nitishraj

Hi, Two of us are planning a Small Budget Trip to Some places in Europe. We are travelling from India for a Conference in Brussels. We thought of exploring Europe before our conference in Brussels. We have Shoe String Budget and need guidance on our Tour. Our Tentative Itiniery is as follows

Arrive at Paris on 20th Oct - Two Days stay and see around Paris - 2.5 days

22nd evening - Leave for Interlaken/ Zurich - Two Days stay & see around Interlaken - 2 Days

24th evening - Leave Interlaken for Tuttlingen - Stay in Tuttlingen on 24th Night & 25th Day - 1 Day - Here Staying at a Friends place

25th evening - Leave Tuttlingen for Munich - Here Stay is arranged at a Friend's place

26th - one day See around Munich evening leave for Salzburg - 1 Day

27th - Two Days Stay & See around Salzburg - 2 days - here Stay is arranged at a friends place

29th - Leave Berlin for Koln and stay and see Koln - 2 days

31st - Proceed to Brussels - 1 Day

1 Days kept flexible - 1 Day
Total About 12 Days
Questions :

- Does this Trip look good/ feasible? What's your opinion?

- We plan to travel by Eurail....Is this a good option and can we travel in the nights?

- Is the trip too tight ? Is there some place we can afford to miss or is there some place which we can include?

- In each country/ destination, what are the interesting places we should not miss?

Let me know your views.....

Look Forward to seeing your views....Thanks....

mjdh1957

If you are on a tight budget then don't even consider staying in Switzerland.

nitishraj

Thanks mjdh1957 and hanabi....for the replies...

That was a typo error...we had planned to skip Berlin and only go to Koln from Salsburg. What do you suggest? Is Berlin Better or Koln.

How does our itiniery look? Is it too tight a trip? Since its our first time and we are going to be by ourselves...

ardithl

With this itinerary, you'll spend about 7 of your 12 days in transit to another location. That travel (packing, getting to the station, getting to the next hotel, etc.) takes time away from your sightseeing and adds to the cost of your trip. When you spend at least 3 nights in a place, you obviously can see much more of it. I'd recommend that you add up the cost of the train trips and hotels, and compare it to the cost of visiting only two or three places. If you stay lin one place onger, you might be interested in getting an apartment instead a hotel, because you can save a lot of money on food when you have a kitchen. Or stay with your friends longer!

qwovadis

www.backpackeurope.com

Shoestring travel a piece of cake

Your route looks fine

www.eurocheapo.com great tips cheap free stuff

www.hostelbookers.com for top hostels.

Things are very high in Switzerland but as long as

you are willing to do hostels like www.matterhornhostel.com

and grovery your food things can still be pretty cheap.

Big Mac was $7 when in Zurich last so save up!

qwovadis

In big cities I get amazing deals bidding priceline.com

Marriott for me $80/nt last in Zurich right on the river

but Hotel Otter is nice there if you do not want to bid

Zurich HB hostel is cheap www.wombats.at nice hostels

along your way as long as you do not mind tonnes of students

and a bit of party...

Usually just hop regional trains seat61.com for going all over

www.eurolines.com bus pass can be very cheap not as nice.

ira

Hi N,

You are making the usual newbie mistake of cramming as much as possible into a short visit. This is the sort of itinerary one gets from travel agencies.

As noted, most of your trip will be taken up moving from place to place. Also, the more moving about you do, the more expensive it gets.

You have 12 days. May I suggest:

Fly into Rome - 3 nights
Fly to Munich - 4 nights
Fly to Paris - 4 nights
train to Brussels

Use www.whichbudget.com or www.kayak.com for airfares. For example, Munich to Paris Orly is as low as 100E.

Compare the cost of flights to trains by using these websites:
Italy www.trenitalia.com
Germany www.bahn.de
France www.voyages-sncf.com

I think that point-to-point tickets will be cheaper than a railpass.

Enjoy your visit.

PalenQ

We plan to travel by Eurail....Is this a good option and can we travel in the nights>

for your wide-ranging itinerary some kind of Eurailpass IMO makes sense and a pass in most of the countries you will be in lets you just hop on any train anytime and the pass is also first class which IME of decades of incessant European train riding the benefits of first-class for the average tourists, esp those with luggage in tow, is great so when you compare ordinary train fares to the pass compare first class fares - which can be really expensive - especially fully flexible ones like the pass provides.

Check out these fab IMO sites to help plan a European rail trip - www.seat61.com; www.budgeteuropetravel.com and www.ricksteves.com. buy your pass before leaving home as though Eurailpasses are sold in Eurail Aide offices in main stations they are pegged usually about 20% higher than if bought abroad.

Mimar

First of all, don't buy a train pass until you've settled your itinerary. It may be that point-to-point tickets will be cheaper. Or budget airline flights. For the latter, look at www.whichbudget.com or www.skyscanner.net.

I agree with ardithl that you're going to be spending a lot of time traveling.

Also you might want to add a day or two to the end of your trip. You could visit Bruges (also as a daytrip from Brussels) and/or Amsterdam and possibly fly home from Amsterdam.

Russ

I agree completely with ira that "You are making the usual newbie mistake of cramming as much as possible into a short visit." Your current plan spends too much time and money on moving around.

You have time to see Paris (4 nights), Munich (3 nights?), Salzburg (2 nights) and maybe one other place. Since you have friends to stay with in Munich and Salzburg, keep those. Forget about Berlin and Zurich. Cologne is a good choice for 2-3 nights - stop there on the way back to Brussels. You can do a daytrip by train to the scenic Middle Rhine Valley from there, and take a tour of Marksburg Castle: www.marksburg.de

Transportation: I would NOT get a Eurailpass for this trip. You can get discounted point-to-point tickets if you buy in advance here: http://reiseauskunft.bahn.de/bin/query.exe/en These discounted tickets are few in number and get progressively more expensive as they sell. Paris-Munich costs 39-89 Euros one way. Munich to Köln costs between 49 Euros and 149 Euros for a ticket for TWO people. Köln to Brussels costs as little as 19 Euros each.

You can get between Munich and Salzburg on a Bayern ticket (daypass, 29 Euros for 2-5 people), which is also good for public transport within Munich.

http://www.munich-touristinfo.de/Bavaria-Ticket.htm

So your cost for the above travel segments would lie between 90 and 200 Euros each, depending on whether you get the best discounts or the more minor discounts. You'd need to add the cost of Brussels-Paris too, of course.

PalenQ

The beauty of a railpass is that in Germany and most countries you can just show up at the station and hop any train anytime - priceless to me at least. Or yes you can pre-book weeks in advance often to get the disconted tickets that are typically non-changeable nor refundable.

And for a trip involving four countries and several days of travel I'd bet the Eurail Select Pass would compete well with the various discounts (which you may have to spend zillions of hours to get) and IMO any average tourist should go first class - decades of incessant rail travel tells me t hat - especially folks with luggage - so IMO compare first class fares to the cost of a first class Eurail Select Saverpass (two or more names on one pass) valid in each country you are going to - in your case a 4-Country Pass valid in France, Germany, Switzerlanad and Benelux (Belgium, Netherlands and Luxembourg) - and except for the French TGV you can hop any train anytime - priceless to many rather than having to be at the station at a time decided weeks in advance and if you miss the train you are out any refund and then have to buy a full fare ticket at a really expensive price typically.

Russ

PalenQ writes, "IMO any average tourist should go first class..."

Maybe so, but the OP is not "average" and mentions the word BUDGET in both the title and the text. First class tickets - for a BUDGET traveler? I suppose that's an option. But the 5-day version of a selectpass for 4 countries you suggest is 330 Euros each in the cheapest saver version, surely at least twice as much as the discount tickets would cost. Perhaps the pass is a good option if the OP needs to wait until closer to the dates of travel to make the purchase, when the cheap p2p tix are gone. "Zillions" of hours to buy 3-4 tickets? Discount tickets are easy to buy. The disadvantage is that the traveler must stick to the scheduled itinerary, but "budget" travelers routinely trade certain inconveniences for price advantages.

nytraveler

You are spending a lot of your time and a good deal of money just getting from one place to another. Pick just 2 places - so you can actually have time to see something - and don't waste so much time and money.

And while Switz is gorgeous it's not really for showstring travelers - much more expensive than the other places you are looking at.

janisj

Since Salzburg and Munich have free accommodations, I'd definitely keep them in your plan. But otherwise this is a bit of a mess because you will come out of it only having seen trains stations/buses, and hotel front desks checking in and out.

One night in a city does not give you one day there --and 2 nights doesn't equal 2 days. All that travel will eat up more than half of your time and REALLY add to your costs.

Russ gives you a very good/workable plan. You can tweak it here and there -- but basically it would be my choice in your situation.

easytraveler

On your trip overall: yes, agree with the others, too ambitious.

Cut out North Germany - Berlin/Koln and just focus on the south - Munich and Salzburg.

Spend more time in Munich. You'll have more than enough to do - you need at least one day to go out to Nymphenberg Palace, then another to do the Residenz - and this apart from having to wander around the Altstadt. For inexpensive food, try the Viktualienmarkt right next to Marienplatz.

On Switzerland: First off, there are no Wombat hostels in Zurich. The Wombat hostels - cream of the crop as far as hostels are concerned - are located in Munich, Berlin and Vienna. They are extremely popular with the young crowd, each hostel having a sound-proof bar which serves inexpensive drinks and is usually hopping till late into the night.

Secondly, try for a B&B if you want to save on lodgings in Switzerland. For two people you can do better with a B&B than with a hostel in Switzerland. Look up "B&B" on tripadvisor.com or try for a website like bedandbreakfast.com.

On Paris - backtracking here - too little time for Paris. Assuming that you will be arriving by air, it'll take several hours to get from the airport to central Paris and get settled into your hotel - that's half a day gone.

The fastest way to get from Paris to Zurich by train is to take the 4 1/2 hour TGV which runs between the two cities several times a day. The TGV for Zurich leaves from the Gare de l'Est, so I would suggest finding lodging close to this train station instead of near the main attractions like the Eiffel Tower.

The TGV train is the fastest way because it saves you travel and wait time at airports.

Also try to find lodging that's not too far from a metro station - marked by a blue "M" in a circle on google maps. You can get all over very sprawled out Paris on the metro. Get a "carnet", a booklet of ten tickets, to save both time and money. It's a royal pain in the... to have to find loose coins or small bills to buy single tickets each time you have to get on the metro.

Lastly, I'll agree with PalenQ that the railpass is worthwhile, especially for newbies. It is very flexible and you are not tied down to a definite train schedule and therefore stressed to have to catch a particular train in a strange city.

Sounds like a terrific trip! Have a great time in Europe!

PalenQ

title and the text. First class tickets - for a BUDGET traveler? I suppose that's an option. But the 5-day version of a selectpass for 4 countries you suggest is 330 Euros each in the cheapest saver version>

well that still may be a good deal compared to regular fares - even five discounted tickets IF they can get them - it is the cheapest pass - no 2nd class option so if for a little more than 2nd class tickets you can go first class do it - I do not know what indiviudal tickets would cost but if they want flexibility to hop any train anytime 2nd class tickets could well cost as much or more.

Mimar

Another argument against Switzerland, at least Interlaken, is the weather's not so good later in the fall.

And, when you leave Paris, you'll need a seat reservation for your train trip, even if you have a pass.

PalenQ

Yes Interlaken in the fall can be dicey - I was there recently one mid-Sep and there was ice on the paths around Murren and cold as heck in Grindelwald and Lauterbrunnen - but not so bad in Interlaken itself - but yes rain can set in at anytime of the year and more so in the fall it seems.

Seat reservations with a pass on the Paris to Interlaken train usually cost 3 euros.

spaarne

Ditto Ira and PalenQ. Too much traveling. What day is it? Where are we? Where do we go next? Just because you can doesn't mean you should. Slow down and smell the roses.

For an illustrated introduction to rail travel in Europe see
http://tinyurl.com/eym5b.

I totally agree with PalenQ's suggestion of a Eurail Select Pass for Germany. Ticket prices are high there and the first class is less populated. You just hop on any train. Seat reservations are not required on 99% of the trains.

Aramis

Pefect advice ira;


OP has arranged accommodation in Munich for 1 night and Salzburg for 2 and you advise him to stay in Munich for 4 nights and send him to Rome where there was no interest expressed at all.

On a "shoestring budget" and you suggest flying.

I've got an idea - I suggest the OP spend the whole 12 days in the Algarve!