Seniors doing more on holiday

“How old would you be if you didn’t know how old you was?”

– Leroy “Satchel” Paige

These days, many seniors can ask themselves the same question. They can check their driver’s license for year of birth, but that number is relative because while they might be 58, 65 or 73, they might feel much, much younger.

(Satchel Paige – who also said, “Age is a case of mind over matter. If you don’t mind, it don’t matter” – pitched in his last major league baseball game at age 59.)

You can join AARP (American Association of Retired Persons) at 50 to garner some advantages of being a senior, all the while denying you’re a senior. Some tour companies who cater to seniors also include age 50, but most prefer that you be 55-plus.

“The average age for seniors is getting lower,” said Bob Whitley, president of the U.S. Tour Operators Association. “It used to be 60 to 70. It’s getting closer to 60 now because of the Baby Boomers entering that market.

“The senior market is getting more soft-adventurous,” Whitley added. “Seniors are healthier. And they like to do what I call ‘sight-doing’ instead of ‘sightseeing.’ They like to participate in the places that they visit, get a feel for the culture and people, walk around the villages.”

Whitley said that seniors gravitate toward escorted tours.

“They are traveling with people with the same likes and cultural levels and they like to have things done for them,” he said. “They don’t have to worry about any hassles about reservations and transfers because on an escorted tour just about everything is done for them. For escorted tour operators, that’s the bulk of their business.”

But, Whitley added, escorted tours have changed drastically since the 1969 movie “If It’s Tuesday, This Must Be Belgium.”

“No longer do tours cover 11 countries on a 14-day trip,” he said. “Tours tend to be more in-depth, with more leisure time, and they tend to stay in regions longer. Often they do backroads and not necessarily big cities. They offer such options as white-water rafting and heli-hiking.”

When I asked Whitley about the downside of tours, he said: “The only minus might be if you don’t like spending two weeks with the same group of people. It depends upon the package you buy.”

Besides destination and price, what should seniors look for when shopping for a tour package?

“They should look at the hotel location, and whether meals are included in the price,” Whitley said. “The hotel location is the No. 1 thing. If you’re someone who likes to shop or walk around on your own, you don’t want a hotel near the airport in London. You want to be nearer the action.”

While major tour companies such as Tauck, Collette and Globus seek clients of all ages, some firms do only senior business.

Boston-based Grand Circle Travel, founded in 1958 as an offshoot of the AARP to cater to teachers and now an independent company, is the oldest firm dealing only with seniors.

Grand Circle and its sister companies — Overseas Adventure Travel, Grand Circle Worldwide River Cruises and VBT Bicycle Vacations — offer about 100 different trips and will carry an estimated 150,000 clients this year, up from nearly 124,000 in 2003.

“For Grand Circle tours, the median age is 72, for Overseas Adventure 65 and, for VBT, about 50,” said spokeswoman Priscilla O’Reilly.

Grand Circle recently acquired Continental Waterways and will add European barging and biking trips next year. This year’s itineraries include such places as Egypt and the Nile, China and the Yangtze, Italy’s Amalfi Coast, Dubrovnik and a Trans-Canada rail adventure.

Rates start at $995 and can exceed $3,000 a person. Each tour description includes a few words about the physical demands of the trip.

Chicagoan James Crawford, 70, a retired law professor who taught for 22 years at the University of California-Berkeley, chose a tour to Bosnia, Croatia and Montenegro.

Crawford said he found Grand Circle “extremely well organized for someone like me, who doesn’t want to be bothered with a lot of details of traveling at this stage in my life. They make all the arrangements. The pacing is suitable for middle aged and elderly people. They always have very good tours usually led by local university lecturers or professors.”

Grand Circle Travel sells its tours directly to the public. For details, check www.gct.com or phone (800) 221-2610.

For sheer variety, no one comes close to Elderhostel, a Boston-based nonprofit educational operation serving 55-plus people with 10,000 programs, 7,500 of them in the U.S.

Elderhostel bills itself as America’s first — and the world’s largest — education and travel organization. Name your interest and you’ll probably find a matching program, from art and archeology to wildlife study.

Besides the U.S., Elderhostel offers programs in more than 100 countries. Rates for its programs can run from under $500. For domestic programs, you must buy your own air. International programs can include air if you wish. The only time participants can be less than 55 years old is if the younger person accompanies an older member. Elderhostel information is available at www.elderhostel.org or (877) 426-8056.

While it doesn’t bill itself as a travel firm for older Americans, Watertown, Mass.-based Odysseys Unlimited is close to it.

“Since our tours are typically two weeks, we tend to get an older, retired market,” said spokeswoman Sue Bonchi. “Our age range is anywhere from the mid-50s to the 70s, with the average from the early to mid-60s. Our trips are definitely not adventure. We don’t camp out; we don’t hike. But there’s definitely walking involved in virtually all the tours.”

Bonchi said seniors are eager to travel, but they are not eager to go to places perceived as risky. “As a company, we don’t go where there are State Department warnings,” she said.

Odysseys sells directly to the public. Because it caters to small groups, the tours, which include air, cost from $1,795 a person and up. Check out www.odysseys-unlimited.com or phone (888) 370-6765.

One thing Grand Circle, Elderhostel and Odysseys have in common: So as not to severely penalize seniors, who are more prone to illness and other problems, these firms’ cancellation and refund policies are more liberal.

For senior women who are widowed, divorced or otherwise alone and dislike being a fifth wheel on more couples-oriented trips, check out these Web sites for women-only programs: poshnosh.com, goingplacestours.com, menopausaltours.com, goodadventure.com and adventurewomen.com.