Exploring Iceland

Here is a more complete description of my allergy experience on the Iceland tour from June 30 to July 11, 2017:

When I was contacted by Odysseys in advance of this trip, I was asked about allergies. I gave complete information about my allergies to peanuts, tree nuts, and dairy. When I arrived in Iceland I was asked by the Tour Guide to fill out a form for meal choices and to list specific conflicts with meals based on my allergies. I filled out this form in detail.

At most lunches and dinners provided by the tour there was at least one course that contained something that I am allergic to. Not one of the restaurants where we dined was made aware of my special needs in advance. Not one. I had to negotiate with staff to get food that I was not allergic to. The tour guide was not helpful in most cases. She asked me to talk directly with the waiters, although there were language barriers in some restaurants. Because no one was aware in advance of my allergies, they had little to offer me as alternatives. When dairy based desserts were offered, I ended up with a couple of raspberries. One lunch in Reykjavik was a creamy lobster soup, which I could not eat. The tour guide told me to handle it myself! At first they were going to give me nothing as a substitute- absolutely nothing! Finally, I was given a small bowl of beet soup as a substitute. One dinner in Akureryi was fish with cream. The staff had not heard that a dinner without cream was needed. I had to send the fish back, and they had to make a new meal, which did not arrive until everyone else at the table had finished their dinners. This problem was repeated at most group lunches and dinners throughout the trip. The tour guide was very little help. I was hungry throughout most of the trip because there were no alternatives to courses available.

At the farewell dinner I experienced anaphylactic shock from goat cheese that was in my salad. The first course was supposed to be lobster soup with cream. I explained to the staff, again by myself, that I could not have anything with dairy. They brought me a salad with goat cheese, but I did not notice that there was crumbled cheese in the salad until it was too late. I was unable to eat the rest of my meal or anything else for 24 hours. Indeed I could barely breathe. I had to leave the farewell dinner and return to my room to recover. Along with difficulty breathing I had hives, swollen lips, and gastric distress. The tour guide did not ask me if I needed medical attention. All she said was that goat cheese is not considered dairy because it comes from a goat instead of a cow! That is simply false. She acted as if it was my fault that I had a reaction, and that I should have specified that I was also allergic to goat cheese as well as cow’s cheese!

This experience ruined the trip for me. I would sue a restaurant in the US that did not take care of my allergy needs, but it seems impractical to try to sue a restaurant in Iceland. I was reluctant to go to the hospital in Iceland that night, although I should have, because I did not want to spend all night getting medical attention before my flight home, and I was afraid I would have missed my flight back to the US on the next morning. Fortunately, I had an epipen with me.

Iceland is wildly popular this summer. The wait staff in restaurants is dominated by young people from Eastern Europe, because of labor shortages. Perhaps this shortage extends to tour guides as well. If this is typical of the way Odysseys runs their trips and the way the company selects tour guides, I have no interest in joining anothe Odysseys trip.

I would also add that our Tour Guide did not communicate clearly what we were supposed to do at our stops. As a result we wasted a great deal of time, and stops that should have taken 30 minutes dragged on for 45 to 60 minutes, which meant that we returned to our hotels late almost every day. Her commentary in the bus was at times good, but mostly not very interesting and difficult to follow. She spent a great deal of time shopping for herself at gift shops and talking on the phone.

gimli, I am so terribly sorry to read your very concerning posts. So much of what you experienced is completely unacceptable.

My husband and I, along with 15 of our friends, will be touring Iceland at the end of August with OU. I am deeply concerned about your Tour Director's lack of responsiveness in arranging your dietary needs as well as taking lots of personal time attending to her personal phone calls and shopping needs. This would be a very big deal breaker for all of us in our group and I truly hope our experience does not mirror yours.  I am hoping that our group does not find ourselves with such a Tour Director and that she has been dismissed for being so inattentive and irresponsible.

This will be our 2nd tour with OU and I have encouraged our friends who are Tauck travelers to give OU a try because our first tour was a stellar one. We all have high expectations and I hope those expectations are met.

Denise

Dear gimli,

We truly regret the lack of accommodation you experienced on your Iceland tour with us; this is not representative of how we operate as a company. We will be contacting you directly to discuss this further.

Dear gimli,

Again, you have our sincere apologies for what you experienced in Iceland. Please know that we did indeed follow our standard protocol when advised of any dietary restrictions or food allergies (communicating the specific needs to each hotel prior to the tour). We have operated tours in Iceland for 14 years and, utilizing this protocol, have never experienced issues until now (our hotels have taken allergies and dietary restrictions as seriously as we do as a company).

Clearly, and unfortunately, the existing protocol did not work on your tour. Based on your experience, we have been in contact with the management at each of our hotels in Iceland, as well as our travel partner on site, to insure the proper standards are met on all future tours.

You have our genuine regrets for what transpired and we are very grateful that you are alright.