Local Transport & Dabbawallah Tour

An opportunity to see the real side of Mumbai whilst supporting a valuable charity

We were looking for a slightly different tour and this proved perfect Travelling by train, bus and shared cabs we explored southern Mumbai taking in a variety of produce markets, bazaars, the Dohbi Ghat and finishing with the Dabbawala A good tour always needs a good guide and Rishi was excellent Moreover the tour operator - Reality Gives - is an NGO supporting education in Mumbai’s slum community - so you felt your tourist pounds were going to a very worthwhile cause

Havent picked me up

They havent appeared to pick me up. I had to have the tour reorganized by viator. I dont recommed at all.

Excellent tour

I did this tour in December 2023. It was excellent. I am grateful that I was informed in advance that the day that I originally wanted didnt work because the markets would be closed. Our guide was knowledgeable, funny, the tour was quite easy, we saw some interesting parts of Mumbai. I would highly recommend it.

A Great Way to Experience Mumbai

What an excellent way to get a flavor for life in Mumbai! We traveled by bus, taxi and trains to several destinations that included local markets, the massive laundry yard, and landmarks; as well as a glimpse at the busy lives of the lunch delivery men. Our guide Raj made sure we were safe and well looked after and told good stories about life in this massive city. A worthwhile experience!

Reality Tours is fantastic.

Under the guidance of Chetan, I so enjoyed using the various public transportations found in Mumbai. Chetan is a great guide and I’m sure the company’s other tour guides and options are just as good. Don’t hesitate to book a tour. You’ll see and learn a lot

A perfect morning in Mumbai

My husband & I met our guide, Jenna, outside the art deco Regal Cinema in Colaba (a stone's throw from the YWCA IGH where we were staying). From there, we bussed to the magnificent Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaja Terminus - fabulous on the outside & even more stunning on the inside. And we watched the hundreds of commuters disgorging from the many trains. From there, we trained to the Dadar Flower Market with its kaleidoscope of colours. Onto Dhobi Ghat - a highlight to see the many hued colours flapping in the wind with a backdrop of a clear blue sky (& odd skyscraper). Taxied to Chor Bazaar & finally to see the amazing Dhabawallas at Churchgate Station. So many highlights in such a short time! Highly recommended.

Experience the charm of Mumbai!

I joined because Elephanta Island was closed. The meeting place is near the Indian Gate. You can experience the charm of Mumbai by bus and city rail. Explore places that symbolize the dynamic city of Mumbai. It was impressive that the guide said, "This is Mumbai!"

Good choice of tour!

So happy we did this tour and also had a private guide. The guide was excellent and very nice too. It was an experience taking local buses and trains. We visited interesting places and it was a good opportunity to ask questions about everything when having a private guide. It was well worth it and I wish I could have more time to visit other places with this company.

Great experience

Mumbai is a very wide and spread-out city. So, it’s difficult to walk to every point of interest. I was lucky enough to spend half a day with Janna. He provided very interesting and entertaining info. We negotiated beforehand what I wanted/did not want to see. And time went very fast. I strongly recommend this organization, that refunnels 80% of the most-tax income to social projects linked to Dharavi, the most important slum in Mumbai.

Excellent Mumbai Tour

Truly exceptional experience with Reality Tours! Would recommend the Half Day by Public Transport Tour without hesitation to anyone looking to become aquatinted with Mumbai. Our guide Nano was very kind and knowledgable about all things Mumbai and answered all of our questions with enthusiasm! The tour itself was very interesting and the local transportation was much more efficient than we anticipated. Don't hesitate to book with this company!

travel like a local

Another excellent trip run by reality tours -we were taken on public busses trains and rickshaws to experience life and travel around Mumbai like the locals. We visited markets ( including a fish and flower market) the laundry and general street life of the suburbs. We were able to experience local life with the security and reassurance of our guide ( Raj-he was brilliant) so never felt insecure. The whole trip was eye opening but in a good way. The guides in all the reality touts that we took made all the difference

Great tour

Very interesting with plenty of surprises. Great way to see some daily life in Mumbai. Great guude also.

Unforgettable-Mumbai experts

Public transport tour was fantastic-can’t reccomend this company, Reality Tours, highly enough. Really well planned and delivered; a knowledgeable and friendly guide with a wealth of local experience and a great sense of humour. Also went to Elefanta caves, an interesting trip off-shore, with over 200 steps up to a wonderful array of man-made temples and statues, which were really worthwhile. Great organisation and delivery of tours generally. Well done!

Reality Tours - Mumbai in Motion with Raj

Wow what a trip! This tour was much more than we expected in a positive way! Our guide Raj was absolutely stupendous!! we met at a well known theater that all the taxi drivers knew! We traveled to places like the local non tourist fish markets, flower markets, fruit and vegetable markets. All the while moving by taxi, walking and on the trains- In a place that moves millions of people everyday it was really fun to see places, people and sites in a small group, that was interactive and very informative. You have to be ready to walk and experience! If you are bothered by crowds and are not comfortable around cultural differences - maybe not the best for you. Bring a small camera and be aware of local customs. When in doubt - Ask. If you want to see Mumbai from a non tourist non large group bus approach- this was an amazing tour! Raj our guide made all the difference. Chelloh (phonetic spelling) - Means Lets GO!!

Wonderful tour company with engaging, personable guides!

I took three tours with this company while in Mumbai in January 2019. The first tour was the Dharavi Slum Tour with Arjun as our guide. Arjun did a wonderful job showing us around Dharavi. We walked around where people were working in four of the many industries that take place in Dharavi - recycling, cloth dyeing, leather, and pottery. We also walked through a couple of neighborhoods, one mostly Hindu and the other mostly Muslim, seeing how people lived, and we walked through the market area. Towards the end of the tour we visited the Community Center and school that Reality Tours sponsors. It was a very different experience and one I will not forget. Since the Dharavi tour was so interesting and the tour guide was so good, the next day we took Reality Tour's Public Transport Tour with Janna as our guide. Janna was funny and informative, and we really enjoyed our time together. During this tour we took a taxi to the train station (normally they go by bus, but the buses were on strike), took a train and then walked to the flower market, walked back to the train station and took another train to the outdoor laundry, took a taxi to the Thieves' Market, and finally took a taxi to Churchgate Station to see the Dabbawallas prepare to deliver their many lunch boxes. We ended the tour with a delicious home-made lunch in the park. The next day we hired a private guide, Bipin, from Reality Tours along with a driver to go to some temples and to the Haji Ali Dargah shrine. Bipin was another very personable tour guide from Reality Tours! We visited Mahalakshmi Temple, Haji Ali Dargah shrine, Shree Siddhivinayak Temple, and finally Sri Sri Radha Gopinath Temple. We could have gotten to these places on our own, but we wouldn't have known what to do when we got there. Bipin gave us background information about the temples, explained what people were doing, and answered our many questions. We caught the end of a service at the Sri Sri Radha Gopinanth Temple and were mesmerized by the chanting, singing, and energy of the participants. I highly recommend Reality Tours. I wish we had known about them when we were in Delhi because we would have arranged some tours with them there too. I'd like to go back to India one day in the not too distant future, and when I do, I'll remember to contact Reality Tours to help enhance the trip.

Unique and informative

My husband and I took two tours with Reality: a walking tour of south Mumbai and Colaba and the public transportation tour. They were both fantastic. The young people who are employed as guides are every bit as interesting as the tour itself. Each had an interesting life and goals for the future. It was a pleasure to talk to them. We especially enjoyed the train trip. Our guide, Sunny, told us so much about the importance and the dangers of train travel. We would never have understood public transportation without his information. It is a complete delight to not only get to see parts of the city we’d never get to but to do it with such outstanding young people.

Wonderful insight into Mumbai as seen by a local

Great trip round Mumbai seeing many of the tourist things but using public transport along with the locals going about their business. Knowledgeable guide took us through the city as if we lived there but explaining everything as we went. The best way to see Mumbai.

Oh yes. We had watched TV in England...

<p>Oh yes. We had watched TV in England about the Mumbai railways, and the phenonenom of 'super dense crush load', and we saw it in action. Trains arrived, releasing a sea of humanity, but we were safely watching, up on a walkway.<br/> We travelled on several trains, a bus, and several taxis, on our way to see various classic Mumbai sights. We had two guides, with one always riding shotgun, making sure we didn't get lost. Very well organised, and it did exactly what we wanted.</p>

Reality Tours operate excellent trips!

We did this one, bike tour and street food tour. Company supports locals and trains people from slums.

I was sick that day and couldn't go...

<p>I was sick that day and couldn't go, but my partner had a great time and got some good photos out of it.</p>

Enlightening and helpful guide from company with great ethos

If you've been on a few India excursions, you've almost inevitably had the experience of being (the first time) shunted into a shop where Western guilt makes you spend more than you can afford or intended. Not here. This was a classic tour, extremely well organised; bang on time and full of new and worthwhile experiences. We (my daughter and I) covered a huge amount of ground in just a few hours, including several transport modes, markets (flowers and Thieves'), the outdoor laundry and a delicious Dabbawala-delivered lunch in a park. Couldn't fault our guide, he was outstanding. The company gives a large part of its profits to helping people in the notorious slums.

Eye Opener!

Being part of Mumbaikars' daily commute was an amazing experience. Pleasantlynsurprised that the buses and trains were clean (contrary to popular belief that they are stinky and dirty) and comfortable. We had a chatty (in a good way!) guide, Pipin, who shared his insider knowledge of the places we visited and the sights we saw - which just added value to the whole experience. I highly recommend this tour as it's the safest way of experiencing Mumbai's network of transportation and traffic!

Fantastic tour and a great way to...

<p>Fantastic tour and a great way to see this city. Tour guides were really good and very informative. <br/> We were 1 hour late getting off our cruise and the guide waited for us and we caught up with the rest of the tour.<br/> Highly recommended.</p>

What an amazing time we had. It was...

<p>What an amazing time we had. It was like meeting a friend and being shown the sights of Mumbai. Bipin was just lovely, patient and extremely knowledgeable, we felt so special in his care, It is a must do experience, we loved it. Do not miss this trip.</p>

An absolute essential introduction...

<p>An absolute essential introduction to Mumbai for anyone who wants to understand the basics of how the city works. Our guide Bipin, looked after us as if we were long lost friends. This must be the cheapest and most educative tour available.</p>

This trip set us up virtually...

<p>This trip set us up virtually straight off the plane to enjoy moving around using public transport with ease and confidence. Great guides. Excellent value.</p>

Fantastic tour, just what we wanted...

<p>Fantastic tour, just what we wanted. Our guide, Bipin Kumar, really could not do enough to ensure we had a memorable time. This tour gave us a real insight into working Mumbai.</p>

Really liked our guide Bibin?, who...

<p>Really liked our guide Bibin?, who showed us how to travel around Mumbai using all the different modes of transportation available. This was really empowering later during our stay, when we dared take a train trip by ourselves and lived to tell about it! Plus, we got to see some cool areas we wouldn't have gone to on our own. Well worth it!</p>

This is really an authentic local...

<p>This is really an authentic local experience in Mumbai. I find this tour very interesting and enjoyable. The guide Bipin Kumar was excellent. I felt very safe going with him on the public transport around Mumbai and he explained very nicely on the sites we passed on the way.</p>

We really enjoyed this tour. Our...

<p>We really enjoyed this tour. Our guide was Pippin sorry this might not be quite right as we had so many guides on our trip I have forgotten the exact pronunciation and it was great fun going on the public transport around Mumbai. My partner is a train driver so he especially enjoyed the train trip. It was a great way to see the city from a different perspective and not jumping on and off of a tour bus! the only point it was slightly unnerving is when we needed two taxis as there were 4 on the tour and the guide was of course only with one set of people. You have to trust the taxi will take you where you need to go! Everything was fine with this but it did make me a little nervous! Overall we had a great time and the tour started at 8.30 and finished around 12.00pm. We got a taxi back from the end of the tour to our hotel which the guide helped us organise.</p>

I was the only tourist of the day...

<p>I was the only tourist of the day, it might explain the lack of enthusiasm of the guide. The visit was also shortened because the dabba-wallahs were off on January 26, the Republic Day of India.</p>

A very good tour with a very good...

<p>A very good tour with a very good guide. We saw lots of sights and enjoyed travelling by bus and train. The only thing that could have been better is if we had finished at the same point as where we started</p>