MikeFromTokyo

Exactly ^

If this kind of trip appeals to a certain crowd that's great. I frankly think it's sad to see that amount of money go to waste om what is essentially a glorified package tour.

For that amount of money one could take a MUCH nicer trip...

erik123

Others run similar tours (e.g. Smithsonian and National Geographic) that include interesting sites (e.g. Bhutan) and are of similar cost. Those might be of interest to those short on time to see all sites and short on attention span - and they are accompanied by expert guides. They are uniformly wealthy.

offerendum

And block the proper suites Some hotels don`t even have enough suites for all travelers. I gess they try to put you in double rooms

P.S. I hate Group traveling. So wasted 240000 $

LR2013

I thought I was the only one who hated the very thought of group travel, I even hate the thought of a "day tour" or a site tour in a given destination. Good to know I have company! Hopefully a block of these tours doesn't show up and take up all the upgrade rooms at any of the Four Seasons I'm ever at! Also very much agree with others that this will likely attract the nouveau riche, some of whom behave in the most inappropriate and ghastly ways....

Kettering Northants QC

20 years Thomas Cook did a luxury charter around the world trip - private aircraft - 50-60 guests - luxury hotels. Alan Whicker, the British journalist, filmed it.

Turned out a bit like a fancy coach trip - stuck with the same people, same guide, little independence, 100k to stop in the hotels they want you to stop in, a lot of time sitting around travelling to and from airports. An inevitable compromise on luxury despite the huge cost.

If you didn't have the inclination to organise it yourself a a good travel agent I'm sure could do better for a lot less.

ridefar

While I certainly wouldn't consider it "cheap" you can get a RTW F ticket on Star Alliance, including upgrades to the best SQ F product, for about $25k all in these days. I will absolutely do that with Ms. Ridefar at some point. Sooner rather than later if my job keeps stressing me out like it has lately. I do think the *A F RTW is one of the best values in airfare at the moment. Value being relative as always, and contemplating spending $50k on plane fare being very much a first world problem.

And to add my $0.02 to the thread: what a ghastly waste of travel money.

MikeFromTokyo

Taken in small doses, this can make for entertaining people watching...

But I agree. Just imagine being stuck on the same 757 with the same group of people all the way around the world..

ridefar

Much as I found the teenage girl throwing a fit at now being able to get chilled Jagermeister at the FS Bosphorus highly amusing (and the subsequent fit by her father over the same issue) there is no way in h@*l I would want to be stuck on a plane with them.

Vacations are for getting away from people. The further the better. But I think I am preaching to the converted on this forum, mostly.

Back on topic: I do know of people that have done this trip (or the National Geographic one). They did it with their kids. They got to visit all kinds of places, safely ensconced in the FS reality distortion field. They felt safe. They never would have gone to the same places on their own. That wouldn't be safe. So there is absolutely a market for it. Not here, maybe, but in general.

kcaluwae

Orient-Express offered a similar trip in the past.
I had a look at their website today (learned it's now called Belmond apparently ) but they don't offer this trip.
They just offer journeys on a single continent.

So probably they did not have a public for this kind of trip.

leonidas

They group will be hardly "diverse". Probably all super rich CEO type people.

cathaana

Hapag Lloyd has been doing something similar with the Albert ...... private jet for years. Supposedly it's well booked.

2tall4economy

They'd have to be richer than (most) CEOs...

I'm comfortably beyond midsize company CEO pay (but I'm not even close to CEO). I'm even on track someday to be in the group that can afford this, *BUT* I save about 70% of my net pay while living small and/or on someone else's dime, depending.

Most people don't save anywhere near 70%, especially CEO types who tend to live large. There's ~60,000 people in the world who make enough passive income (as the other guy said "$3M in investment income") based on the Credit Suisse report. Add in the fact that ~30,000 people of that 60,000 can afford a private jet and the target market isn't all that big.

...and being the saver I am I wouldn't spend it on that anyway (even though I'd like to).

Kettering Northants QC

When Thomas Cook did this tour 20 years ago there were a few people who were young who earned big money, a couple of whom had to leave the tour early to go back to work. Most seemed much older - people newly retired and those SKIing. it seemed like a fancy saga trip - retired GPs and undertakers from Bolton.

I recall several saying it gave them the opportunity to see a bit of everything after which they would go back.

I seem to recall a neighbour of my parents did a similar but shorter tour on Concorde.

vuittonsofstyle

I cannot bear to be organised by someone, or to be paired involuntarily with people I may not like. Package tours are package tours. You just pay more for some.

quitecontrary

Ah - that would be most of us on this board then I 'm sure there's not much 'Old Money' on here otherwise we'd all be staying with our pals in their villas, Manoirs or castles. I can't imagine the Grosvenors, Rothschilds, Kennedys or Thyssens ever having to ask where the best Luxury hotel in town is
And sometimes 'Old Money' don't have the money to stay in expensive hotels - didn't Gilberto and Bianca Arrivabene Valenti Gonzaga the owners of Palazzo Papadopoli say in an interview that they couldn't afford to stay in an Aman?