Traveling to Europe this summer

[josh0099]

Originally posted by: Mellow
Looks like we'll be dropping the UK (except for maybe a day or two in London), Switzerland, and Marseille in favor of Barcelona + Madrid, Rome, Prague, and one or two German cities.

Can anyone recommend Frankfort, Hamburg, or Berlin over the other two?

Thanks for the Steve Ricks book idea! Looks like a great investment!

I would goto Munich in Germany great beer halls and a great city overall... Also check out neuschwanstein castle which is outside of Munich... Text
Also you could goto Dachau (Concentration Camp) if you are a history buff, which is also outside the city but readily accessible...Also the $18/day food budget is way too low...Even if you do hit markets and get food you will be starving. I would say budget $30 and if you have extra spend it on booze

 

[RaistlinZ]

Don't skip London entirely. At least spend one full day to tour. You will regret it otherwise if you knew what you missed out on.

 

[DivideBYZero]

How in hell did you book a bus from Dublin to London for £15?

 

[Skyclad1uhm1]

London is indeed extremely expensive. If you venture out of the tourist part in Amsterdam you can get reasonably priced food. But it may still be cheaper to just take a train to a different town in the Netherlands (will take about half an hour to get to the second, third of fourth largest cities) as those tend to be cheaper still. And in Paris you won't get really cheap food either, but there are some reasonably priced places.

Ask if you have more specific questions, I should be able to answer at least questions regarding the Netherlands, considering I live there

 

[IamBusby]

Originally posted by: Mellow
Looks like we'll be dropping the UK (except for maybe a day or two in London), Switzerland, and Marseille in favor of Barcelona + Madrid, Rome, Prague, and one or two German cities.

Can anyone recommend Frankfort, Hamburg, or Berlin over the other two?

Thanks for the Steve Ricks book idea! Looks like a great investment!

I live in London and many a weekend when I'm skint I'll pop into central where there's loads of things to do for free. Natural history museum, Science museum the national art gallery, the Tate etc.

They are all for free and that's all days. The only reason you would have to pay money is if you wanted to see a particular exhibition/donate money otherwise you can just walk in.

Go to the riverside (from Waterloo station) where there's usually loads of outside plays, shows and music and of course the sights.

Honestly I can go out into central with a £5 note and come back with £3 change after spending the whole day out and about. True you can easily do the opposite also where I've gone out and come back after spending £100 without coming back with anything.

 

[IamBusby]

Originally posted by: DivideBYZero
How in hell did you book a bus from Dublin to London for £15?

If you book early enough there's a bus service called "Megabus" I think it is where they do trips from various city's for £1. I know they do Cardiff to London, Bristol to London, Edinburgh etc. Not sure if they do Dublin though as that would obviously involve the ferry.

 

[davestar]

Originally posted by: Mellow
Looks like we'll be dropping the UK (except for maybe a day or two in London), Switzerland, and Marseille in favor of Barcelona + Madrid, Rome, Prague, and one or two German cities.

Can anyone recommend Frankfort, Hamburg, or Berlin over the other two?

Thanks for the Steve Ricks book idea! Looks like a great investment!

Where to go:

Hopefully this won't be your only trip to Europe. Assuming you'll have other, definitely save the more expensive parts of your trip for when you're older (ie have more $$ and the USD is stronger).

I'd recommend Munich over the other German cities you mentioned. Also, I'd definitely check out Vienna while you're in the area. I've been to ~20 European cities and Vienna is absolutely in the top 3.

Also, like I mentioned before (I think), try to organize your trip so that your destinations are close(r) together. You'll not only save money on transportation, but you'll save precious time and sanity.

If I had 30 days and had never been to Europe (though know what I do now), I'd do something like:

Paris -> train to
Marseille -> train to
Cinque Terra -> train to
Rome -> train to
Venice -> train to
Munich -> train to
Vienna -> train to
Prague -> train to
Krakow -> fly to
Paris

or

Amsterdam -> train to
Brussels -> train to
Paris -> train to
Bordeaux -> train to
Barcelona -> train to
Marseille -> train to
Cinque Terra -> train to
Florence -> train to
Rome -> fly to
Amsterdam

Travel

As far as the Ryanair/EasyJet issue... The cheap flights are very enticing, but you have to factor in that getting to/from airports costs a fair bit of money and A LOT of time. Compare taking a train vs taking a flight:

Plane: 1/2 hour bus/metro/train/taxi to the airport + 2 hours at the airport + 2 hour flight + 1/2 hour getting bags + 1/2 hour bus/metro/taxi to the arrival city center. Essentially you lose a whole day and you're exhausted.

Train: Walk from your hostel to the train 10 minutes before the train leaves, have a relaxing and scenic 2-4 hour train ride, arrive at the train station a few blocks from your next hostel happy and ready to rock

RyanAir/EasyJet have their place, but I much prefer to use trains. The best way to go, IMO, is to find the cheapest flight from Philly to a city (A) that you're interested in. Take trains to every subsequent city and then only from your last city fly back to city (A) via RA/EJ.

Random

What else... check out the Lonely Planet books in addition to (instead of) Rick Steves. They're more geared to the young crowd than ole' Ricky.

If $2,500 is really all you have to spend on the trip, you essentially have to head to eastern Europe for atleast part of it. You'll probably never make your budget otherwise. In August I spent under $1,000 while there over 15 days without skimping.

 

[Demo24]

Originally posted by: Mellow
Looks like we'll be dropping the UK (except for maybe a day or two in London), Switzerland, and Marseille in favor of Barcelona + Madrid, Rome, Prague, and one or two German cities.

Can anyone recommend Frankfort, Hamburg, or Berlin over the other two?

Thanks for the Steve Ricks book idea! Looks like a great investment!

Barcelona and Madrid are nice cities! However you will need to be able to use spanish to get around easily.

Also I would recommend spending the money on a good meal while there because the food is excellent and they have large portions! Just remember they eat really late there. Many restaurants don't open until 9pm

 

[Mellow]

Thanks again for the input.

Can anyone point me to the cheapest way to utilize the rail system. Looks like I'm looking at a minimum of 6 days of country to country travel. A lot of the rail systems I've looked at won't give me quotes this far in advance. Would a rail-pass be my best best?

 

[davestar]

Originally posted by: Mellow
Thanks again for the input.

Can anyone point me to the cheapest way to utilize the rail system. Looks like I'm looking at a minimum of 6 days of country to country travel. A lot of the rail systems I've looked at won't give me quotes this far in advance. Would a rail-pass be my best best?

Use Rail Europe to get quotes. Just put in random non-holiday dates 1 - 2 months from now. The prices will be pretty much the same come summer. Compare the sum of individual tickets vs the cost of a Eurail pass, though understand that there's additional costs (seat reservations, etc) that'll apply to the Eurail pass.

As a general rule, if you'll be travelling in touristy Western countries, you'll probably be better off with a pass. If you'll be hitting up some more easterly cities you might be better off with individual tickets.

 

[IceBergSLiM]

w3hy on earth will you be spending 7 nights in paris. WHY THE FUCK ISN"T ITALY ON THERE. SCREW PARIS ALL TOGETHER GOTO ITALY.

 

[ElFenix]

Originally posted by: DEMO24
Barcelona and Madrid are nice cities! However you will need to be able to use spanish to get around easily.

Also I would recommend spending the money on a good meal while there because the food is excellent and they have large portions! Just remember they eat really late there. Many restaurants don't open until 9pm

of course, madrid's 9 pm is the same time as berlin's 9 pm and london's 8 pm, despite the fact that it is west of london. so it's more like 7:30 pm. spainards aren't really up late, they just live in a really messed up time zone.