I need some advice. I am planning to travel with my three children (all under 12) this summer to Europe. I would like to see as much as possible, realizing that I will not get to see everything. I was hoping for some guidance in hitting the obvious highlights mixed with some not so obvious stops to make the trip memorable. I would like to see Paris, London, Prague, Scotland (Loch Ness), Spain, hopefully Italy. My thought is to use this trip as a taste of Europe and as a base for future trips.
My children are all excellent travelers and I'm not really interested in a "kid vacation".

How long do you have? How are you getting between stops? Train, plane? You're hopscotching all over Europe. Also look into open jaws airplane tickets to and from Europe. That will save you backtracking.

Look at guided tours and use them as a guide for the highlights and how long to spend in any given place.

Most of the people on this forum prefer slower trips with more time spent in fewer spots.

Hi t,

3 kids under 12, 4 places plus 2 countries in 28 days.

That's a lot of traveling.

You can get train schedules at www.bahn.de for all of Europe.

See www.whichbudget.com for cheap flights.

Remember, you lose at least 1/2 day each time you relocate.

My suggestion would be to pick 4 of the 6 countries you mention, and spend a week in each.

But if you want to move around more than that, and truly fit in all 6 countries, maybe 1-2 cities each country, staying just 2 days each place... then I'd investigate the various family rail options to see if any fit. I think train travel would be the most fun and logistical feasible with family group such as yours.

On this board, it's Vacationally Correct to visit relatively few places.

As with political correctness, that's simply the prejudice of one set of opinionated people. Your views are different. So here's the prejudice of another opinionated person:

An open jaw arriving Paris, leaving London. 3-4 days Paris. Cheapo flight (Smartwings) from a Paris area airport to Prague. 3 days
Cheapo flight to Venice: train to Florence and then Rome. 7 days total in Italy.
Ryanair to Valencia. Travel round southern Spain. 5 days
Cheapo from virtually any grass-strip in Spain to Glasgow or Edinburgh. Couple of days in Edinburgh, side trip to Inverness.
Cheapo or train to London, 3 days: leave from London

Just about takes up 28 days. A tad rushed - personally I'd leave Spain out, I get bored with Prague after about 5 nanoseconds and could happily live the whole of my next incarnation in Rome - but hardly catastrophically rushed.

Are you getting the full flavour of every place you visit? Of course not. I've spent close to half a century in or around London and I still haven't fully fathomed the place out. But, with a fair bit of teaming and lading, that itinerary will give you a decent overview.

There'll not be much time for "not so obvious" stops, though. But why should there be? There's a reason London, Paris, Venice and Rome are just about the most visited places on the planet. They're infinitely more interesting than Southall, Peronne, Mestre or EUR (though Southall and EUR are marvellous if you're into Sikh temples or Mussolini gigantism). Give this board specific briefs for off the beaten track excitement around your trip. You'll get far more useful answers than the tired old "oh it's too rushed" whinges

i just thought with 3 kids in tow that trains might be easier and more relaxing then getting to and from airports so often