Horrible tour to Valley of Fire from Las Vegas. Tour guide's name was Max. He spoke very broken English and was very hard to understand. Max couldn’t answer any questions about the history of the area. In the tour instructions it stated 7:15 am sharp pick up time and don’t be late. In capital letters “ driver DOESN'T WAIT “. We were waiting sharp at 7:15am. standing outside to be picked by a Van as stated in the description of our tour under “ what to expect “, Instead we were picked up in an older Ford SUV. After standing outside until 7:40 we decided to call and find out when we were going to be picked up or going to be picked up at all!? We were able to reach the driver by phone who stated he would be there soon and finally showed up around 8am. The Ford SUV as mentioned earlier had noticeable small dents, paint peeling off in places. There was a couple (from Italy), sitting in the back seat when we were picked up. There was total of 3 couples (6 people) cramped in the SUV including my husband and myself not counting the driver. It was very difficult for people to get in and get out of the SUV the entire trip. This was especially true for the couple seated in the back seat who had to climb over the seat in front of them to get out. We had to pull the seats down in order for the couple to get out then back into the SUV. Another couple were Spanish speaking which they spoke good English as well. For the entire trip our tour guide was speaking to them in Spanish, his native language while he was driving. Very little English was spoken while inside the SUV.
Tour guide/ driver Max had relatively little knowledge of the area, except how to get to 5 stops he took us to. At one point when I asked Max about the cabins built by CCC's to give us more information, he didn’t understand my question until I pointed out on the sign Civilian Conservation Corp camp and explained to him what roll they played in American history. It was very hard to understand Max's broken English when he was speaking. In one of our stops he began to say go, go, go pushing us, three couples to line up close to each other and took a picture of us. Max did not ask the group if we wanted a group picture he just basically "herded us together" and took a picture of us with his cell phone. Never once did he bother to ask the group if he could take a group picture of us with his cell phone? He never explained himself to the group what he was going to do? Nope! My husband and I did not want pictures taken with strangers that we barely even knew or spoke to and will never see again for the rest of our lives. Before my husband and I figured out what was going on it was too late. On another stop tour guide Max, started doing the same thing and I said that I don’t want any pictures of us with or without those people taking from his cellphone. He then began to get aggressive and said that he needs the pictures for his company. I said you already took pictures of us without our permission, and I walked away from him. During the entire trip when we’re still not sure what to think about our tour guide we tried asking him questions. Max did not let us finish our sentence when he abruptly started saying “stop”,”stop”, “wait “, “wait” “we go, “we go.” And when following him away from the car 2-3 steps he was saying “ ask”, “ask”, then my husband repeated his question about the area, just a simple general question that you expect a tour guide should know, and he replied, " I don’t know." Trip was 5 stops, 20 minutes each to see the area. On 3 stops in the beginning, Max informed us to take only 20 minutes to walk around then be back at the SUV. We walked around, took pictures of the area, and the entire time Max was sitting inside his car taking naps. Our tour guide Max was totally disengaged in his tour guide job, you can sense that he didn’t want to be there in the first place and trying to finish his tour as soon as possible. He brought us back to the city around 1 pm. We had one more stop we had on the way back, which was a bathroom stop in a little grocery store. Our tour guide looked unkept with his back left pants pockets completely ripped off his jeans. He was wearing some sort of designer jacket with ensignias we never had seen before. Max's driving was not safe going in and out of traffic at speeds sometimes as high as 89 mph. . He already figured out that we were not happy tourists and he was talking to the Spanish couple in their language which only one word we were able to understand “review “. I am sure he was begging for good reviews. On the way back, the Spanish couple were typing reviews on each of their cell phones about how great the trip was and how great Max was as a tour guide. There you have it! I think he is not fit to be a tour guide. Simply saying. Sonanda company has five stars reviews, and some of the reviews honestly we were surprised to read about Max, that he was knowledgeable and knew the area, and that reviews were in 2022,2023. That is simply impossible because, first of all he can’t articulate himself with minimal English. How, and who wrote those five star reviews on Max is a mystery!