First time solo traveller
 

Hi all

I am hoping you all can help me I've spent weeks pouring over these forums wow there is so much useful information in here..

I am planning a 3 -4 week trip to europe in Jan 10 Flying into London on the 2nd Jan and flying out from London 3 or 4 weeks later.. Places I want to go are London, Paris,Amsterdam, Prague, Berlin, Munich, Vienna/Salsburg, Rome, Milan, Florence I'd also love to do the 'Glacier Express' train through the alps of switzerland but it seems to be so far out of the way of any of the places I'm going to be in I wonder if there is a similar train more north I could do instead?? I intend on doing my whole trip on Eurraill taking night trains for the long haul trips to save on accommodation..

.My question is is Amsterdam worth doing or should I skip Amsterdam to spend mmore time in Italy for example?? I have no idea how to even begin to put together the itinerary any help would be greatly appreciated!!

You have quite a bit going on. First, decide if you're traveling for 3 or 4 weeks. Then decide why you're flying into and out of London. You should fly into London and out of the last city you'll visit. That will save back tracking and perhaps some expense.

In three weeks you could do London, Paris, Amsterdam (I liked Amsterdam and would suggest going) and one other place/area. If you try to fit too much into the agenda you'll come out of the trip in a haze. It's much better (IMHO) to stay in a place and really explore it than to rush on to the next place just to say you've been there.

Also you will be spending a lot of your time getting from one place to another (even traveling on night trains) and incurring more expense every time you travel to another city.

Before purchasing a Eurrail pass I would check the price of point to point tickets. I don't think Eurrail is good in England (it didn't used to be). Also is it valid for travel in the Czech Republic? Another thing to check is the price of a couchette/sleeper berth on the night trains. You might not save as much money as you think. You certainly don't want to sit up all night in a regular seat and arrive tired. French night trains usually do not have regular seats; you will need to book a couchette (a 6 bunk sleeping compartment that is shared with others) or a private sleeper (expensive).

This may be your first trip but it won't be your last. Don't try to experience every place in one trip; go for depth rather than breadth and you'll have a better experience.

Thanks for the reply I hadn't thought about flying in and out of different places but I will look into it as I'm not going until Jan I'm holding out for some good deals on flights to Europe from Australia.. Again thanks for the info..

I highly recommend The Lonely Planet's forum called The Thorn Tree, western europe branch, to plan the kind of trip you are proposing. Also guidebook series like Lonely Planet, Rough Guides, Let's Go are good for budget travel.

Be careful about too many overnight train trips. And make sure a 'pass' of any kind is really the best value, once you get your itinerary set. Sometimes point-to-point 2nd class tickets from the train station work just as well.

You've named 11 places in a 21-28 day trip, that's an awful lot of moving around. Literally moving very other day. Depends your personally choice which places to skip, but I would cut that list in half to be more manageable. 5-6 places in a 3-4 week trip is still pretty fast paced.

Hi Debbie -

I think that you'll enjoy your trip a lot more if you trim your intinary a bit. Here's how you might consider allocating each week: Week #1: London and Paris, Week #2: Vienna and Salzberg, and then Week #3: Florence and Rome.

Go to contiki.com and look at their long trip itineraries to see how you may want to link the cities into a logical sequence. The list you have is really difficult to do at this point starting in London it would look like: London-Paris-Munich-Berlin-Prague-Vienna-Venice-Milan-Florence-Rome and there are some large distances to cover in that group.

I agree that you're trying to do a lot, but I also know that Aussies like to do ambitious European itineraries because it's such a long trip from Oz.

Pam & Russ... Debbie hasn't been on the forum since back in March when she posted this question. But maybe your replies will be helpful to others. Cheers! Suze

Bugger.

Hadn't even noticed that, Suze.