First Time Traveling

[logan4000]

Hi i am trying to plan a trip about 2-3 month. Starting in London, then heading into the rest of Europe. just wondering how to really go about planning. i am pretty flexible and i plan to have a good chunch of money. i will be traveling alone.

[madamtrashheap]

Welcome to GFE, logan4000.

A few things to consider for your planning stage:

1. what time of year do you plan to travel?
2. consider transport between each city - you'll likely use a combination of trains and flights.
3. consider an open-jaw ticket, that is, fly into one city and fly home from another city, that way you don't have to back track and can make the most of your time
4. have a look at other posts in this section for ideas on a route/places to visit
5. make a list of cities/things you really want to see, then the rest will begin to take shape
6. once you have a rough idea of places you'd like to see, post a draft itinerary and we'll help adjust as necessary.

Happy planning!

[logan4000]

thanks i will post more later

[logan4000]

hey there i have a good idea of places we wanna go we have book a flight that lands in frankfort on sept 1st, we also are getting 2 month unlimtied rail pass's from there we want to go to belgium then amsterdam then over to berlin from there we are heading down to munich for okoberfest from there over to czech where i am hoping my buddy can hook me up with a place to stay at his cuzins that live in the little village of Trisoz he says there is a bunch of old castles and thing to hike to witch would be really neat to see then to prague where he has friends that can take us out for some night life lol he says there are some kewl places to go there and then into italy we definatly wanna go to rome and havent decided on many other places yet tell me what you think THANKS

[Eagle]

logan4000,

I have a few comments to add as well.

You didn't indicate where you were travelling from, but since you're planning to start in Frankfurt I'm assuming you're travelling from North America. My first suggestion would be to pre-read the Guidebook Europe Through The Back Door before you get too far in your planning. It's an essential read for those travelling to Europe for the first time.

Depending on where you're from, be sure to ensure that you don't stay in the Schengen zone (pretty much all of western Europe) longer than three months, or you could face severe penalties.

As you're planning to visit OktoberFest, be sure to book accommodations WELL in advance if you want to stay right in Munich! If you don't pre-book you'll probably end up staying in a nearby town, which is a bit of a nuisance to get back and forth to the festivities.

There are almost unlimited possibilities of places to see in Europe, and some other places you might consider are the Cinque Terre (Italy) and Gimmelwald (Switzerland). Be sure to allow at least four or five days each for the "big three" of London, Paris and Rome.

Cheers!

[logan4000]

hey thanks for the tip i was wondering where to go in switzerland too so that sounds good and i am from Grande Prairie Alberta we are leaving fom Edmonton and i hope our book store has that book should be a lot of help thanks