srir4m

Hello everyone,

We are a recently married couple in our mid-20s, planning to set off on our first trip to Europe in Sep 2013. Below is an itinerary we've drafted after reading several trip reports and threads. Let us know what you think.

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1-Sep-13 fly, fly and fly all the way from Australia. Long flight!
2-Sep-13 Land in london. Rest day. Sleep the jetlag.
3-Sep-13 London.
4-Sep-13 London
5-Sep-13 London
6-Sep-13 One day trip to Oxford/Stonhenge. Not sure which one to do.
7-Sep-13 London
8-Sep-13 Catch the evening Eurotrain to Paris
9-Sep-13 Paris
10-Sep-13 Paris
11-Sep-13 Paris
12-Sep-13 One day trip to Versailles.
13-Sep-13 Paris
14-Sep-13 Catch the morning easyJet to Krakow. Land and look around Krakow.
15-Sep-13 Auschwitz-Birkenau conc camp one day trip.
16-Sep-13 Spend the day in Krakow. Catch night train to Prague
17-Sep-13 Prague
18-Sep-13 Prague
19-Sep-13 Prague
20-Sep-13 Catch the afternoon train to Vienna.
21-Sep-13 Vienna
22-Sep-13 Vienna
23-Sep-13 Vienna. Catch the night sleeper train to Luzern
24-Sep-13 Luzern. Visit Mt Titlis.
25-Sep-13 Luzern. Visit Mt. Pilatus. (not sure if its worth to visit both titlis and pilatus. maybe spend that time and money on a boat cruise in the lake?)
26-Sep-13 Luzern. Take evening train to Lauterbrunnen
27-Sep-13 Stay at Lauterbrunnen. Go on a few walk trails.
28-Sep-13 Stay at Lauterbrunnen. Visit Murren/Wengen.
29-Sep-13 Stay at Lauterbrunnen. Visit Jungfrau.
30-Sep-13 Lauterbrunnen
1-Oct-13 Catch the Eurocity day train (EC 37) from Lauterbrunnen to Venice. Takes 7-8hrs to reach Venice.
2-Oct-13 Venice
3-Oct-13 Venice
4-Oct-13 Venice. Travel to Rome.
5-Oct-13 Rome, Italy
6-Oct-13 Rome, Italy
7-Oct-13 Rome, Italy
8-Oct-13 Flight from Rome to Australia
**

We thought long and hard whether we should fly to Poland just to visit Auschwitz concentration camp since there are lots of other conc. camps in Prague and near Vienna. Auschwitz is the only conc. camp I've heard and read about, and, correct me if I am wrong, no other conc. camp comes close to the size and causes the kind of emotional impact as Auschwitz. Please do let us know if there are any conc. camps worth visiting near Prague/Vienna.

We are spending effectively 2.5 days in Venice. I am not sure if we'd have sufficient time to visit the nearby Islands (Murano, Burano). Should we stay one additional day?

Looking forward to hearing your suggestions and advice. Cheers!

annhig

Hi srir,

congratulations at planning such a varied and well-paced trip! IMO you've done a great job.

to answer your two questions, Krakow is well worth visiting as a destination in itself and will be quite different from anywhere else with the exception of Prague. I don't think that there are any camps close to any of the other places you are visiting but if I'm wrong others will doubtless put me right, but in any event i would have thought that having seen Auschwitz, you would probably not feel the necessity to see another. just my opinion and others may have other ideas which will be equally valid.

regarding your time in Venice, I think that in 2.5 days, you will have enough time to go to the islands if you plan carefully. Personally I'd forget about Murano and concentrate on Burano and Torcello, which you reach by a ferry which goes from the next quay to the place where the boats get in at Burano. but if you could steal a day from somewhere else, that would certainly help, but don't steal it from Rome, where you need all the time you can get!

Dukey1

Titlis vs. Pilatus.

I can speak to Titlis. You take the train from Luzern to Engleberg. Attractive scenery along the way as well as a partially-rack-assisted rail route.

The gondola station is an easy walk from the rail station. The trip up takes place in three stages. The last stage is by "Rotair" an Italian gondola which rotates 360 degrees as it ascends/descends.

You can easily do the entire trip in half a day.

The trip to Pilatus may be somewhat more attractively varied for your tastes since the return from Pilatus basically requires a repeat of the train route Engleberg-Luzern.

Dukey1

Sorry, my last sentence above should have read, "since the return from <B>Titlis</B> requires a repeat..."

Gretchen

Nice trip. One piece of advice I'd have is keep your planned trip to Versailles as a "maybe" to do IF you think it would be better than seeing and experiencing more in Paris. Even though you seem to have a nice length of time there, you may surprise yourself in wanting to do more!!

welltraveledbrit

I think you've done a good job particularly on the pacing which is normally something people struggle with on a first trip. Just to say if you're particularly interested in jewish history there are interesting sites in Prague (cemetery, holocaust memorial, synagogues etc)but we very much enjoyed visiting the Jewish synagogues in Venice and taking a tour of the Jewish quarter that was run by the jewish Museum in Rome.

marg

Two suggestions - go to both Mt Rigi and Pilatus while in Lucerne. Different types of mountain transport and the views from Mt Rigi are unbelievable.
Second suggestion - go to Schilthorn when in Lauterbrunnen.

srir4m

annhig, thanks for the info. and you are right, after visiting one conc camp, i dont think i'll have it in me to visit more regarding venice, ill look to see if i can fit in one extra day.

dukey1, thanks for your comment. i'll still stay with the plan for visiting mt pilatus. since these are weather dependent, we'll make a final call i guess once we're in luzern.

gretchen, hahah. okay

welltraveledbrit, i saw some photos of those in one of the trip reports. we'll visit those sites.

marg, schilthorn! thx for the suggestion. i read about schilthorn but wasnt sure how it compared to jungfrau and whether it was worth visiting. will read about it more and look to fit it in our schedule. cheers