Mercurius · Q&A
Before you book
What is included in the price?
Your accommodation, all travel within the Netherlands, your meals, entry to everything we take you to — and the two of us, for the whole journey, from the moment we collect you to the moment we hand you back.
Not included: flights to and from the Netherlands, travel insurance, and anything personal — drinks beyond what is on the table at the meals we plan, souvenirs, laundry. There is no tipping expectation and there are no optional extras waiting to be sold to you once you arrive. The number you are quoted is the number.
How does the price treat rooms?
We quote one per-person figure, and it divides the whole cost of the journey — rooms included — evenly between everyone travelling. There is no supplement for travelling alone, and none for being an odd number.
That holds however the rooms fall. If your party is an odd number, so that one room ends up with a single occupant, the figure does not change and nothing is added to it later.
We charge one fee for the journey rather than a separate bill for each traveller, so how you divide it between you is yours to settle. Most parties simply split it evenly, which is what the per-person figure assumes. If you would rather someone with a room to themselves paid a larger share, that is entirely for you to decide amongst yourselves.
There is one exception, and it is the reason to tell us early. If your party is an even number and one of you would rather have a room alone, or if several of you want rooms to yourselves, that means booking rooms we had not counted on, and a supplement is added for them. Say so when you enquire and we will work out exactly what it comes to before anything is settled — what we will not do is add it to a figure you have already been quoted.
Why does the price change so much with the number of people?
Because there are two of us either way. Whether we are looking after one person or eight, both of us are there for every day of the journey — the same driving, the same planning, the same evenings. That cost is fixed, and it is divided among however many of you there are.
It is why a couple pays more per person than a party of six, and why travelling alone is genuinely expensive: you are not paying a premium for solitude, you are paying for two hosts who are not shared with anybody.
Will we ever be put together with another party?
No. Every Mercurius journey is private. You will never arrive at a hotel to find you have been folded into somebody else's group, and there is no minimum number to make a departure “go ahead”. If you book, it runs, and it runs for you.
Does the time of year change the price?
Yes. The time of year matters. Tulip season and midsummer cost more, because everything — rooms in particular — costs more. Late autumn and winter cost less, and Dutch cities in December are their own reward.
How far in advance should we book?
The sooner the better. We take a small number of journeys a year, and spring is spoken for early. But we have put together a very good week at six weeks' notice, and if you have a date in mind it costs nothing to ask.
Who you are travelling with
Who actually travels with us?
Both of us. Not a subcontracted guide, not a driver we have booked, not a local representative who meets you at the hotel. James and Alex, the two people on the Our Story page, for the whole journey. That is the whole idea, and it is why we cannot take very many bookings.
Do you provide medical or nursing care?
No — and we want to be exact about this, because it matters.
James is a nurse and Alex is a therapist. On a Mercurius journey we are your hosts, not your clinicians: we do not provide nursing care, we do not manage anyone's medication, and we do not treat. That is not the service.
What the background does mean is that very little about a body, or a mind, is unfamiliar to us. Mobility aids, oxygen, a walking pace that is slower than it used to be, a bad night, a memory that is not what it was, the small indignities nobody wants to explain to a stranger — none of it is awkward for us and none of it needs a preamble. We plan days around fatigue instead of pretending it will not arrive. And if something does go wrong, you will be with two people who have both spent their working lives not panicking.
Do we need to speak Dutch?
Not a word. Almost everyone you meet will speak excellent English, and where they do not, we are there. Learning to say dank je wel will nonetheless earn you a smile every single time, and we will teach you.
Do you only host LGBTQIA+ travellers?
No — everyone is welcome, and we mean it. But we do say plainly who we are, because a certain generation of gay and lesbian travellers has spent a lifetime deciding, at every hotel desk, how much to explain. With us there is nothing to explain. Your husband is your husband. You do not have to read the room. That is worth naming, and it is why we name it.
How the days work
How much walking is there? What about all those cobblestones?
A typical day has four to five hours on your feet, and it is broken up — a museum, a long lunch, a canal, a sit-down. Every journey of a week or more has a genuine rest day built into it, not a euphemism for a shorter day.
And yes: the cobblestones are real. So are the famously steep Dutch staircases in older hotels. We will not tell you the Netherlands is effortlessly accessible, because that would be a lie. What we will do is ask about this properly before you book, choose hotels with lifts where you need one, keep the car close, and build the days around what you can comfortably do rather than what a guidebook says you ought to see.
What if we need to change the plan on the day?
Then we change it. A plan is a proposal, not a contract with your knees. If the morning is harder than expected, or the museum is too much, or it is simply too good a day to be indoors, we rearrange it and nobody has to feel awkward asking. There is no schedule to hold to and no group of strangers waiting in a minibus.
What are the hotels like?
Chosen one at a time. We stay in them ourselves and we do not book anything we would not be happy to be woken up in. In practice that means small, characterful, centrally placed — and comfortable in the ways that actually matter: a proper bed, a lift when you need one, a bathroom you can use without an argument.
Can you handle dietary requirements?
Yes, and we would much rather know everything in advance than improvise. Allergies, coeliac, diabetes, vegetarian, a swallowing difficulty, a medication that will not sit with alcohol, or simply a strong feeling about fish — tell us, and it shapes where we book rather than causing a problem once we are there.
Practicalities
Do you book our flights?
No. You arrange your own travel to and from the Netherlands, which keeps you free to use the airline, the airports and the air miles that suit you. Tell us your arrival and we are at the airport when you land; tell us your departure and we get you back there in good time, with a margin for the things that go wrong at airports.
Do we need travel insurance?
Yes. We ask every guest to hold travel insurance including medical cover, cancellation and repatriation, and to bring the policy details with them. This is not us covering ourselves so much as it is the single thing that turns a bad week into an inconvenient one. If you have a pre-existing condition, declare it to your insurer properly — an undeclared condition is the most common way a policy quietly stops working.
How does paying actually work?
We agree on the journey first and put it in writing — the itinerary, what is included, and the total — before any money changes hands. A deposit confirms the dates and the bookings we then have to make on your behalf; the balance is due before you travel. Full written terms, including how cancellation works, go out with your proposal, so nothing about the money is ever a surprise.
