used their plates to literally dig, like a shovel, at the tub of prawns. They were using their plates as shovels to scoop out copious amount of prawns as if they had been starving for prawns for an eternity. Everyone was mortified at such crude behavior and despite the stunned silence and stares, they just walked away with about 4 absolutely stacked plates of prawns. Their demeanor was as if they were kings and queens, their head held high while walking back to their table as if everyone were insects beneath them.
I had to go up and tell them that such behavior was unacceptable in our country. Thankfully they were willing to listen. It always amazes me how people can be so wealthy but lacking the class and dignity of their economic status.
#64
As someone who's been working in tourism in Iceland for close to a decade its really hard to tell just a single story...
One that comes to mind is when i met someone on top of a GLACIER wearing business casual clothing and no safety equipment..
Or the guy that tried crossing a popular river on the south coast and managed to turn a Landover into a submarine.
OR the group of university students that lied about their insurance coverage and parked their minibus/camper by the black gravely beach during a sandstorm... That broke half the windows and destroyed the exterior of the car..
Please for the love of god people, be careful when traveling abroad!!!
#65
When I was in France touring WWI and WWII memorials, the actual tour guide didn't speak English, so I was commissioned to be the translator for all the British and American tourists. I was Assistant to the Regional Tour Guide, so I hope my story counts.
We were at Verdun, and it was a pretty free-for-all tour where the kids could somewhat play alongside the craters' edges, to really drive home the eeriness of a war zone overtaken by normalcy. Anyway, Middle-Aged American B***o says, "Wow, all of the craters and hills here must have been really convenient for the fighting! They're lucky they picked such a location!"
LADY ARE YOU FOR REAL.
#66
Not a guide, but I recently returned from a hiking trip to Yosemite. I was astonished by the amount of people who were so unprepared for the strenuous hikes. I witnessed people wearing flip-flops and ladies carrying sparkly high-priced handbags - on hikes!
Good grief, surely they had some idea of where they were going. It's not like they were dropped off by a friend who yelled "surprise!".
#67
Am tour guide. "How long is the aboriginal ladys' gestational period?" - American tourist at Uluru (Ayers Rock) Australia. Just wow.
#68
Worked as a tour guide at a few really old churches. Most people were fantastic but some are astonishingly douchey.
Three types of tourists come up pretty often:
1) those who interrupt to sound smart and it backfires miserably ("Ohhh the bell tower collapsed in 1605? Well OBVIOUSLY it was damaged by peasants at the start of the French Revolution as all symbols of religion were reviled..." nah bro you're like 180 years off, I don't know how you f****d up that badly)
2) those who DEMAND to see closed sections of the church (one lady threatened to "call the archbishop on me" because I couldn't take her down to the crypt-- look, it's locked and no one's seen the key in like 300 years, I don't know what to tell you)
3) those who mock me/try to challenge me on every part of the tour. If you hate it so much then why are you paying to be here?
again, they were the exceptions-- 99.999% of the time, I had a lot of fun and really enjoyed the groups I led. But some people seem to go out of their way to be stupid/rude :(
Edit: forgot, one time a man demanded a different tour guide because he "wouldn't be led around by a dirty Russian." I'm not Russian, I don't speak Russian, I have no idea why he was so convinced I was Russian.
#69
Not a tour guide, but I went on a trip to Amsterdam/Germany with my college once.
A group of about 5 girls got so drunk that they slept through the entire bus tour of Berlin. I got drunk the night before too, but seriously? Don't get so drunk that you miss the entire reason you spent all that money to come here. Save your money and get s****y drunk at home.
#70
I'm in the middle of talking and someone's phone rings. Ok, that happens sometimes, and usually they'd just cancel the call or step outside. Nope, this guy answers the call and starts talking on the phone, only a few metres from where I'm standing. I think, 'oh he'll just quickly explain he's busy and end the call', nope! He starts a conversation... The rest of the group glare at him and I'm put in an awkward position because my workplace put a huge emphasis on politeness. So I suggest to him to continue his call in the hallway, just outside the room we were in, to which he replied 'no, I'm fine here', and went back to his phone conversation. I'm doing my best to talk to the rest of the group (about 25 people), but he's *so* loud! Eventually this Chinese woman yells across the room at him "shut up, we want to listen to the lady, not you" which worked. But I just couldn't imagine the nerve to ruin everyone's experience like that, cos you're too selfish to talk on the phone outside.
Also, the place I worked allowed photos but had a strict 'no photos of the staff' rule for privacy reasons. I always explained this at the start and 99% of people were cool. One day I had a particularly happy snapper who got right up in a staff members face to take a photo, like I'm taking centremetres from his face to take a photo. The staffer was just some rando middle aged white dude, so I'm not sure why the fascination, but he was livid. It's like I saw it happen in slow motion so couldn't do anything to stop it. That guy was removed from the tour.
#71
Took a class of middle schoolers to a museum and one of my a*****e students dragged his hand across a 3000 year old Indian painting. Later on I found out the object was almost certainly a reproduction but I nearly died of rage on the spot.
Edit: the student was with us on a 45 day placement for severe behavioral issues. He earned enough point in school to qualify for the field trip. Never again.
#72
Not a tour guide but I guess you could say I work in the tourism industry. I work ground crew for a company that does Helicopter tours. Number one rule for customers is “DON’T WALK UNDER THE TAIL BOOM, THE ROTOR WILL K**L YOU AND IT WILL HURT”. It’s unbelievable how many people have a death wish out there. People see the fastest way to the other side of the helicopter and don’t stop to think “Oh hey, that spinning blade may or may not slice my whole f*****g head off let’s see how close we can get to it!”.
#73
They took a big s**t in front of the group. So, we tour through streets and parks and make it really clear that the toilets at the beginning of the tour are the only ones for the first 90 minutes of tour. We get to a park about 30 mins into the tour. Not a big park mind you, it is basically a big roundabout with a swing set, bench and two trees. I'm in the middle of my spiel in the park when I see a guy at the back of the group, step away, pull his pants down and squat on the grass. Of course I was stunned and lost my flow which had everyone looking around only to recoil in horror as this guy drops a log like it was nothing. He wasn't even ashamed.
#74
Not *their* guide, but, I had to give a group of grown men a stern talking too about no monkeying around under rail cars at a railway museum. They went on to climb around on top of a boxcar. The kids I was giving tours to that day were much better behaved.
#75
I once was a tour guide in high school for a group of young Chinese students coming to the rural US on a sort of “fresh air” trip. They told us beforehand that we had to keep the kids away from water because apparently parents don’t value swimming lessons in China and there is such little open swimmable water that no one learns on their own. We were also told that the kids think swimming happens “naturally” — like if you go into water, you’ll immediately start swimming.
Anyways, one of our excursions was to a local reservoir and the plan was to hike up a hill nearby to overlook the reservoir lake, get a few photos, and then leave. When we got to the top, it started POURING rain like I had never seen before. I’m talking so much rain you can’t see 5 feet in front of you. Then lightning starts striking the lake and I’m still trying to keep it cool even though I had never been so close to lightning before. The students were taking it well and laughing, which was good, until they started running _directly for the lake_ and *jump in*. Apparently they had also never learned about electricity conducting through water, so I’m freaking out and start pulling them out of the water (they weren’t in very far) and a couple of them complain that their phones were wet... in the rain.
No one got hurt, but it was a crazy day. We got back on the bus and the kids started drinking liquor in the back (they ranged ages 9-16) and I had to bust them for that too.
TL;DR: apparently Chinese kids think swimming will just happen if you go in water, especially lightning-struck water.
#76
My cousin does snorkeling tours. She had to drag a lady away from a turtle because she was trying to touch it.
#77
Once had a group of people ignore the warning signs and stepped over the hobbit feature here in NZ to take photos safe to say they distroyed the set causing it to under go 6 months of rebuilding to get it back upto par.
#78
I work in the backcountry ski guiding industry, working my way to becoming a lead guide. Guest are always trying to k**l themselves but here’s one that stands out . Right now I mostly tail guide and pick people up when they fall , which is most of the time.
One particularly deep day I’m sweeping a tree run and all of a sudden there’s a man digging frantically in the snow towards a a pair of legs . His wife had fallen head first down slope in a Flatish area. When she lawn darted the first half of her body was buried in the snow and only her legs and feet were visible. Her husband thought it was a good idea to stand on top we’re her face obviously was and star digging near the exposed part of her body. I guess in the moment he forgot about human anatomy and where her head might be !?
At this point I was maybe 3 minutes behind them so she’d had her face under the surface for a while. I told him to stop and move , yelled “ STOP YOU’RE ON HER FACE , I tried added a couple expletives but nothing. I finally had to grab him by the backpack and power bomb him down the slope. I uncovered her face in under 10 seconds. She gasped for air , had a cry and then proceeded to tear that man to pieces verbally.
#79
Technicaly not a tour guide but we had excursion at our work place. We took them to apron of the airport to show them the freighter version of B737. Fortunately the airport does not have lots of traffic. The group wanted to snap some photos of the plane. One of them wanted to have full plane in the photo so she started to walk further away from the group unintentionally walking to taxiway. It was a big oopsie and we didnt have any more excursions anymore also we had to fill security incident report.
#80
Watching a Chinese tourist lean over a red velvet rope and touch a tapestry on the wall at the freaking Vatican.
#81
Not a tour guide but this happened while we were being given a tour of a milk packaging factory that we intended to shoot for a commercial. Control was super tight, we needed special permission, sterilized suits, goggles and hair nets just to get inside.
The director goes over to one side of the factory to check the lighting, see if it's a good angle to shoot. He photographs the whole place to keep as reference and then it happens... He drops his phone... Into an open vat of milk.
The factory had to shut down immediately. Over 150.000 liters of milk had to be scrapped, the vats had to be washed and sterilized, the health inspector had to be called down so production could restart. It was an unmitigated mess and I have no idea how we were still allowed to shoot inside the factory after that. Although each crew member had to get a one-hour training session before going in.
#82
I was on a tour in the Chernobyl exclusion zone and there was a group of students showing they had zero idea what nuclear radiation is. Asking questions like why there isn't any farming in the zone, and then arguing with the tour guide. One guy was literally touching everything and then dipping his hands in a bag with crisps. When he got a nosebleed halfway through I told him it was the radiation sickness kicking in.
Of course when we were checked before leaving the zone he had to be decontaminated. What an idiot.
#83
Visitor: "You're not from around here, are you?"
Me: "Actually I am, born and raised."
Visitor: "Well I've been coming to the south for 25 years and you just don't seem like you're from here."
Me: "Well ummmm my parent's don't have strong accents either."
Visitor: "I just think I would like you better if you had a southern accent."
Sorry that playing up to stereotypes is not in our visitor's services manual. I'm here to talk about history not recreate your southern fantasy.
#84
In Wyoming it is common to buy bear spray (highly concentrated pepper spray) when heading into Yellowstone. One tourist believed it was bear repellent, lined up his family and sprayed all of them. Chemical burns for everyone!
As a raft guide we regularly got asked whether we would be passing the same spot/going through the same rapid later in the journey. We would reply "why yes, this is actually one of the only circular rivers in the world!"
Q: "How deep is the river?"
A: "About chest high on a duck!".
#85
Not a tour guide but i once saw a tourist take a s**t in front of the Anne Frank house.
#86
Was lobster diving Palm Beach off a boat. Had a group of fellas and a smoking hot babe with them, they were in wet suits, she had nice 2 piece bikini. When you lobster, you carry a net bag with a long string to carry your catch. They had hooks/snaps to drag around. She, just tied it to her bottom bikini. They did well, putting their catch in the bags, letting them fall behind. When thy were surfacing, a great barracuda went for a snack. A tasty lobster in a bag, with the bottom bikini attached. Needless to say, the girl went up the ladder first to get on the dive boat. She didn't even flinch! I was the divemaster/guide at that time. Some things you just can't tell people.
#87
Not me but when my aunt and uncle went to Bethlehem, some idiot tried to climb into the manger that it is believed that Jesus was put in after he was born.
#88
I'm a guide for a popular mainstream brewery. The way tours work there, we always have two guides per tour: one leading and one closing the group, for safety reasons.
When we greet people, part of our spiel consists in pointing out the fact that the only toilets are located at the entrance - so right where we are standing at the moment - and the pub at the end of tour. We also make it very clear that no one should at any point be behind the closing guide, no matter what. Both of these will be important later on.
So, on the day this happened, the other guide and I were alternating between leading and closing. We greeted our group of ~25 people and noticed there was a little boy of around 4 there with his parents. This wasn't the first time something of the sort happened, but I'll never understand why people feel the need to bring their children and even babies to a brewery. Much less one that is advertised as being difficult to walk around. Oh well. We leave with our group and everything is fine until we reach the brew room. At this point, while my colleague is explaining the beer making process, the father approaches me saying that his son needs the toilet. I tell him that we are close to the pub and ask if he can wait five minutes so we could all leave the brew room together, or if he'd rather the three of us leave for the pub immediately and rejoin the group later on. He answers "nevermind" and rejoins the group. After a minute or so, I hear the door to the room opening and closing, this is a big no-no of course, because we need to always be aware of where everyone is. So, I go to investigate and find the father holding his son while he pees around the corner... fml.
#89
A family of Muslims wouldn't buy pictures unless we edited the family of Jews out of the group photo. I was a zipline guide, we were six stories in the air for a couple hours. Really really awkward. You could cut the tension with a knife. The Jews were super nice, and tipped $20 the Muslims were crazy mean and left $0.
#90
Was a campus tour guide for 2 years. A parent (who was also an alum) of one of touring high schoolers asked in front of the entire group if anyone “was still jumping off the clock tower?” I gave him a confused look and said no? He proceeded to tell everyone that three people jumped off the tower while he was a student there. Thanks for bringing that up dude really sensitive and considerate of ya.
#91
I was on one of those Big Bus tours of San Francisco in the evening. Last ride for the night. The tour guide probably mentioned five times before leaving that it would be freezing up top and that no one could go up or down the stairs during the hour tour because it was dangerous.
This couple was at the top with their INFANT (wearing nothing but a onesie with a thin bed sheet over the carrier). The tour guide suggested multiple times that they stay downstairs since it would be freezing. Well, it felt something like 30 degrees or less and the poor baby was crying the entire time before we had to pull over (after 30-40 minutes) so the couple could take their popsicle baby inside the bus to thaw out. Best parents of the year, choosing a better view over their baby's well being.
