25 days in Europe
 

Hello Everyone! We are 4 friends (2 couples) planning a visit in Europe for 25 days. We have already booked our flights - 24th July from India to Paris and 17th August from Zurich to India. We have not made any further bookings.

Kindly suggest which are the best places to visit in Europe during this time. We are thinking of doing Paris, Italy and Switzerland. But considering that it is too hot in Italy, suggest some good options. I guess Paris and Switzerland are doable in these months.

We are not much into history. We like relaxing, wandering on the streets, shopping and eating.

Hi, hit the yellow triangle and ask the moderators to change the tab to France/Switzerland it will get you more help

Ok, my thoughts

One critical thing is, do you like wine? This will cahnge the focus.

Paris 6 days (one to get over jet lag)
Strasbourg 4 days, include a trip down to Colmar
Konstanz 4 days including visits to the garden island trips on the boats etc
Switzerland; sorry I cannot advise, very expensive but I understand the country has a special attraction to Indians, over to Swiss experts

I don't know where you live in India, but on average Italy is not anywhere near as hot as most of India. It's a mountainous country, and the higher up you go, the cooler it is. We spend part of our summers in the foothills of the Sibillini mountains, and we usually sleep under a wool blanket.

It would be very easy to combine a visit to Switzerland with a visit to one of the large northern lakes (Maggiore, Como, and Garda). It's not usually very hot on any of the three lakes.

I don't know Switzerland very well either, but we really liked Lucerne, a beautiful town on the lake of the same name. It wasn't very expensive, either. We found an inexpensive hotel and plenty of reasonably priced places to eat.

That's great. Thanks a lot for your inputs. Yes it is really hot in India, so I guess we can handle the summer in Italy. In that case we can continue with Paris, Italy and Switzerland as per our plan☺️

Are you going by train - probably so and if so for loads of great info on planning a European train journey check out these IMO superb sites: www.ricksteves.com; www.seat61.com and www.budgeteuropetravel.com - download the latter's free online European Planning & Rail Guide for lots of rail intieraries and places to go by train in each country. And check out the Eurail Select Saverpass - a railpass that comes in first class which IME of decades of European rail travel makes me advise to folks on the trip of a lifetime and especially those carrying luggage - a much much more relaxed ride even though 2nd class is vis-a-vis Indian trains I have ridden certainly adequate.

How about:

Paris - 5 days - do a dAay trip to Versailles and maybe to Reims (if into Champagne and being from India you may not be unless a Sihk) or to nearby Chartres to see the world-famous cathedral

fly or take an overnight train from Paris to Venice

Venice 3-4 days

Train to Florence - 3-4 days

Train to Rome - 4 days

Train up to Stresa, on Lake Maggiore - lovely lake - 2 days - one day exploring the lake with a boat pass - visit the three famous Borromean Islands just off Stresa, a nice laidback resort whose train station is a stop on the mainline from Milan to Switzerland.

Head for the Jungfrau Region around Interlaken - the epitome of the dreamy Alpine Wonderland picture of Switzerland perhaps etched in your minds' eyes - glacier-girdled peaks rising thousands of feet above lush cow-dotted meadowns (yeh cows are kind of sacred here too!) - esconcse yourself in a hotel in Grindelwald or Wengen or other Alpine town and has a stupendous view of the majestic peaks from your hotel balcony - 5 days here.

Head to Zurich for your flight home.

Well a suggestion hitting the highlights of your general itinerary and at a rather leisurely pace.