August in Europe

[willburress]

Hey everyone---
My friend and I are planning a trip in August, as we both are doing study abroad programs that end around the same time. We cooked up this itinerary... will this work? We are more interested in just experiencing each city, not necessarily seeing every single thing. Day trips out of some of the larger cities are what we'd like to focus on, as well as exploring the city on our own.

Any suggestions are appreciated.

July 28: Rome
July 29: Rome
July 30: Rome
July 31: Venice
August 1: Venice
August 2: Interlaken
August 3: Interlaken
August 4: Munich
August 5: Munich
August 6: Munich
August 7: Munich
August 8: Prague
August 9: Prague
August 10: Berlin
August 11: Berlin
August 12: Berlin
August 13: Amsterdam
August 14: Amsterdam
August 15: Amsterdam
August 16: Amsterdam
August 17: Amsterdam
August 18: Brussels
August 19: Brussels
August 20: Brussels
August 21: Paris
August 22: Paris
August 23: Paris
August 24: Paris
August 25: Possible homestay w/family friends in France
August 26: Possible homestay w/family friends in France
August 27: Possible homestay w/family friends in France
August 28: Dublin
August 29: Dublin
August 30: Dublin
August 31: Dublin
September 1: Fly home

[madamtrashheap]

Welcome to GFE, willburress.

If you've read through some of the other Posts on these Boards, you may have noticed two things that we often remark on:
1. August is the busiest time to travel in Europe so you'll need to book well ahead for accommodation
2. A minimum time in each city listed is often recommended, and days trips require an extra day to be added in many cases.

With regard to the second point, as you've noted that you and your friend don't necessarily want to see everything in every city, it might help if we knew what you did want to see to make sure you've allowed enough time in each place to cover your wish list. Rome, for example, usually requires 3-4 full days minimum to explore the city. However if you were considering a day trip to Pompei, you'd need to consider that in the number of days you spend in the city.

The other cities on your list bring up a few points:
Venice - if you take the fast train from Rome to Venice, you'll have a day and a half to sightsee, which is good.
Interlaken - are you going for the adventure sports or scenery? If it's the latter, then consider going a little further up the mountains to Lauterbrunnen or Gimmelwald and also consider adding a day as the travel from Venice to Interlaken/Bernese Oberland takes the better part of a day and eats into your time there
Munich - 4 nights (3 full days) is a good amount of time to explore the city, spend a day out at Neuschwanstein and Hohenschwangau plus half a day at Dachau.
Prague - 2 nights is barely enough time to see the city, so no time for a day trip to say Kutna Hora. You might want to consider adding a day to Prague as it's a great city.
Berlin - consider stopping in Dresden on the train between Prague and Berlin as it's a great lunch and sightseeing stop. Berlin for 3 nights is again not a lot of time to see things, but it will depend on your interests.
Amsterdam - it's a great city, but might wear you out after 5 nights. Had you planned any day trips from here? If not, consider making your stay 3 nights instead. Also look at budget flights from Berlin to AMS instead of the train.
Brussels - it's a short train trip from AMS to Brussels so you could consider having the afternoon, evening and next morning in Brussels then spend 2 nights in Brugge/Bruges. It's a pretty town and great for wandering, but if nightlife is more your scene then spend 2 nights in Brussels and add the extra night somewhere else.
Paris - again, short train ride from Brussels to Paris so you'll have the afternoon of the day of arrival to play with, which is a good thing. What day trips had you planned from here?
France Homestay - great if you can stay with your friends, good way to see more of the country and culture. Where would it be?
Dublin - fly from Paris to Dublin (check Aer Lingus). 4 nights in Dublin is good, but you might want to consider heading out to Galway from Dublin for an afternoon, night and next morning as it's a great University town too and good scenery.

[herrbert]

If you don't want to see everything in a city, than yes it will work, but make some time available for traveling!

as an example: at this moment it's unclear, if you will head from Munich to Prague on august 7 or 8, but it makes a lot of difference.

And I agree with the comment about Amsterdam. 3 days here is enough. (if you are attracted by the liberal image of the city, please note that A'dam has been passed in this a long time ago, by for instance Madrid or Berlin, at least in my view.)

[willburress]

Near the end of our itinerary, we were running out of cities, so we kind of blocked out a lot of time in Amsterdam/Paris/Dublin... all we know is we wanted to fly back on Sept. 1.

I'll need to talk to my friend to find out where her friends live in France... my impression is that it's a smaller city.

I hadn't looked at any daytrips out of France... what would you recommend?

In regards to accommodation, we have an appointment next week with STA Travel to pick their brains about hostels. We're planning on having everything booked by early June, as we both are studying abroad during June/July (Spain for me, Greece for her), and then we are both flying to Rome.

We've both been researching independently about the things we want to see, and then we are meeting next week to put together a tentative list. One thing we both have agreed on is we want to experience things rather than just checking landmarks off of our list... which is kind of hard to schedule in advance... although we'll definitely be taking pictures in front of the Eiffel Tower (we're not totally immune to tourist-y things!).

Thanks for the great advice! It's so hard to navigate through all of the websites and guidebooks without someone else to bounce our ideas off of!

-Will

[WillTravel]

Some things you can do to experience life in the cities you visit:
Go to grocery stores
Take public transit
Visit public libraries
Visit some residential neighborhoods
Talk to locals whenever you can
If you are interested in a certain activity or hobby, see if there are enthusiasts in that city.

[herrbert]

Mar 25, 2009 10:29:51 GMT -5 WillTravel said:

Some things you can do to experience life in the cities you visit:
Go to grocery stores
Take public transit
Visit public libraries
Visit some residential neighborhoods
Talk to locals whenever you can
If you are interested in a certain activity or hobby, see if there are enthusiasts in that city.

adding:

relax in the park
go to a festival (in summer there should be plenty)
go to drink in a nice local bar, instead of the touristy things (hard rock café), and the same for food. If you talk to the locals, they can often recommend you the best places (which you just can't find in a guidebook.)

[madamtrashheap]

willburress, have you found out where your friend's place is in France yet? This will have a bearing on places to suggest for day trips.

Also, redo your itinerary with the additional days in cities/xtra cities you have now had time to consider and list them when you have a chance so we can see where you're up to.

[willburress]

Hey everyone!

Thanks for your help on the first itinerary! It definitely allowed us to work most of our problems out. In the end, we decided to eliminate the homestay in France, as we wanted to add more time to other cities.

Right now, any suggestions for day trips from these cities would be great. For the grand majority of these, travel would occur on the first day of the city stay. We plan on being in each city by 3:00 PM (or earlier) in most circumstances.

Jet lag should not be a problem at the beginning of the trip as I am traveling from Spain (6 week study abroad), and my friend is traveling from Greece (5 week study abroad)

THE FINAL SCHEDULE:
July 28-July 31: ROME (4 nights)
August 1-August 2: VENICE (2 nights)
August 3-August 5: INTERLAKEN (3 nights)
August 6-August 9: MUNICH (4 nights)
August 10-August 12: PRAGUE (3 nights)
August 13-August 16: BERLIN (4 nights)
August 17-August 20: AMSTERDAM (4 nights)
August 21-August 22: BRUSSELS (2 nights)
August 23-August 26: PARIS (4 nights)
August 27-August 30: DUBLIN (4 nights)
August 31: FLY HOME

Thanks everyone!