How to Choose Your Tour Type

When we started EF Adventures, we built every tour around a simple idea: the best way to experience a place is to get out and move through it.

That thinking shaped three ways to explore the world: Hiking, Biking, and Multi-Adventure. Which one you choose comes down to how you like to travel. Do you want to discover a destination on foot? Cover more ground on two wheels? Or try a little bit of everything?

We’ve put together this guide to help you decide what tour type is best for you.

Hiking tours

Some places are best experienced one step at a time. Hiking takes you beyond the roads and into landscapes you might otherwise only admire from a distance. There's time to notice the smaller things: wildflowers along a ridge, the sound of a river below a gorge, or a village coming into view as you descend from the mountains.

In Italy's Dolomites, you'll hike beneath the towering peaks of Tre Cime di Lavaredo, passing World War I fortifications along the way. Between trails, there's time to explore Cortina d'Ampezzo and visit the LUMEN Museum, where mountain photography tells another side of the region's story.

Scotland offers a different kind of landscape. Follow sections of the West Highland Way through the wildflower-covered moorlands of Loch Lomond and into the dramatic Glencoe Valley, where the scenery has a way of making you stop in your tracks.

And for those who want to cover more ground, our Alps Hiking tour crosses Switzerland, Italy, and France, past alpine lakes, mountain passes, and the Matterhorn reflected in glacial waters.

Our Hiking tours are for travelers who enjoy the journey as much as the destination. The satisfaction of reaching a summit, the conversations along the trail, and the places you can only get to on foot.

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Biking tours

There's something about seeing a place from the saddle. You can cover more ground than you would on foot, but you're still close enough to the landscape to feel part of it. One minute you're riding through vineyards, the next you're stopping for coffee in a village you might never have found otherwise.

In Tuscany, five days of riding take you through the rolling hills of Val d'Orcia and Chianti, including sections of the Via Francigena, an ancient pilgrimage route connecting Canterbury to Rome for more than 1,000 years. The climbs are part of the experience. So are the long lunches, local wines, and medieval towns waiting on the other side.

In Provence, the ride is as much about what's between the stops as the destinations themselves. Cycle through the lavender fields and vineyards of the Luberon, following quiet country roads between hilltop villages and centuries-old towns. There's plenty of reason to get off the bike, whether it's to explore a local market, stop for a café crème, or settle in for a long Provençal lunch.

Spain's Mallorca offers a different kind of ride. The island's Tramuntana Mountains are a training ground for professional cyclists, with winding roads, sustained climbs, and Mediterranean views that make the effort worthwhile. Follow some of the same routes as the pros, passing mountain villages and dramatic coastal scenery along the way. It's easy to see why cyclists return to this island year after year.

Not every biking tour is about conquering a climb. Some are designed for experienced cyclists looking to push themselves, while others offer a more leisurely way to explore. What they share is the freedom of discovering a destination on two wheels, with plenty of reasons to stop along the way.

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Multi-Adventure tours

Hiking or biking? Rafting or kayaking? A Multi-Adventure tour says yes to all of it.

Rather than exploring a destination through one activity, these tours combine several. Each is chosen for what it reveals about a place. Hiking a gorge tells you something about a landscape that e-biking through its vineyards doesn't. Kayaking a coastline gives you an angle no trail can.

In Costa Rica, that might mean mountain biking near Arenal Volcano one day and whitewater rafting through tropical rainforest the next. Add kayaking, ziplining, and hiking, and you've experienced the same landscape from just about every perspective.

Japan takes the variety even further. You'll travel from Tokyo to the Japanese Alps and Shikoku island, rafting Class III and IV rapids through Oboke Gorge and soaking in Dogo Onsen, a hot spring with 3,000 years of history. It's a trip that moves between adventure and tradition, often in the same day.

Then there's Portugal, where the activities change with the landscape. Hike through the misty forests of Sintra, kayak beneath the golden cliffs of the Algarve, and e-bike through cork forests and vineyards in the Alentejo.

Most Multi-Adventure tours combine four to six activities across a single itinerary. But the point isn't to fit as much as possible into each day. It's to experience a destination from different angles, with time left over for local food, culture, and the unexpected discoveries in between. For travelers who like variety or simply don't want to choose one way to explore, this is where it all comes together.

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How experienced do I need to be?

You don't need to be an expert hiker, cyclist, or kayaker to enjoy an active adventure. But you should choose a tour that matches your interests, fitness, and comfort level. Our tours span a range of physical activity levels, from lighter days with plenty of breaks to more demanding routes with sustained climbs and significant elevation changes.

A hiking tour in Peru, for example, comes with different physical demands than a ride through Tuscany. And even within the same tour type, the terrain, distances, and daily activities can vary considerably.

The best place to start is our Physical Activity Levels guide, which breaks down what to expect so you can find the right fit.