25-day Europe travel planning

[milladenise]

Hi there, my friend and i would like to have a trip to Europe on the coming September for about 25 days. We have listed out few countries/cities which we would like to visit. We are glad to receive all suggestion or advice from any kind soul regarding our route below:

- Starting from London, (4-5 days)
- Paris, Nice (4 days)
- Barcelona (2 days)
- Milan, Venice, Rome, Florence (4-5 days)
- Berlin, Munich (3 days)
- Amsterdam (2 days) , then back to London

The no. of days indicate the days we will stay in the cities and we allow about 3-4 days as the travelling time between cities.

We would like to have your kind advice about:

- Is this route doable?

- We would like to have a flight-and-train travelling way to lower our budget. For instances, we take flight to travel among countries and take train to travel among cities within same country. Is this a good idea? or there will be a better way?

- Also, we would like to have private room with private bathroom for our accommodation. In such option, how much will be the minimum cost? (we would like to get as lowest budget as possible for such option)

- How much should we budget for all the expenses? (to travel within 6 countries above,including accomodation, food, low-cost flight, euro rail tickets)

- The daily expenses budget??

Please indicate in USD.

Thanks in advance for all of the kindness and help!

[Eagle]

milladenise,

First of all, welcome to the GFE Boards! I have a few comments to get the discussion started.

To begin with, if you haven't travelled in Europe before, I would highly recommend pre-reading the Guidebook Europe Through The Back Door. It covers a lot of VERY useful information, including Itinerary planning and costs. The country-specific books from the same author provide listings for budget Hotels and also some Hostels.

Can you confirm that you'll be leaving on the trip this September (in a month of so)? If so, you'll need to plan your route quickly!

I'll have a more detailed look at your route in the next day or so and provide suggestions on that as well as budget items. My initial impression is that you have too many stops for a trip of only 25 days.

Some comments on the places you have listed so far:

> London (4-5 days) - that's a good start, as you'll need time to get over jet lag and also there's a LOT to see there. For accommodations, you might have a look at www.cartrefhouse.co.uk/ for one possibility. Be aware that London can be expensive, so you'll have to allow for that.

> Paris, Nice (4 day) - that's not much time to see both places. I'd suggest at least four days in Paris, as again there's LOTS to see. You might consider Nice for a future visit?

> Barcelona (2 days) - one thing that stands out here is that you'll need to allow for travel times, and Barcelona will add considerably to the travel times. This destination is a bit "problematic", given the duration of the trip and the budget issue.

> Milan, Venice, Rome, Florence (4-5 days) - that is simply NOT enough time to visit those four cities! I'd recommend at least four days in Rome, as there is so much to see. To begin with, I'd drop Milan from the list unless there's some overwhelming reason you want to stop there. You also have to allow for travel times, which in some cases will be a few hours if travelling by EuroStar Italia / Alta Velocita (which costs more than the slower trains) and in other cases could be half a day.

> Berlin, Munich (3 days) - again, this is NOT enough time. The travel time between the two cities is at least half a day and each of those cities deserves three days each.

> Amsterdam (2 days) - that's about right, however travel from Berlin to Amsterdam is a bit of a lengthy trip by train, so be sure to allow for that as well.

For travel THIS September, it's probably a bit "late" to get the best prices on the budget airlines (but I haven't checked). They usually operate using a "sliding scale", so as the flight fills the prices increase.

Hopefully some of the others will have some comments as well. I'll try to have a closer look at your plans and offer further suggestions soon.

Cheers!

[seanmtl]

- Is this route doable?
Yup but you really won't have much time to see enjoy these cities. I say try to see half. Last summer I spent about 17 days seeing Rome/Barcelona/Paris/Amsterdam/Brussels and I although I enjoyed the trip, I feel like I could/should have spent a lot more time in each city (except for Brussels).

- We would like to have a flight-and-train travelling way to lower our budget. For instances, we take flight to travel among countries and take train to travel among cities within same country. Is this a good idea? or there will be a better way?
It really depends on a lot of things. Just look up prices for flights at easyjet/ryanair/airberlin/etc and compare with trains on deutschebahn.de, sncf.fr, etc. Busses are also very cheap but ABSOLUTELY horrible. I took a 12 hours bus ride from Barcelona to Paris, it was cheap and got the job done, but it was just really boring and long. Check out megabus or eurolines.

- Also, we would like to have private room with private bathroom for our accommodation. In such option, how much will be the minimum cost? (we would like to get as lowest budget as possible for such option)
Hostels will usually run on average about $25-30. For privates with a bath room (they call them "en suite" over there), figure to pay at least double that (in total).

- How much should we budget for all the expenses? (to travel within 6 countries above,including accomodation, food, low-cost flight, euro rail tickets)
I'd say about $60-70 per person per day.

- The daily expenses budget??
Food is slightly more expensive then in the states, depends on where you go though. You can have some amazing street food in most European cities (Why I LOVE Berlin!!!) for not even $10 a meal.