Testimonials

03 Apr 2017

Working with Julie was a pleasure. With three weeks notice I asked Julie to arrange an unforgettable, last minute vacation for a family of four… I provided a list of priorities, and she asked for a couple days to put some options together. My family has literally travelled the world. My 17 year old daughter said it best, “Of all our adventures, this was my favorite.” Julie made it easy..no hassles, no surprises, just exactly what we wanted. Her advice, professionalism, and follow through to ensure everything went smoothly was invaluable. I won’t waste my time planning my own travel in the future.

Jason Bately
Davidson, NC

07 Jan 2017

As usual, Julie had everything planned right down to the transfers for this big trip to AU. Unfortunately, we had to cancel the week before departure because of an injury. And here, Julia really shined – handling all the travel insurance claim for us down to the last detail – making this refund experience smooth for her clients. Thank you Julie! You have all our travel business!

By : DB/GMTravel (Gwen Miles)

October 2, 2016

We cannot speak highly enough of Julie! Having worked with her on several trips now, she is simply the BEST! takes care of every detail, watches out for her clients while they are travelling, she always answers every question and has expert knowledge of so many locales. We trust her explicitly to deliver the best in service wherever we are traveling. We hope you will pass this along to Julie – she is a real asset to your company in every way.

By: Davidson Travelers (Gwen Miles)

October 06, 2016

Julie is the perfect travel agent! She’s a stickler for details, cares deeply about her clients and their travel experience, and communicates thoroughly and often. She booked our cruise and planned extra nights before and after so that our anniversary trip was ideal. We’ve met her in person on several occasions and she’s a real sweetheart as well as competent professional.

Nancy Dye
Raleigh, NC

24 Sep 2016

Julie was wonderful to work with. She took the time to explain and offer suggestions when deciding where we wanted to take our 15th wedding anniversary. Once when decided on France she was a well of knowledge since she use to live in France. She was very personable, easy to work and I would definitely use her again.

Nikki Lacy
Huntersville, NC

I have traveled all over the world. Planned trips, gone with groups, and done countless hours researching for things over the years. This trip I gave all that way and placed everything in Julie’s hands. It was a leap of faith but one I will do again. Julie made our trip to Bali and Korea seemless. Everything was thought through and double checked. We had drivers at the airports, resorts that exceeded my expectations, and local guides that were professional and fun to be around. There were a lot of moving parts, 4 resorts, 2 airlines, 2 drivers, 2 guides and exertions that gave us a true feeling of the cultures. From cooking classes to a healing ceremony, her choices enhanced the experience we were trying to create, I don’t know what else you could ask for from an agent. The best compliment came from a guide, who said Julie was on top of her game for us. There is a great amount of confidence you gain in someone, when you know they are working as hard as you would for yourself.

By: Susan (Susan Bednarick)
Mooresville, NC

November 1,  2015

Julie Harris once again planned a trip of a lifetime for me and my husband. My husband and I had never been to Italy and wanted to celebrate our 40th birthdays with a week long celebration. Julie listened carefully to our ideas for the trip and then added her expert advice and knowledge to make sure our all our travel plans reflected our desires to have a “taste of Italy.” She planned a trip through Rome, Tuscany and Florence that felt luxurious but yet stayed with in our strick budget. Each property we stayed at was warm, welcoming and made us feel right at home. It was hard to say goodbye to each location. The private tours were extremely educational, personal and allowed us to get a true glimpse of the Italian culture both long ago and today. We appreciated the phone calls to check in with us during
each of our stays to make sure we were well taken care of and to remind us of upcoming important events in our itinerary, It was a birthday celebration to never forget. Thank you Julie!
By:  Jennifer Myers
Davidson, NC  28036

Very well planned By: PePop (Terry Weatherford)

Very well planned and organized. Hotels were excellent and well located for activities. Air travel was seamless and no problems incurred. the hotel accommodations, the tour sites, the travel plans, rental cars, etc. all met our expectations. The one issue on billing at one hotel was clarified and corrected promptly to our satisfaction.

Cornelius, NC

Huntersville, NC

There has been a lot of talk recently about whether it is safe to travel to the tourist regions in Southern Africa with the current ebola outbreak in Western and Central Africa.  I want to help to alleviate some of the fear that many people have. Some people have the misperception that Africa is like one big country, but it is actually a huge and very diverse continent.  The distance from Cape Town, South Africa from Freetown, Sierra Leone, the center of the ebola outbreak, is 5,931 miles.  To put it into U.S. perspective, this distance from Los Angeles to New York, NY is roughly 2,800 miles.  According to a recent article in Forbes, there is more of a chance that you could get ebola in the US, France, or the United Kingdom than in Southern or Eastern Africa.  There are more than twice as many flights from West Africa to the United States than to South Africa.  There have been 4 reported cases in the US so far which is more than South Africa, Botswana, Namibia, and Tanzania combined.  Flights into Johannesburg and Capetown do not connect through West Africa.  Typically you connect in JFK / London / Dubai / Frankfurt / Paris.  Therefore you are completely avoiding the areas where the ebola is present.  Click here for a map.

September 24, 2014
From day 1, Julie was the greatest! She was recommended to us by my husband’s work colleague. At first, we wanted to celebrate our 30th wedding anniversary by planning a trip to Italy on our own for sometime in June or Sept, but time constraints and the complexity of making plans prompted me to contact Julie. She was able to pull off booking a wonderful itinerary with VERY SHORT NOTICE. I first contacted her on Jul 24 and by Aug 5, she had finalized all our flights, hotels, tours, and transfers for our trip which took place Sep 8-18! Julie was incredibly responsive every step of the way, returning every call and email promptly. She really listened to our needs, made excellent suggestions, worked within our budget, and provided all the details, tips and information we needed to enjoy a great vacation (especially loved La Corte dei Papi in Cortona). Julie is a great communicator and her follow-up was fantastic! We highly recommend her and hope to work with her again in the future! A+++

Eileen Caffry
Shelburne, VT

Charlotte, NC

I just wanted to let you know that we had a fabulous time at the Dreams Riviera Maya Resort in Cancun and I wanted to thank you for taking care of everything and organizing a really awesome family vacation for us. The Cool Tour was amazing and was definitely the highlight of the trip for the boys. We look forward to booking many more vacations through your company.

Kind Regards,
Sanjee

Sanjee Singh
Avax Consulting
Marietta, Georgia

Hi Julie,

I just wanted to say thank you for everything.  We had an amazing honeymoon.  The massages you had waiting for us were so relaxing.  You made our trip stress free. Thank you again 🙂

Jessica Adamczak
Huntersville, NC

I so enjoyed working with Julie! She is quick and efficient and was very helpful with our travel planning. She was amazing at helping us get our passports expedited, she got us direct flights with great departure times, and we were able to use air miles as well. She also secured an awesome property for us that met our needs for a family of five. Would totally use her again in a heartbeat! Thank you, Julie! You are the best!

Karen Anthony
Davidson, NC

If you are looking for a wonderful travel experience, try both Julie Harris at Solis Escapes AND go to Costa Rica. My friend and I were looking for a warm-weather get-away, but didn’t want to sit on a beach for a week at a resort. Julie Harris of Solis Escapes put together the perfect vacation for us, so that we enjoyed interesting tours, learned about the ecology and country of Costa Rica, AND enjoyed beach/pool time at lovely hotel resorts.When we met with Julie for the first time, she listened to our requests, asked valuable questions, and then put together a travel package that met all our needs. We stayed in lovely hotels, enjoyed interesting tours, and experienced the people and ecology of Costa Rica.Julie Harris is a delightful travel agent – if you are looking for help in any kind of trip, I recommend that you call her.

Barbara Dillman
Davidson, NC

Thank you Julie Costa Rica Girls

From the first meeting with Julie to plan the trip, to the ‘debrief’ after the trip, Julie listened carefully and exceeded all expectations for our trip to Costa Rica. The hotels selected were especially nice as were the recommended excursions! Julie arranged for all transfers for the regions of the country we visited and even over bouncy, winding Costa Rican roads all went well. Thank you Julie! such a nice job – no wonder we have Julie planning another trip for us – this time to Italy!

Gwen Miles
Davidson, NC

I would highly recommend Julie. She was very professional and handled a couple of last minute problems, (caused by my crew), very efficiently.

Julie helped my wife and I set up a trip to Belize. She had been there before and was very familiar with all of the great spots to see, and memorable things to do. Her knowledge is unmatched, and she is very sweet and takes time to get exactly what you want out of your trip. It was very easy to follow the itinerary, and if we felt the need to get in touch with her with a question about the trip she was there immediately helping us. Do yourself a favor and use her service.

Julie was so awesome at booking the cruise for my honeymoon. Seamless service, WONDERFUL attitude and an amazing spirit. I have told all of my friends that they should work with Julie when making their vacation plans for the new year. Thank you so much for everything Julie!

“Last summer our family had a great opportunity to spend a month in Asia. After picking China and Vietnam we did not have much of a clue, and time was short. Julie jumped on it, quickly understood the type of travel we wanted and put together a fantastic itinerary with local guides and drivers on a reasonable budget.  Julie was knowledgeable, extremely responsive and a real pleasure to work with. (more…)

“Our family takes the obligatory local beach trip every other year; but in between those trips, we explore other parts of the world, taking in all the history and local experiences we can. Let me say I don’t like the traditional beach trips: I don’t like the sand or the bugs that invariably get everywhere, so I was glad this year was going to be different. Still, we hadn’t planned a specific trip. I met Julie for a Lake Norman Woman Magazine interview and loved her approach to planning client travels. While I’ve always handled all the vacation planning myself (thus the stand-off my husband and I were having), I sent Julie an email asking if she knew anyone in Martha’s Vineyard because it  was my dream vacation since I was a child. In her interview, I had learned Julie wants to know her clients’  travel expectations, likes, dislikes, etc., so I told her my affinity for Jaws and Empire Falls, and I was honest about my husband’s and my son’s–and my–expectations and habits. Most importantly, I admitted that I was asking her for something that may be impossible at such a late date. Julie found us the perfect house to rent in the exact part of the island that I wanted (and while it may have been accidental, I believe it was fortuitous). Then, she was able to arrange our flight and bus schedules (because flying directly onto the island was beyond our financial scope), seamlessly aligning all the transportation with the island ferry schedule. And if you think “Bus?” and turn up your nose? No, it was comfortable and even had Wi-Fi! Because Julie could take these travel plans off my plate, I was able to get all my editor responsibilities finished before my trip so I was able to turn off my email throughout the trip. Really. I actually did that! And, I had time to read two travel guidebooks ahead of time to feel really prepared for the trip of a lifetime. Julie also arranged for me to talk with someone on the island about the other incidentals and helped with finding a rental car, the linen service, and the other things we’d need. And she took it in stride when we changed our minds and wanted to stay in Boston two additional nights after the island–and she helped us find a hotel. I’ll be honest: we typically haven’t considered a travel specialist in the past because of the perceived expense. But when the bill came, Lee didn’t even notice Julie’s fee–and the stress and time she spared me, in turn, allowing me to relax and enjoy the experience was worth it ten-fold! One thing I think anyone will notice in working with Julie is she is genuinely excited for you to be going on your trip. And she handles all the aspects of you travel as if it were her own. I’m spoiled–I don’t want to go anywhere else without Julie, ever again!”

“Thank you!  Thank you so much for working with me to make my wife’s 40th birthday surprise very special.  She absolutely loved the yoga and surf retreat in Costa Rica.  Without your assistance, I have no idea where we would have ended up but I sincerely doubt it would have been as memorable.  The first day when I called you and we spent half an hour talking about what types of vacations my wife and I enjoy clearly indicated to me that you were unique and better than average at what you do.  You took extra steps to make sure that I had all of the information needed to make the right choice for our fabulous trip and continued to follow-up every step of the way until we left the U.S., EXCELLENT customer service.  We loved the Harmony Nosara as well as all of the staff that made our stay simply incredible.  We will definitely go back to Costa Rica and will use and recommend your services for future travel.”

“When my husband and I decided to go to Costa Rica for our vacation this year, I decided to find a travel agent to help me plan the trip. We did not want to drive in Costa Rica but we did want to visit the different regions. A travel agency recommended Julie Harris of Solis Escapes, LLC. Julie helped us plan a most unforgettable vacation. She arranged the complete trip: air, hotels, transportation to/from each location, day trips, travel insurance, etc. Julie is a very good listener and it resulted in vacation memories we will always cherish. The people she worked with to set up the trip did a great job. We enjoyed our visit to each region of Costa Rica, met warm and friendly people, the drivers were always on time for pick up, and were friendly and informative. I will gladly recommend Julie to anyone I know that needs travel assistance. She paid attention to detail and was always “there”. In addition to Julie being a very nice person and easy to work with, I consider her to be a true professional. Many thanks, Julie!!”

“The cruise was amazing!!! Thanks for all your planning and assistance. Everything went wonderfully. We loved the “lil” extras we got for being on our honeymoon. You made everything so easy for us so we truly were able to relax and enjoy our vacation. I can’t begin to talk about how exquisite the ship was. Adrian took several pictures of the ship which I will send to you. We are looking into doing a another trip around summer so we will most certainly be giving you a call for assistance with that. We have referred you to several friends so they should be contacting you shortly. Thanks again for making our honeymoon the best experience ever!”

“Thanks so much for planning our romantic getaway to St. Lucia. Your attention to the details and complimentary amenities like the wine and spa treatment were lovely surprises. The Hotel Chocolat and their Boucan restaurant proved to be hidden gems. The accommodations were well designed and had homemade snacks and beverages refreshed every day, the grounds beautifully kept, and the staff genuinely happy to make our stay the very best. Besides the award winning restaurant where guests from all over the island came to dine, there were chocolate making classes, and educational tours of the cocoa producing plantation. St. Lucia¹s beaches, rain forest, and the Pitons made for some gorgeous scenery.”

“Everyone watching TV or listening to the radio, is convinced that they don’t need someone to advise them about insurance. Just go on to a website, click on a couple of choices and start saving money. This might be true for a little while, until they need to file a claim. Then they realize, they weren’t as protected as they thought they were. We were going to celebrate a milestone at work and wanted to visit the Boone/Blowing Rock area. There are countless travel websites, not to mention hotel sites, each touting themselves as the best. We did searches and were bombarded with choices. Too many in fact. So we turned to Julie Harris at Solis Escapes. A travel agent with years of experience planning trips, she provided us with much needed advice. She recommended the Meadowbrook Inn in Blowing Rock and when we got there we were impressed with the accommodations and the proximity to downtown. A three day weekend seemed like a week-long vacation. Thank you for the suggestions and making it as simple as packing up and driving there. So when somebody asks, who needs a travel agent, I’ll tell them anyone who wants to enjoy their vacation. Thank you.”

“Julie Harris from Solis Escapes, LLC planned our 20th wedding anniversary trip to Cancun, Mexico. It was so nice to have her do all the planning, researching and booking! I felt like my vacation started right there and then…. no hassle in shopping or reading reviews. It was great just to trust a professional and let her do all the leg work for us – alleviating confusion and stress. All we had to do was show up and enjoy!! The resort she recommended was incredible and it was a great feeling to know if anything was wrong she was a phone call away even though we were out of the country. The extra perks we received thru Julie were amazing and very detailed. We are very lucky to have a wonderful Travel Advisor for the years to come!! She saved us money, time and stress. Nothing else could be better!!!”