Europe in 2 weeks?
 

Hi all,

Am looking at taking a trip to europe sometime next year with my wife. Would be really helpful if you could give me some tried and tested itenararies. My major constraint would be time (abt 2 weeks). The mode would be mostly eurail. So if the seasoned travellers could help me with some tips for efficient travel, that would be great.

Thanx and ciao,

Kiran

What do you most want to see? As you can no doubt tell, two weeks is just a bare start to seeing Europe. With two weeks, I might try three major cities and maybe a couple daytrips. I'd suggest two of those cities be London and Paris.

My next trip will be just over two weeks and is all Italy (except for a day in London), and I know I'm seeing only a small part of Italy at that.

Eurail might not be your best bet either. You might find flights between places with occasional train rides to work better, or it might be cheaper to buy all of your train tickets point to point.

Without being too detailed maybe with only 2 weeks you should limit your travel to just one country. Perhaps you could fly to London and spend 2 days there - then fly to Rome spend 3 days, Florence for 3 days, Venice for 3 days and either increase each of these by 1 day or choose one other place in Italy. Honestly to try and fit 3 or 4 countries into a 2 week trip will kill you and you won't do anywhere justice. My last trip was 2 days London, 1 day Rome, the 4 days Florence, 5 days Venice (but I love it and don't get bored) and then 3 days Rome before flying home directly from there.

Others may disagree but if I could be in ONE place for the whole 2 weeks I'd do it - really get to "live" a city.

Hi,

Thanx for ur advice.

Actually it is more like a see-all-must-see places first and would then keep coming back over the years for the individual country trips.

Was considering london, amsterdam, zurich, salzburg, vienna, rome, venice and athens. Maybe 20 days tops for the entire trip. Paris and barcelona would be outliers for the eurail option but wld have loved to cover them too.

Awaiting more suggestions...

Thanx

Kiran

You have been reading too many tour brochures--do not believe them. Apply these simple rules and you will be happier:
1. 3 nites per location
2. max of 4 hours to next destination
3. Half of your time in cities of less than 10K population.

No, no, no, no, no......8 cities in 20 days means 2.5 days per city, not including travel time - not at all a reasonable plan of attack. You won't see or appreciate anything.

Pick a couple of countries, three tops, and do a combination of major cities and more rural areas. Give yourself time to relax and take in your surroundings.

https://tours.ricksteves.com/tours05/eub05/itin.cfm

Here is a sample tour from Rick Steves - read the itinerary, then recognize that all the arrangements and travel are done for you by <i>experienced</i> staff.

Are you experienced in European travel and understand how to use trains, local transportation, know distances between cities, what days sights are open/closed, how jet lag may affect you, etc? If not, you need to allow time in your schedule for mishaps, transportation strikes, going to &quot;plan b&quot;, and all the things that happen that you will have to work around.

You can cover the highlights of several major cities in 2-3 weeks, but you need to allow plenty of cushion for 1)when things go wrong or take longer than you thought 2)actually having some time to relax in a place, sit in a park, people-watch, stroll, browse. If you run from sight to sight for 3 weeks, in the end, the memories of your trip will be a blur.

I think you can easily visit more than one country in two weeks, or even three if they are close together.

One common itinerary might be London and surroundings, cross channel to Belgium (Brugges and maybe Brussels a day) then over to the Netherlands and end up in Amsterdam. YOu could throw Paris into that mix without going out of your way too much, but I think that would be too much in two weeks.

I haven't been to Switzerland, but I think you could do an itinerary of Switzerland (Zurich? whereever) to Salzburg and end up in Vienna.

I don't understand the idea of seeing all must-see places in Europe so you can come back later to spend more time. It just seems like a waste of this trip and money. I know some other people talk about that, also, but not quite to the extent of all the places you've named. It will cost you a lot more to do a trip like that, also.

I hope you will forgive me, I am trying to help, but what you have suggested sounds insane to a seasoned traveller. I mean this in the nicest possible way. You cannot go from London to Athens and see everything inbetween in only 2 weeks, even if you refuse to sleep that entire time. If you want to do all that, you should allow at least 2 months.

Please heed the good advice you are getting from these folks who have been to Europe many times. Even if your trip is for 20 days, you are trying to do WAY too much!! You will have no time whatsoever to see much of anything. You will not be able to get oriented and get the feel for any place, so you won't know where you want to revisit and what you want to skip next time. Most of your sightseeing will be through the window of the train, and that's no way to see the world.

Please, PLEASE trim back your plans and post us back with a new itenerary. We will be glad to help.

This is rarely my advice, but if you really want to do the itinerary you described, I would consider a packaged tour.

8-10 cities/countries in 2 weeks is WAY too much, IMO. The places you mention are not geographically close, so you'll be spending a LOT of time on the train. It will be labor intenstive to plan, and exhausting to actually do.

Heed the advice above about logistics in changing places. Substract the 1st &amp; last day of your trip which normally are consumed by arriving &amp; departing. Subtract 1/2 day (minimum) for each time you change locations. So by my math you've got 10 days, less 2 days, less 5 days... which leaves effectively 3 days to actually BE somewhere!!!

After reading Suze's reply, I agree that if you are absolutely determined to take a whirlwind tour, it's best to go w/a tour group. At least then you won't be spending time looking at maps, dealing w/train schedules, or trying to find hotel rooms.

Good advice above. But I know people who have done what you are planning and have loved it (usually younger people with more energy than I have). I would venture a guess that many people who are giving you advice did exactly what you are thinking of doing and now wish they would have spent more time in fewer places.

May I suggest something like London, Amsterdam, Berlin, Prague, Vienna? If you had open jaw flights into/out of London and Vienna then you could minimize your travel time. Have fun planning.

There's absolutely no way you can see and actually enjoy london, amsterdam, zurich, salzburg, vienna, rome, venice and athens in two weeks. (And I'm speaking as an energetic 28-year-old!)We just got back from a 13-day in trip during which we visited Paris, Amsterdam, and Bruges. And it didn't feel like enough time!

For a two-week trip, I'd think about three major cities, or two major cities and two smaller towns, etc. I've also taken two-week trips to one country (Ireland and Italy). In some ways that's even more rewarding.

Hi Kiran,

Have you seen &quot;If It's Tuesday, It must be Belgium&quot;?

or &quot;The Amazing Race&quot; on TV?

:-)

In an effort to actually provide some constructive info, may I suggest reading the reply from me (and others) on http://www.fodors.com/forums/threads...p;tid=34494386

Best wishes,

Rex

Have you been to Europe before. I think in a 2 week timneframe, I would consider doing 3 major cities like London, Paris and Rome. You can easily spend a week in any of them for a good 4 days in each would be enough to see most of the major attractions and sites.

I don't know if you are set on train travel, but may people on this board recommed flying ebtween cisites. There have been great deals mentioend on this board regularly.

I think any more than 3 major cities would be overload and exhausting.

If you really want to do &quot;Europe&quot; in two weeks, then I do highly suggest an &quot;overview&quot; or &quot;highlight&quot; tour. Insight Vacations ( http://www.insightvacations.com/us/ ) has some great tours at reasonable prices. They are my favorite tour company.

--Marv

Rex, how did you make your link hot on this message board? Have not figured it out here yet. Thanks

--Marv

I think that if the link is a Fodor's thread, the link is always &quot;active.&quot;

I don't think that rex did anything special for that to happen.