3 Months to See the Best of Europe!
 

For all you veteran European travelers... I need some serious advice. Never been outside of North America, and have never been "backpacking" before. I want you're opinion on where I should go! We're travelling April-June (90 days ish)
I'm a female travelling with my friend. We are not interested in nightlife or festivals, like architecture, nature, food (haha), and culture in general. We want a good mix between city and "off the beaten trail", however it is important for tourist amenities to be available (hostel, food, etc). Our budget is maximum $100 per day, each. That includes food, shelter, and sightseeing. And obviously any travel costs outside of a train pass.
We are thinking about spending a month in France and 2 months in the rest of Western Europe (Italy, Switzerland, Austria, Germany, Netherlands & Belgium)

What are your favorite ***small towns and cities*** of Europe? (I already have a pretty good idea from other forums which major cities to go to)

Thank you!!!

Most of Fodor's trip reports and message board responses are not about backpacking, staying in hostels or traveling on a budget as low yours, and probably the majority of travelers rent a car when they go touring outside the major cities. Few people travel for as long as three month -- so brace yourself for lots of lectures about the Schengen rules.

Without revealing here which major cities you are visiting, it is really next to impossible to offer advice about where else you might reasonably go. It's possible that your post will mainly elicit a scolding about reading more guidebooks.

I think you need to track down where you can find hostels outside of the major cities. They are seldom in small towns off the beaten track, so availability of affordable accommodation plus being reachable by train may end up choosing your destinations for you. (Don't worry -- Europe is filled with wonderful, not-touristy places reachable by public transportation).

I'll also suggest that you think about starting in Italy in April and heading north. If visiting Austria and Switzerland is mainly about scenery, you might consider eliminating them, not because they aren't beautiful, but because it might be more thrilling to go to Spain in spring.

Have a great trip!

Have a look at the Hostels International site for places to stay. You may well be better off choosing a hostel a train ride away from the city you wish to visit rather than one in the city - and it pays to book them in advance too - the closer to you arriving the more expensive and the more chance they are full.

Consider renting a gite in France or an apartment if you are staying for a week or so in one area - it may well be cheaper.

Make sure you are under the 90 days in Schengen too - no 90ish days ;)

Have fun - it sounds like a great trip.

Dear Karli,
As Zeppole predicted, guidebook recommendations will be coming your way, and I'm going to start!

Such a response does make sense, because while you may think you have the framework of sorts for your trip (timing and budget), there's almost no way for anyone to help you out without your finetuning your specifics first. Quite frankly, you could search "favorite small towns and cities" on this forum and Google and end up with enough material to keep you busy for a year, much of which would be useless.

So please do some more reading first, and I think you will end up with a treasure trove of really useful information.

Here are two websites and books that probably would be the most help for your type of budget travel:

Let's Go website and guidebooks
--http://www.letsgo.com/
--"Let's Go Europe 2011: The Student Travel Guide [Paperback]"
(and they have many more guides of this type)

Lonely Planet Website and Guidebooks
--http://www.lonelyplanet.com/us
--"Lonely Planet Europe on a Shoestring"
(and they have many more guides of this type)

Once you have made some of your still general but a tad more specific choices, then come back to this board and do separate postings, for example:

"We're going to spend 10 days in Switzerland. We will be coming from (city,country) by (train,airplane) and then we will head on to (city, country) at the end of that time period. Where would you suggest we spend our time?"

"We plan to be in Bern, Switzerland for just 24 hours. Could you name just five things or less that you feel we should NOT miss?"

"We plan to stay in Nice, France for three days. What two or three favorite cities do you recommend as daytrips from there?"

We certainly would be able to help you with those types of postings, and the information you'd get back would not be as much of a mishmash for your own use. Then you can keep adjusting your itinerary as you get more input.

I'm going to try to find two other websites, tools I have in mind, but these two website with their guidebooks will certainly start you off in the right direction.

I am excited for you for your trip!

Here's the planning tool website I was looking for--a poster named Jessiedeexx had used it to sketch out her itinerary to critique last April:

http://www.eurotrip.com/trip-planner
and since it takes a bit to load, you can see what it looks like on the home page of the website:
http://www.eurotrip.com/

There are other tools, but I thought this was rather nifty and was happy she shared it with us.

DH and I mostly traveled in Italy and loved visiting towns with universities. Venice, Pisa and Perugia come to mind as our favorites.

Looking for cities with hostels is good advice. With train travel so convenient, you can easily make one a base and do day trips.

Paris, Paris, Paris. Then take train to Montpellier (an excellent university city and super base) and then to Provence and then Nice. Train over to Italy. Work your way north to the lakes then into Switzerland? Rome, Rome, Rome.

Remember, you can fly into one country and out of another so you don't have to back-track. Other posters who say do some reading are correct.

Forgot to say London, London, London! Please promise to write a trip report.

karli - I backpacked around Europe solo for a few months back in 1994 and 1995 so I have some insight on what you are going through in terms of planning and preparation, and also how to enjoy yourself and get around once you are there. I just answered a question similar to yours on another forum posted by someone who wanted advice about backpacking around Europe for 3 months. Here's a link to that thread where you may find some helpful advice.

http://tinyurl.com/249voa3

In addition to hostels, look for convents. You don't have to be catholic, they are clean and simple and safe, as long as you are willing to meet their curfew -- usually midnight, I think. Do a search for rooms, convents, by city, or post a question here.

Which major cities have you already decided on?

I think it sounds like a great trip, and imo your budget is sufficient by backpacking/hostel standards, but your question is just so broad it's hard to answer helpfully.

Personally I loved Venice, enjoyed Paris, liked Amsterdam OK.

My favorite smaller towns are in Switzerland on Lac Leman outside Genev - Lausanne, Vevey, Montreux. I have a friend who lives there is why I happen to know them. But I'm sure there may be 1000's of other similarly great places.

Because of the time of year for the best weather you should start south and work your way north.

Hi K,

Also visit the Thorntree Forum at www.lonelyplanet.com

Thanks for all you're help guys! I know I seemed very vague about my question... sorry! What I was trying to get at was what are some of your favorite small towns of Europe? Since I am in the beginning stages of my plans, I am open to anything and everything.

-Spain, decided to skip, even though it would be really nice in the spring, Austria and Switzerland are higher on the "must see" list.
-Thanks for the guidebooks! I will probably have more specific questions once I kind of have an idea of what I need to know about specific places
-Using Eurotrip now! Here is a very over-loaded map of Europe with all the major cities, plus smaller towns I've found so far that I would like to visit. Please ignore the "how many days in each place).
http://www.eurotrip.com/trip/circle-western-europe
-Read that other thread, it answered some of my questions. Don't know how I missed it!

Great Karli! I'm out the door, but I'll take a look at your Eurotrip link tonight or tomorrow.

Now that I look into it, I might have to adjust some things. Apparently Switzerland is really foggy and yucky in April/early May with the Alps.

Karli, my daughter used www.hostelworld.com to find all her hostels and cheap hotels, she found it was very helpful as it gives reviews and also rates safety as one of their key points.

She backpacked around Europe for 6 months and is now working in Canada,
I miss her but she is having a wonderful time as I am sure you will. Best wishes with your planning.

Ok, Karlie--I'm going to start with what I see is a pretty good logical adjustment given your trip dates etc and see if you are interested.

You have the opportunity to see Amsterdam and Keukenhof Gardens in pretty darn good tulip season if you flew into Amsterdam first the first week of April.

Ironically, Amsterdam/tulips is more seasonal dependent than "weather dependent". And even in freezing cold, Amsterdam is a unique European city with easy access to fascinating outlying areas. In addition, many airlines and train systems use this city as a crossroads, so you should be able to come up with a good airfare into here and then either fly out of here (a true circle),use this as part of an open-jaw flight trip, and/or start a rail pass from here.

Info on tulips: http://www.keukenhof.nl/

So that's a starter. If you think that sounds good (I'm sure other origin suggestions will be forthcoming from other posters and I claim no "supremacy" as to the value of my opinions), I will be happy to list some options for building the next few steps of your itinerary from there.

Good advice above from what I've seen so far.

I can only offer where I'd go and for how long if I had never been to Europe before and had 12 weeks to spend. But what you choose will depend on your interests and may vary from mine. Cities I'm listing include side trips, and the order you visit these is another puzzle to figure out:

-London: 1 week
-Paris: 1 week
-Amsterdam: 1 week
-Berlin: 5 days
-Munich: 1 week
-Salzburg: 2 days
-Prague: 4 days
-Vienna: 1 week
-Venice: 3 days
-Florence: 1 week
-Rome: 1 week
-Nice and the French/Italian Riviera: 1 week
-Barcelona: 1 week
-Madrid: 1 week

Of these have not been to Berlin, Munich, Nice, or Barcelona. It would also be tough to leave out other possibilities, such as Athens, Naples/Pompeii/Amalfi Coast, Lisbon, Budapest, Krakow, Brussels, various places in Switzerland, Scandinavian cities (especially Copenhagen), Dublin, Edinburgh, and Seville/Granada/Cordoba. Of these, have only been to Dublin.

Definitely check into staying at hostels and doing couch surfing. Fodor's Forums are good, but such types of traveling is less of a specialty here.

Maudie: Yes, I have heard of that site. Looks like a good resource! Good to know more than one person has found it useful. Canada? That's where I am! Alberta specifically.
AlessandraZoe: Sweet! I wasn't sure when tulip season in the Netherlands was... but now I am definitely considering flying to Amsterdam. I actually have a friend who works at the Amsterdam airport... so maybe I could get a good deal? Must talk to him about that!
bachslunch: Most of your wishlist is like mine! I will need forever in Europe and Bill Gate's fortune to see it all though. :( Planning on making eastern Europe another trip, as well as the British Isles and Scandinavia. Hopefully multiple trips back to wester Europe as well! I am planning on staying at hostels, and have just been acquainted with this new couch surfing idea. I've heard a lot of good things about it, but am still wary....

Remember you can stay only stays 90 days and not three months if a couple of those months have 31 days. It can be very expensive if you overstay even one day.

I looked at your eurotrip map, and you may want to consider dropping a number of the destinations. "2 days" in a place actually means 1 full day, or a little more, due to travel time. Especially if you'll be taking trains or other public transportation, that's a lot of time not only actually travelling, but getting to and from your lodging the train or bus station.

You're right about the weather in the Alps.

Look into taking the cheap European airlines, such as Ryanair, to get between some of your destinations.

Some of my favorite smaller cities in Europe, which may add to your list, rather than detract:
- Bologna. Untouristy, great food and people-watching, and interesting art and churches.
- Arles. Great Roman ruins in the town and near it. I don't like Avignon as much.
- Amboise. Cute little town, several interesting sights in town (and look for the houses built into the volcanic rock cliffs), and many chateaux nearby. Tours is a bigger city, less interesting. Either way, if you're planning to use the city as a base for visiting chateaux without a car, you'll need to check carefully on how to get around. Group tours are probably too expensive for your budget; as we'll always rented a car, I don't know what public transport is like between the chateaux.
- San Gimignano and/or Siena, Italy.
- Salzburg, Austria. Really try to go to a music performance here
- Hallstat, Austria. Just the cutest place.

Toulouse I've never been to, but would probably drop it from the itinerary. Carcassonne I have been to. It's pretty, but quite touristy and out of the way of some of your other destinations. If you're interested in architecture or castles of the time period, there are more authentic structures and towns to visit.

We love art and history and museums, so most of our trips in the last 15 years have been heavy on that, and light on the mountain beauties of Switzerland, Austria and Germany. So my list of preferences is skewed toward places that have art and history (and good food).

Rick Steves recommends (or used to) that when taking a longer trip in Europe, to take "a vacation from your vacation," and schedule a longer period in the middle where you spending more time relaxing, rather than seeing the sights. Not a bad idea. I once, long ago, after finishing grad school, spent a month in Europe. It was wonderful, and I would have been happy to stay longer, but at the end of the time, I was ready to slow down and not eat in restaurants so much! Anyway, consider parking yourselves somewhere for a longer period of time. If you stay in a smaller city, it will be cheaper. Especially if you do that, you might want to look into renting an apartment. I never done that, but plenty of Fodorites have, and recommend it highly.

Generally speaking, due to spring weather, could you start in the south and work your way north, following the weather as it gets warmer?

Enjoy your planning; you'll have a wonderful trip wherever you go!

Also check out www.eurocheapo.com for budget hotel ideas

I saw that you took down your Eurotrip itinerary, so I'm not sure where you are in the process right now.

I loved Bachlunch's list, but I actually thought it was great you didn't choose London this time around, although if you get a good flight fare to London and want to start from there, there's an overnight train/ferry combo from London to Amsterdam that's sort of neat. Your plan to keep yourself on the Europe mainland sure gives you more exploration/small town time.

Another note Re Amsterdam--You just want to avoid it May 1. That's Queensday and you will have problems getting accomodation around then.

Looking forward to your revised plans. I hope you are keeping Switzerland in the mix :)

sorry, the link to the eurotrip is now: http://www.eurotrip.com/trip/circle-western-europe-rome

fmpden: I'm thinking of planning my trip for like 87 days, so we have a couple extra days just in case.

Lexma90: wow thanks!!! my eurotrip map right now is a "wishlist", so I will narrow it down so I don't spend my whole trip on a train. Thanks for posting your favorite smaller cities! I will look into them and revise my list :) I was thinking about flying in and out of Rome, but someone suggested Amsterdam instead, since the tulips are in bloom in April. Seriously considering that...

jamikins: thanks, I'll take a peek.

AlessandraZoe: Sorry, I just updated the link. Good call on checking flight prices to London. However I'm not sure I'll be able to just skip the British Isles if I fly there! It would be very hard! May 1st... I'll keep that in mind. Although I have some friends in Amsterdam, so I might be staying with them! Switzerland is being difficult... I'm definitely going to try to keep it in! Does anyone know when it starts to get nicer in the Alps? What about mid-May? I guess it varies year to year..

Not all of Switzerland is "the Alps". It wouldn't necessarily be foggy and icky if you are down at sealevel. Like those towns I mentioned along Lac Leman.

London is outside the Schenden zone so days in London/England would not count as part of the 90. There is posting on the Rick Steves site from a father who's daughter had to pay a $500 fine because she was departing on her 91st day thinking that three months meant three months.

Just want to make sure you know you can do "open jaw" (fly in one city/out another) and "mult-city" flight arrangements. Those arrangements sometimes cost more, but I'd say we've always ended up even and in some cases, less, on the $$ end of things. You can build flight itineraries on www.kayak.com, www.orbitz.com, whatever to see what combinations might work for you.

So if you already knew that, I didn't mean to insult you. Just wanted to make sure you knew you didn't have to plan your trip in a circle.

There are also cheapie "within Europe" airfares, too, to explore. RyanAir is one you might know, but here's a good list of others: http://www.euroflights.info/#airlines

OK--other thoughts without having checked your latest Eurotrip

May 1 in Amsterdam is when tulips fizzle out, so...

If you hold off Switzerland until late June, you'd be able to do the Bernese Oberland--start with Bern (one of the most underrated smaller cities in the world), hit Interlaken and then ascend up to Murren, Kleine Scheidegg, etc. See Jungfrauroch by traveling THROUGH the Eiger. Yeah, the weather can be iffy, but it can ALWAYS be iffy.

I guess you can tell I like Switzerland, and in fact, I'm busy trying to convince my youngest to spend her junior year abroad there. One of my favorite trips even was when we spent time around Geneva, headed up to Bernese Oberland for around a week, and then flew out of Zurich. We had purchased a Swiss Family Pass there (have no clue what they are doing now), and the transportation abilities just kept me in a state of awe. For example, once we landed in Geneva airport, we practically stepped off the plane and onto our train to Lausanne, hopped on a train to Montreux, then a tram to Chillon, and stepped onto a boat back to Lausanne. Could never get over how easy it was to do anything in that country.

O' for an late edit button -- It is Schengen zone

suze: Maybe I'll hit up those towns if I end up being in Switzerland early.

fmpden: That's a real bummer for her! Definitely good to know those things ahead of time. I don't understand how people think it's fun to wing it in Europe - I'm too much of a control freak :P

AlessandraZoe: I've always assumed that open jaw flights were way more expensive, however I will look into that for sure, because it would be way easier! I'm making a new itinerary that starts in Amsterdam, so I can see the tulips! I've heard a lot of good things about Switzerland, so I'm working on adjusting things so I can see it later in my trip. It seems like such a relaxing, quiet country!!

karli--Yeah, thinking "open jaw" was more expensive was always my assumption, too. Then I had to make a trip itinerary from hell for my oldest daughter work: NY to Paris (two days) to Prague; fly out Vienna into Cairo; fly back to US from Cairo. I couldn't believe it--the trip sequence ended up far far less than what my point-to-point estimates were.

I really don't usually do Orbitz--I tend to use Kayak as my search tool (actually, I use the software BEHIND Kayak, which can be found at http://matrix.itasoftware.com/ )and then seek the fares with the involved airlines--but Orbitz actually made that exact trip itinerary work for a very reasonable amount of $$.

And then there are the Europe cheapos that just don't show up that much on booking sites, and they often work far better than rail costs and often save a lot of time (time always equals your money). I remember trying to find out how much rail costs would be from Paris to Nice, and one of the posters on this wonderful forum said, "You know, you could all fly there from Orly at 1/2 your rail cost." He was right. That was a good lesson learned.

Those cheapo fares should be part of any equation. I needed to fly back from Granada to Madrid last spring with just hours to spare. Just one way. Would check every day on a bunch of sites to find something reasonable. Out of the blue one day, found a RT fare for Granada-Madrid/Madrid Granada for around 1/2 the price of anything that had been up there previously. Just used the first half of that itinerary. Luckily, the second half was not connected to any other reservation we had made, so there were no other later flight sequences that would have been automatically cancelled.

Switzerland in a way is NOT relaxing unless you are the "responsible citizen" type. Then you can really chill. It is a country full of anal retentive people (big generalization, forgive me)--MY PEOPLE. I love it when I walk into a restroom there and there is no trash and the toilet seat is clean. WHY? Because it's expected that one would pick up after one's self. Chopped wood outside mountain houses are not only arranged neatly but also with a sort of competitive flair. I remember hiking past those wood piles in admiration, looking at my husband and saying, "I MUST have been Swiss in a former life."

AlessandraZoe: Haha my family must have Swiss roots as well... or at least my mother! I looked into open jaw flights on expedia, and found that it is actually the same price as a point to point! This is super exciting. AND the cheapest of the few cities I tried to fly back home from was Berne, so Switzerland will be graced with my presence in June! Yay. Going to check Orbitz now to see what they quote me. This is potentially going to be a huge time saver. Thanks!

Good.

Have fun--I expect to see a LOT of changes to the itinerary. Good for you for exploring this before 2011.

Not sure if will help at all, but I've just started our t/r for our 3.5month adventure in Europe, Aug-Nov this year.

aussiedreamer: did you ever write a full trip report? I can't find it. I would love to read it! Sounds like you had an awesome time.