What People SAY About TERC and our Different Services & Free Trip Planning Service     

about Trip Planning                                           about Rail and Reservations                                             about Safety, Accommodations, Packing,  etc!

    You will see below, we don't "just sell railpasses and tickets".  We also provide answers to your specific travel concerns.

10 October 2000 Hello Mele,    Hey I had the BEST Vacation of my life!! No joke. And I travel a lot. Thanks for all your help. Your suggestion to France's Charmonix and Italy's Cogne were great ideas. I met Rick Steves, who was with his family in Gimmelwald, Switz. I asked if he knew you and he said he did. I paid many compliments on your part. Because of the web site my friends are interested in traveling there.  You may get some customers... Yes, go ahead and link my web site to yours. Thanks for asking.  Sincerely,  Richard

Hello Mele, & Thank you SOOOOO much!!! In a few minutes you explained that to me better then hours of me trying to figure it out. I can't tell you how much I appreciate your help!!  Rachel 06 Jan. 07

 Second, we would appreciate your assistance (and suggestions for improving /making the best of our trip) regarding our proposed travel plans.  Monique  1 Dec 06

Aloha, Mele   The kids and I returned from our trip to London and France!

I wanted to thank you for your help with the trains & itinerary. Everything work out great! The train rides were smooth and relaxing. A great place to rest and meet others.

London and Paris were great, with the Abbey, Eiffel Tower, Versailles, etc. However, I think that we enjoyed the smaller towns most. Beaune is a great little town, and the hotel was perfect. We went biking vinyards! Chamonix was also an incredible place. A nice town with lots of great hiking. The gondola ride across the glacier was a once in a lifetime experience. Our hotel in Chamonix turned out to be very nice with a great breakfast (best part - kids were free).              Cheers, Rick of Clinton, Iowa  1 August 06

Wife and Husband Thank you:  Hello, Mele,  The Eurostar tickets arrived this morning, as promised. What a sweet touch to add the British landing card. Once again, your excellence makes us happy and we will surely keep you on file for our next trip .  Be well, and, again, be very proud of how you conduct your business!   -Dori of Port Washington, NY  26 July 06 Dear Mele:  I'm Dori's fortunate husband, and I have to add my two cents! There is no substitute for excellence; it is something to be admired, treasured and recognized.  Thank you for the effort and thoughtfulness you put into what is really a minor purchase.  An exchange like the one you sent to Dori truly enhances the pleasure of such a trip. Thank you for your humanity!  John the "fortunate husband of Dori of Port Washington, NY  27 July 06 You folks have really validated that I am accomplishing my goal for "service" with all our transactions large or small, and this is much appreciated. Thank you for taking the time to e-mail your feedback and for reminding me that my little business is contributing to the "pleasure well" in our universe, AND Thanks for giving me a reason to sit a few minutes and smell your bouquet of roses.  Mele of TERC I'M IMPRESSED! To Sacha, WOW, and from Hawaii to boot.   Thank you for your detailed reply and offer not to sell me the ticket plus to offer alternatives here in Taiwan. Bottom line is "Gee that is expensive for a 4 hour train ride each way!" I think I will pass for now but thank you so very much for your prompt and informative reply. I will pass on your site to others as I am certain that this must be a reflection of your attention to your clients.  James of Taiwan  2 May 06 Congratulations on having an employee who still knows the meaning of customer service.  I recently planned my first trip overseas.  I am not using a tour and booked everything myself.  When I decided to take a night train instead of a flight I came across your site and started to do my homework.  That is when I started to bug the h--- out of Sacha.  She was more than kind and extremely helpful with my never ending questions before and after I purchased my rail passes.  It is refreshing to see a company and an individual who holds customer service as their #1 priority.  Stacey of Grant, Florida  8 April 06 Thank you Stacey for your feedback. Particularly today when I am leaving her in charge of the office while I travel to Europe. I have a lot of confidence in her abilities and it is always nice to hear that our clients do too.  Mele of TERC You helped us exactly one year ago when we booked our trip (myself and our four children) to Europe last April. I saved all your emails, as your assistance was of great value! You put together all our Eurail travel, as well as our Chunnel passes, and everything was absolutely wonderful, thanks to you.>> Glad to hear things worked well for you. Always love the feed back. <<My friend Diane is going to Italy at the end of May (21-31), and she told me today she needed a travel agent. She told me she was booking her own train reservation departure just one hour after her scheduled landing in Zurich (from Los Angeles). I advised her that this was probably a bad idea, given possible flight delays, customs, orienting herself in Switzerland, etc., and offered her your email address and number.>> You are hired! Good advice.   Also thanks for the referral. <<I just wanted to let you know that she will be contacting you. As well, we are planning our own return trip to Europe in July, so I expect to be in touch with you within the month myself.>> <<May I take this opportunity to say that I thought of you dozens of times on our trip last year, as everything you said turned out to be true, and we had the benefit of your years of experience. So, thank you again!>>  Laurie of Agoura CA 91301  10 April 06 Aaahhh, thanks again for the feed back. Mele of TERC Hi Mele: In Spanish MELI We are both Seniors from the Old School & certainly appreciate the time and effort you gave Us. Unfortunately on Med advice and due to our health problems we decided not to Use the Euro Rail system. Instead we took an AirFrance package w 3 nights hotel within our budget limitations. We thank you for your time & goodwill assisting these 2 Old-timers.WE WILL ADD your Agency to Address Book and hope to call you in a near future. Thanks again   Didi   31 March 05 You have been an absolute joy to work with, Mele, and I'm very grateful for everything you were able to do for Chris and his son. I'll get busy checking out hotels in London for the night of the 14th - I'm sure they'll have a blast. Thank you again,  Beth of Newbury Park, CA  14 March 06 Glad to hear your voice again!   I was so happy that you helped my wife and I plan our honeymoon to Europe 3 years ago.  You helped us with car and train reservations and everything went fabulous.  We are going back to ski next month and was wondering if you could help us with deciding about renting a car or just using trains/buses.>>  Paul of Hawaii  10 Feb 06 Just wanted to say thanks for your help on the quick trip we made before Thanksgiving to Paris and London. We had a great time (especially me since I didn't have to work while I was there). We'll certainly keep you in mind the next time we plan something in Europe. Next time, I think Ireland and England for a week or two.  Thanks again, Rick  of LA Ca  6 Dece 05 Ms. Mele Fujiwara, I want to thank you so much for all the help you gave me in planning my trip! The Rail Pass worked out great. The copies you made of the Rick Stevens book were amazing. I loved the self-guided tour of the castle in St. Goar and the one of Salzburg. Rothenburg was great too. I took the Night Watchman's Tour, saw St. Jacob's Church, and saw the Crime and Punishment Museum. Berlin was kind of big and hard to get around. I went to the Checkpoint Charlie Museum, the Pergamon Museum and the KaDeWe department store.  Paris was great. The architecture there is something I had never seen before. I took a lot of pictures. I will have to go again. I also got some maps of Paris and one of Salzburg. I will send them to you. Thank you so much again for all your help! I don't know what I would have done without it!  Jake of Williamsburg, Va.  6 July 05 Glad your Trip was great. I appreciate the maps and will pass them on to our other travelers.  Mele Just wanted to send thanks from the Frodsham party's European excursion. Over 33 days we toured 12 countries (if you count the Vatican and Monaco), had a great time, and the Eurail pass made that all possible. We really appreciated your help and advice. You can be sure that if I have the chance, I'll send my recommendations your way.  Frodsham party of Marlboro, NJ 4 July 05 Well you have given me a wealth of information and now I just need time to check out all of the sites you provided URL addresses for.  I appreciate very much that you took time to address all of my questions and comments.  I already feel less stressed knowing I can count on your to help me plan this trip. Janice of LA Ca.  25 April 05 Our tickets, Paris-Brussels return, arrived today, thank you so much.  It was a pleasure doing business with you, I've passed your name on to my sister, and you will hear from us the next time we have a trip planned!  Mina of Pittsboro, NC  20 Jan 05 Thank you so very much for your exteremely informative message. I'm flabbergasted. Sincerely, Matt Cantor 23 Dec 04 WOW mele! that was FAST!! i just got it right now! talk about fast service! i'm amazed! THANK YOU sooooooooooo much, mele, for all your help w/ this train ticket! i REALLY appreciate your getting me on the trains i wanted and making sure i'm taken care of. you're fantastic! next time i need any travel help, i'll contact you for sure! do you do only trains or do you do flights/hotels, too?  THANK YOU again, mele!  angella of San Francisco, Ca 13 Oct 04     Angella, Since we ship from Fresno, California, all our California clients get cheap 1 day ground UPS shipping.  Luck you folks!  Mele of TERC Hi, I received the rail pass and reservation today. Thanks a lot for your great service. I was very pleased.          Paul of Hoboken, NJ  9 Sept 04 Thank you very much for you kind help in planning our trip to Europe. It was a very nice vacation, we have enjoyed a lot. Your itinerary helps us a lot in planning the trip,  Again with thanks,    Manideep of Pembroke Pines  FL 26 Aug 04 We just wanted to thank you for all of your help with the Eurail Selectpasses.  We would have been so lost with out you. We have everything finalized and our looking forward to a wonderful trip. Thanks again for all your help and tidbits of information. You were wonderful to work with! Best Regards,  Kelly & Nick of Poway, CA  11 June 04 Hi Mele, Hope you remember me the lady who missed your lovely offer at the last minute!!! Well atleast I'm happy to inform that we had a great trip and are back safely. Mele your information was very helpful. I carried the print of your mail with all the information. Thanks a lot for helping me plan the trip even without knowing whether I will get the passes from you. When I did decide to get them it was too late and I missed the offer and I still feel sorry!!!! Anyway next time if I want to get a offer from you I'll act faster. Thanks once again. Regards Enoka  of India  26 July 03 Intermational Shipping by UPS from our Fresno California, USA office takes 4 to 5 Business days and I am sorry our American Holiday didn't give us enough time to follow through.  I still am amazed at how small our world is becomming!!!. Mele It never occurred to me the best resource for travel to the U.K. would be a U.S. resident! I never would have found you if I hadn't researched the train routes on a British web site.It's been so great to have your knowledge and experience as a resource. It has surely saved me a bundle, already, in little details I would have overlooked, just out of sheer ignorance. I'll update the itinerary, no need to make you into my secretary! I will use your itinerary as a template for all of my future trips, it's such a great tool! Thanks! Thanks SO MUCH for the advice on traveler's checks - I was just about to get some. What a waste that would have been!  (Use your ATM card for cash in Europe for best exchange rates) I cannot believe it'll be six little weeks before my daughter and I are hopping the pond!!!!! I am soooooooo excited!!!!  -Chris  of Baltimore, MD  15 May 03 You're website, travel knowledge and planning skills are a blessing for those of us starting out!  Best regards, Tracy Marie of Eugene, Or.  30 April 03 Hello Mele, My husband and I are very impressed with your service and attention to details. It was extremely helpful to see the time involved in the journey and the suggestion of when to start etc. I would really appreciate your itinerary service. I think with it being our first trip, limited time and two kids we will have to be quite organized. Thanks for the tip on Nice and the alternate spot of Antibes. Our kids are easily spooked by things so I appreciate any "safety" tips or places you would avoid with kids prone to nightmares and anxieties! Thank-you. I will definitely talk up your service. It is very unique.    T. Noble  Van Couver, BC  Feb 12, 02 I'm really impressed with your promptness on answering my questions. . .and, the completeness of your web presence. Loved reading your postings on "toilet training for Europe." Do you work out of Europe or USA? Are you a one man (one lady) travel advisor? And there's another question: Are you a guy or a gal? Just wondering.               Meet Mele and find out! I appreciate all the info you've given me; I'll print them off and make sure I'm clear on it all. I feel certain we'll be dealing with you on the group's tickets for July from Paris to Rome.  Robert  Feb 2, 02 Mele --   This itinerary is great. I will look it over with my companion and we will make some adjustments. Do the museum passes work at St. Chapel/Notre Dame etc and do you sell them? Do you plan vacations to other destinations than Europe? I have thus far enjoyed your services immensely, and would happily consider using you for other vacations in the future... including Hawaii... -- Kent  of CA  4 Feb. 02 Yes  they work at these sights. I can sell you museum and even transportation passes for London & Paris, BUT, instead I will give you information on how to get these things much cheaper in the cities you are visiting. And I ONLY DO EUROPE!  Doing More would decrease the qualify of our service and information. Thanks for your kind words and endorsement,  Mele  "I've historically coordinated my own schedules with myself and adult companions, using the Thomas Cook Timetable, spending hours considering options... I was fortunate to find Mele at TERCMele@aol.com when I went with my 3 daughters and it was the deciding factor in expanding the trip using a 3 country pass. I knew my freewheeling needed to be more refined with a party of 5. Even with Militant Optimism a teenager can make for a tough travel companion if we're stuck for half a day in a train station due to poor planning-thanks Mele for making sure this didn't happen...;-)"  enjoy your thoroughness and I have lots of friends that travel... keep up the good work. Lance Hall  MN 22 Dec 2001   And thank you Lance for "your words of recommendation".  Mele Fujiwara, TERC Travel Consultant and mother of 4! Hi Mele! Just wanted to send you a quick note to say that my husband and I had such a wonderful time in Europe! I picked up a few maps from Paris for you to pass on to other clients ---just as you did for us! I have so many good traveling tales for you! Also, I wanted to thank you again for the "n"-th time......you've been so helpful! We couldn't have planned our European vacation without all of your generous help and patience! Your train skedules were so helpful, as well as all the other information you provided! I'm so glad I met you in your class! Looking forward to hearing back from you!  Mahalo! Rona Anduha   Hawaii  3 October 2001 Hi Mele,     I got your package in the mail today, with all the free  train timetables and maps.  YOU ARE WONDERFUL! You better believe I'll be telling people who plan to visit Europe to contact you and have you do the work for them! In fact, I'm going to add something to that effect to my own website. YOU'RE THE BEST!  -Joe Monzo  CA. 31 Aug 2001 Thanks for the tip; I will print out the packing light page. Thanks for all your help in planning our Europe trip. Any time you need a referral I would be glad to oblige.  David Toof MD   23 August 2001 I am back and had the greatest time in Italy. Your train schedule really helped. The only time I had a problem was that I did not change in Bologna when I wanted to go to Verona Porta Nuvoa. I went all the way to Milano just to trace back to Verona!  I have information about local buses and trains to pass on. I will write to you later in details. This is to tell you that I have not forgotten my promise. Aloha, Takako  Hawaii  8 Aug 2001 Just wanted to let you know that we had a great trip to Europe and everything went like clockwork. Thanks for arranging the Chunnel tickets. Our train actually broke down on the way back to Paris and they are giving us free tickets. Don't know if/when we'll be able to use them. I would like to let you know about a special place we discovered.     We'll contact you soon for help with our next "foray".  Thanks,  Bob and Echo Miles Seoul, Korea 24 Jul 2001 Hi Mele: I really appreciate the chance to work with someone so knowledgeable about Italy. I've attached our itinerary below; hopefully it will format correctly..............Paul Davis  CA. 12 April 01 My Dear Ms. Mele Fujiwara, My God !!! You sound like an angel in disguise !!!! Thank you ever so much for these tips and for agreeing to guide me further. I still cannot believe I might be able to talk to and get the help of a real expert like you. I ONLY think of, talk about and dream about my Europe trip. Even in my sleep - there's just one thought - EUROPE !!!   I am also doing some reading up (on the internet), making cost comparisons, etc, along with figuring out what all I'd like to cover in Europe. After I do the preliminary work you suggested, I'll e-mail you the details and then you can advise me where I could make changes.  I thank you once again for your support. I am almost feeling re-energised and excited all over again. I hope we can make this happen. Warmest regards,  Monisha  21 June 2001 just wanted to let you know i received the chunnel tickets and very much appreciate your help in arranging the travel plans. you must have one of the best jobs.....enjoy   brian toqe,  CA 25 June 2001       "I sure do!"   Mele Everything looks great! Thanks SO much for your incredibly friendly sevice!  Irene Middleton, NC   25 June 2001 Dear Mele, Remember us?? I took your class three years ago before traveling to Italy. We are now living in Northern Calif. We just returned from a week in Paris. Used Rick's Paris Book exclusively. Remembered your suggestion to buy the Paris Museum Pass .... A MARVELOUS suggestion... It was unbelievable, the way we walked past blocks of lines of people and went right in the entrance of many places but especially the Louvre and The D'Orsay. Please note our new email address. Merci Beaucoup Madame. Mary Drew and Dick Rolston  CA. 27 June 2001 Dear Mele, Thank you for your help with regards to our trip to Italy and Austria. We had a great time and there were no problems.   Sincerely,  Keith Moody  Hawaii  28 May 2001 MELE You are efficient! It was a pleasure spending the afternoon with you. both fran and I learmed a lot from the meeting. Will await your train schedules. Thanks once again. We will try to get the hotel you recommended in Paris......if our paths cross, would like to take you out to dinner.  Allen Teshema  Hawaii 4 May 2001 Hi Mele, It's said that all good things come to an end. A vacation without an end is no longer a vacation. I had a wonderful time in Paris. Didn't get to do all that I had hoped, but there were unexpected and serendipitous events that made up for it. Would like to share them with you when you return from your trip abroad. In the meantime, I have some Metro tickets that I didn't use and I'll put them in the mail for you.  Elaine Shinigawa  Hawaii  4 May 2001 Hello Mele, Thank you for your relpy and yes the rail passes were OK..... and Thanks again for all your help. Now I know why Rick Steve recommended you.   Bev Carlon  Hawaii 14 Feb. 2001 RE: travel from geneve airport (switzerland) to aigle (Leysin) I really appreciate the very helpful information you gave me (via e-mail), that's what I'm looking for. I am already enjoying my stay in Switzerland. Thanks again      N. Kornfeld 18 Jan 2001  TERC Web Site user I received my rail passes in the mail and wanted to thank you for all your help and advice. You were an immense help in planning my trip. Thanks again,  Lauren Bush  Hawaii  29 April 2000

				8 May 99 from Praugue HAVING A WONDERFUL TRIP SO FAR MELE.   TRYING TO SAVE INFO. AND BROCHURES FOR YOU.   I'M MODIFYING PLANS AS I GO AND AM OFF TO BUDAPEST TOMORROW. THE CZECH PEOPLE ARE GREAT AND SO IS THE BEER.   JUST WANTED TO SAY "HI" AND THANK YOU FOR YOUR HELP AGAIN.     TIM SAWYER
				mele -                                                                              27 June 99 Your web site is looking great. boy, you've done lots on it! I really like the way you've added all of the links. Very useful and too cool! Thanks for letting me know about my stuff. (Road Reports + ATM tip)  Again, Mele, I would like to thank you for all of your help in planning our trip. Your pack lite class was a godsend - wish I 'd taken even less than I did. I shudder to think how much unnecessary stuff I'd have dragged along with out the benefit of your guidance in this department. Your tips on places to go, see, do, eat at and stay at were most helpful also. It is absolutely so that without your generous guidance, assistance and support our trip would not have been the same. You are truly the "goddess of cost effective,  fun European Travel." mahalo nui.aloha       Marlee.

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