I am planning to visit Europe this year and would like to know whether I should concentrate on one country or see an overview. I am planning on a 10-14 day tour. Any suggestions!

lots depends on you and your tollerances...i would make a quick circle tour, if i only wanted to get a feel for the place....i would pick one or two places if i wanted to understand each place in a more in depth way...are you drawn to one place over another....have you done your reading and research yet??/ there is a lot of difference when you compare istambul to say copenhagen, or paris with berlin....

on this forum you are best to get some ideas and then throw out your questions on fodors and get lots of opinions from recent and/or seasoned travellers....it helps if you tell us something about yourself and what you like and who you will be travelling with

For a short trip like 10-14 days, I think you should limit yourself to selected areas of one country, or possibly adjacent regions of two countries.

What are your interests?
How do you visit?
How many destinations would you have?
Where would you certainly want to go?

For your kind of trip: don't spend less than three nights in one place, if the place is interesting enough. Or don't go to places not interesting enough to stay 3 days.

I'd skip a grand overview tour, but 2 countries in 10 days, or 3 in 14 might work well so long as you are careful not to try too much. On my first trip, I spent most of my time in London and environs, which has the language advantage of familiarity, as well as cultural similarity -- not that culture in Europe is radically different across borders, but there are differences. To England (which can easily occupy two weeks), I added 3 days in Amsterdam. That worked well, as I still had no language problems of consequence but did get a sense of a different place.

You might try something similar, or might add a visit to a third place. I think the main thing is to spend enough time in one place/area/country -- at least a week -- to get a decent sense, before "tasting" other spots.

Because travel times are not so great, what you visit (if different countries) need not be adjacent, although I'd not suggest any real benefit from travelling great distances unless there was some specific spot you wanted to see.

If you plan to go to Europe every year and start traveling extensively there, then maybe concentrating on one area for two weeks makes sense. But if that's not the case, I'd actually opt for an opportunity to experience three different "cultures" -- say Rome, Paris, and London as the most logical or typical. But Vienna, Amsterdam, and Paris could be just as good, or almost any three that you can think of -- or two cities and one "countryside" area, like cruising the Rhine or driving in Tuscany. In fact with more and more cheap flights within Europe and if you can get an open jaw flight -- this is a great way to sort of get "three vacations instead of one".

Hi,

For 14 days, 3 places is a good idea, two is better.

Please don't attempt an "If it's Tuesday, it must be Belgium" tour.

HI
book an open jaw ticket, which means you can fly into one place and fly home from another--that eliminates having to backtrack.
Rome, Paris, and London would of course be a fabulous trip. Are you going in a good weather season?
You might want to do two large cities and end the trip in a quieter and more relaxing and scenic place.
Possibilities are endless, I don't know what interests you. Art museums? Fine food? Scenery? Gardens? British history? Italian Renaissance? etc etc

These are just a couple more suggestions: London with some daytrips, Paris, then train down to Provence or the Riviera, and fly home from Nice.

Or, fly into Rome, then go to Venice or Florence, then spend a few days in Tuscany or in the Lake district, fly home from Milan or Venice.

Or, fly to Paris, take train to Provence, get back on same train line, go to Milan or Venice or change and continue to Rome.

What have you always dreamed of seeing?
Start from there...

My first question would be about your personality and interests.

For me, I hate to rush around & the necessary logistics of trains, taxis, and hotels, I like to keep to a minimum. I often travel solo and am more interested in cities, not the countryside.

So for me... I would pick something like fly into Paris, stay there 5-7 days, take an overnight train to Venice, stay there 5-7 days. Fly out of Venice. Just an example of something that's fairly easy to negotiate on your own, no backtracking, only two hotel reservations, and two fabulous cities that are easy to navigate on foot (walking neighborhoods and sitting in cafes are two of my favorite activities).

I am not a group person so would never consider an organized tour, BUT for a first trip IF you really want to see a bunch of places in a short period of time, it might be worth considering(i.e., 3 counties, 7 cities, 10 days) because that kind of travel takes a bit more experience to organize on your own.

I would definitely stick to one country. Each European country has so much to offer, it would be criminal to whizz through them in no time; you need to be able to relax enough to enjoy the beauty of Europe. I would see either Rome, Venice and Tuscany, or Barcelona, Granada and Seville. And even at that the visits would be too short, but its such a shame to miss any out of the three.

I think that questions like these propoerly begi with WHY do you THINK yu want to go to Europe at all?

Answer that in three or four terse telegraphic sentences, an I -a-along with many of the rest of "us regulars" can answer you better.

Some corollary infothat would also help is:

How old are you?

What month/season do you have in mind?

Do you plan to travel solo, as a two-some? or more-some? Or doing some "hooking up", in tne course of this 10-14 day trip?

Best wishes,

Rex

I think ultimately you do have to decide what YOU want to do. What really gets you excited about going to Europe? Are there certain countries or places you really want to see? What kind of traveler are you in general, and how much have you traveled? All of these matter.

Actually, although I usually prefer to concentrate on a single city now that I'm older and have some favorites, when I first started traveling to Europe, I went to several countries and still think for your first time, that is what most people want to do. YOu just have to be limited in the geographic area you can cover. For example, Dublin, then fly to Edinburgh and then take the train (or drive) down to London is certainly feasible and enjoyable in 14 days. That is actually one of my first itineraries.

You could also do London, then cross the channel and go over to Belgium (Bruges) and end up in Amsterdam. That was another itinerary I did early on and is possible in your time frame. YOu could even do three biggies -- London, Paris and Amsterdam in that time frame.