HomeGrown Tours - Oak Bluffs, Massachusetts

ka

We had a wonderful tour of Martha's Vineyard with this company, the bus was clean and comfortable. Dee Dee was our tour guide, she was fun and had great stories and insight about growing up and living on MV, we especially enjoyed all the tidbits about the filming of the movie Jaws. Best way to see the Island, book the tour, we loved it.

Ropl

This is easily one of the best narrated bus tours I had participated around the world.

Allison did a fantastic overview, never a dull moment full of interesting tidbits, famous people etc.

Highly recommend and fully enjoyable.

Russell L.

Why I’m grading it like this is because I dealed with two people with this tour company. One was great and the other one was not.

Our tour guide, Jeff. Who also played Alex Kittner in the film was a great tour guide. He showed us as much as he could, and gave us all the fun facts involving the making of Jaws that even documentaries didn’t tell us and was in no rush whatsoever. There was only one catch with him, but it may not have been his choice. Was at the end of the tour, he signed an autograph on 8 x 10 photos he had, for $25, each. However, I feel like that should’ve been included with the tour for how much we already had spent on the tour.

But the real catch was with a woman named DeeDee. Who was the one who I spoke with and scheduled the tour on the phone. At first, she was a very nice person and worked with me, but the thing was over time of scheduling it, she had told me first they only scheduled by hour and not buy an overall price. So, to make sure that me and my friend could afford it, we asked just the one-hour tour that was, $75. But then when the day got closer, she said there was a mistake or something and said that they aren’t charging by the hour, only charging a flat rate with no time limit. Which was, $150 each. More money than we wanted to pay. But the worst part of it was when our tour was getting close to the end, Jeff got a call from DeeDee on the phone, which was on speaker, so me and my friend could both hear DeeDee clearly. And she responded with a very disrespectful comment where Jeff was telling her “We’re wrapping up the tour,” but she said in a very disrespectful way something like, “These guys only paid for an hour so their tour is over, so drop them off and bring me the car!” My friend and I looked at each other as if she was a two-faced, which she was. She first says they charged by hour, then makes us pay a flat rate for no time limit for twice as much, but then is saying it went back to an hour. Thank God DeeDee wasn't our tour guide!

So let me wrap it up. Jeff was a great tour guide. But avoid DeeDee if you can, I wouldn’t trust her with my money anytime.

And this message is for DeeDee. I know you're going to respond to this comment in your defense to make me look like the victim and not you. But at the end of the day, I hope the other fans reading this understand my point of you, if you could've just listened to yourself how you sounded on the phone that day.

Vicki M.

Our tour was amazing! It started out with a mix up with our tour time, but DeeDee was so professional and worked with us until we were satisfied. John, our tour guide, is a lifetime islander and he was not only very knowledgeable about the island but was also quite funny. I highly recommend Home Grown Tours, especially if it's your first visit to the island.

Wanda W.

I recently toured with homegrown tour, LLC. I paid 130.00 (65.00 for myself and my friend Chris). Dee dee canceled the tour because of inclement weather but later changed her plans and decided to accept 14 people on a short bus. I attended but my friend did not due to the limited number of people allowed.
Dee dee refuses to reimburse me for the extra ticket.
By reviewing the list of people on the bus and amount of money she collected in total for that trip. and if she included Chris as present, the count would exceed her limited number of 14. It is impossible to reason with Dee dee as evidence by the unprofessional and aggressive tone text messages she sent to me. I finally had to block her angry replies. As a senior citizen, I cannot recall ever corresponding with anyone as rude and unprofessional as she is, particularly as a business owner serving the community.
My suggestion is wait to pay maybe the day of departure for tour and never pay her in cash because you certainly will lose your money dealing with this shady lady…. unbelievable.

Allen B.

Stan the Man knows Martha's Vinyard inside and out and he gave a great tour with some interesting side stories. Great introductory tour to the island.

Mark R.

Deedee and Jon were great to work with - very flexible. Deedee called me the morning of the tour to tell me Jon would be driving us because she had a family emergency. Jon , a native of MV, was knowledgeable and accommodating. We enjoyed our tour very much.

Janis C.

Our tour was great! Deedee was very knowledgeable about the history of the island. She grew up there so she had the stories behind the stories. We were there off season and she was very accommodating.