simja

Hi Guys

I've booked a flight on the 15th June into Berlin and departing from Milan on the 11th July (25 days) and will need to structure a trip around this tight timeframe.

Places we want to cover are:

Berlin/ Elsewhere in Germany
Amsterdam
London
Paris
South of France- Marseilles, Nice, Gorges Du Verdon
Spain- Barcelona, Ronda?
Italy- Cinque Terre, Rome

Can you please advise how long in each city? We are thinking of flying/training from each destination whichever is fastest!

nytraveler

I'm sorry - but I have no idea how you can cover at least 12 different places in only 25 days. Once you have removed the time to get from one place to another (between a half to a full day - depending on destinations) you will have only one day and perhaps a small part of another in each place.

And that assumes you are only talking about one other place in Germany.

Unless you have been to many of these places before you are giving them incredibly short shrift - IMHO London, Paris and Rome each require 3 full days (4 nights) to see even the most major sights.

I assume you have modeled this on some sort of dreadful tour (it it's Tuesday this mush be Belgium) but there is no way individual travelers can travel at the same pace - since the tour group makes all arrangements for you, is familiar with all of the cities, hotel and sights and keeps you moving (albeit much of the time on a bus with very few stops) for long days (luggage outside the door at 7 am and on the bus by 8 am).

While it is physically possible to visit all of these places (assuming you don;t run into any strikes or bad weather) in the number of days you have it will be a very lengthy tour of the train stations and airports of europe. It will also be very expensive - since there are costs for trains/planes between cities as well as getting to and fro often far distant airports.

In 25 days I think a reasonable itinerary is 5 cities (not countries) - so you can actually see a little bit of the city and perhaps spend a day in the nearby countryside.

Without knowing you - you age, interests and traveling companions I would not presume to make specific recommendations. But I will tell you that on my first trip to europe we had almost 6 weeks and saw one city each in 3 countries and 2 cities each in 2 countries - so 7 cities total in 6 weeks (some with day trips - for example, Versailles from Paris) - and for almost all we didn't get to see many things we wanted.

Strongly suggest you pick your top 5 spots and then look in detail at the train (bahn.de web site) or plane travel options between them.

Aramis

You will probably find that most "seasoned" travelers like to try and spend at least 3 nights per stop, and more if it can serve as a good base for day trips or they have a special affinity for the place, as a way to balance between seeing the sights and the frustrations, or limbo of moving. That doesn't mean it has to be your pace; some people like to move quickly.

You have 9 "regions" listed; Barcelona and Ronda are so far apart they have to count as 2, as does your Italy selections of Rome and Cinque Terre. That works out to a little less then 3 nights per place. I will save everyone else the trouble of informing you (in case you didn't know) that it can take a good 1/2 day to move between overnight stops. I always count "nights" and presume that people who can figure out how to post to this Forum and purchase plane tickets are away of the concepts of time and distance.

All of your 6 major cities mentioned can keep you busy and sated for more than 3 "nights", or 2.5 days on the ground; London, Paris, Amsterdam, Berlin, Barcelona, and Rome. If you split the time evenly, that is 18 nights down, leaving you 7. It will be hard to fit in Cinque Terre, the South of France and Ronda into those 7 available nights. The most obvious outlier is Ronda. It is the most distant city from all the rest and that, coupled with the fact that it would be a bit of a shame to go all that way and use up a whole day of travel (there and back) to miss the rest of Andalucia makes it the easiest recommendation for dropping from the itinerary.

That leaves you with CT and South France (SF) for those 7 nights. It could be done on a land route between either Rome and Barcelona, or Rome and Paris. Given the two locations, I would probably allot 2 days for CT and 4 for SF. Staying in one central place and perhaps renting a car makes some sense in SF

Another thing you could consider would be to leave Spain out altogether; Barcelona is still a bit of an outlier unless you can fly in or out of it, because of the time it would take to get to another airport city. That would allow you to add more time in the other stops.

There are quite a few ways you could do this. there will be at least a little back tracking required. One way you could deal with it, using the suggestion to leave out Spain is and using a single flight leg in Europe is;

Fly to London 4
Fly to Berlin 4
Train to Amsterdam 3
Train to Paris 4
Train to SF 4
Train to CT 2
Train to Rome 4
Fly from Rome

Just a start to the process of making your brain hurt as you try and figure it all out

mamcalice

I will take Aramis's suggested itinerary one step further and suggest that you eliminate either Berlin or Amsterdam and add a day to Paris and to Rome. The rest of the time will be taken up by long train rides.

However, it would be a good idea to list your top 6 or 7 destinations and consider an itinerary including those stops.

adrienne

You have a huge problem with your time constraint. It doesn't matter how much time you need in each city/town as you will have to conform to your itinerary giving you, at the most, 2 days in any place.

Here's an example:

Berlin - 3 days
Travel to Amsterdam - 1 day
Amsterdam - 1 day
Travel to London - most of 1 day
London - 3 days
Travel to Paris - 3/4 day
Paris - 2.25 days
Travel to Marseilles & Marseilles - 1 day
Travel through Gorge du Verdon - 1 day
Nice - 1 day
Nice to Barcelona - 1/2 day (flying)
Barcelona - 1.5 days
Travel to Ronda - 1 day
Ronda - 1 day
Travel to Cinque Terre - 1 day
Cinque Terre - 1 day
Travel to Rome - 3/4 day
Rome - 3 days

This is not a trip I would enjoy and I recommend cutting out a few places and enjoying the places you do visit and actually seeing things rather than running around helter skelter.

But it's your trip and you do what you want. Enjoy the train stations.

PalenQ

? We are thinking of flying/training from each destination whichever is fastest!>

OK here are some great sites for helping get a fix on Europe's fantastic rail service - www.budgeteuropetravel.com; www.seat61.com and www.ricksteves.com. As for flying yes to relocated quickly but you also want to see the Europe in between its mega tourist cities too, right - and trains going up to nearly 200 mph in many countries will let you do this in comfortable and at times about the same time all told as flying where you have pre-flight check-in time limits, waiting for bags, getting to the airport and then back into town,etc.

And Europe's many overnight hotel-type trains can let you relocate across Europe at night and save on a hotel cost to boot.

Anyway - yeh from London to Berlin fly but you could also take the Chunnel train from London to Paris and then work you way thru Germany to Berlin by train and stop off in some neat places en route, like the fabled Rhine River Gorge, Heidelberg, Munich, etc.

StuDudley

Your itinerary looks like our first trip to Europe in '77. I don't remember any of the destinations - because I was almost always in a car or train, was exhausted when I got there, and was only "there" for 1 to 1 1/2 days. We traveled with my mother & sister, and they "bailed out" half way through the trip.

On our next trip to Europe, We went back to many of the same places so we could see what we missed on the prior trip.

All a part of "learning to travel". These travel forums are great because we can "pass on" what we've learned to others.

We now spend 2 months each year vacationing in Europe. Normally we spend 2 weeks in a single location.

Less is more.

Stu Dudley

nytraveler

While it's true that there are many trains in europe that run throughout the night many of them are not trains with sleeping compartments (which tend to be quite expensive and house 4 to 6 persons - and if you're traveling alone they will be strangers.

But many of these trains actually have 1 or more changes during the night - and seats rather than bunks in compartments - so you need to research this carefully to see where it is possible.

Also, some of these trips are very lengthy by train.

For instance - there is a train leaving Berlin at about 12:30 am and arriving around 9:30 in the am - but an "overnight" train from Nice to Barcelona takes at least 15 hours with several changes of train.

If you are determined to do this you can - but you will have to set up a schedule that works like clockwork - and hope that there are no delays anywhere along the line. If you will enjoy it or not is another issue.

Pegontheroad

I really like Stu's comment about "learning to travel." Most people who frequent this board do so because they love to travel, and they're mostly very experienced travelers.

I suspect that in the past many of us have done tours or "If this is Tuesday, this must be Brussels" types of itineraries, and we learned our lessons.

My travel tends to be pretty low key. My tendency would be to spend all my time in one country (usually two to three weeks), visiting several cities or areas and spending two to three days in a given place. If the city isn't a high-interest place, I might spend only 2 days, but if there's a lot to see I'd spend 3-5 days there.

I live in Washington State, so I will be wiped out from jet-lag at least the first day, so I don't hit the ground running. I make sure to set aside one day between each city for checking out, traveling to the new place, finding and checking in to the new hotel.

I prefer to take trains when possible, since train stations are normally in town, and I don't have to worry about getting to the airport. Unless the distance is very long, flying doesn't necessarily save all that much time, anyway, since I have to taxi or bus to the airport and check in, arriving at least an hour early, then getting into my next town. Also, I get to see the countryside if I travel by train.

If I were you, I'd pay pretty close attention to the posters on this thread. They're mostly "master travelers."

PalenQ

group tours are good for what they offer and many people - far more than solo travelers - Americans that is go on tours than do independent travel - for obvious reasons. But with the train system and cheap flights it is so easy to get around Europe and once in cities you can easily manage yourself - with online hotel booking reserving hotels in your budget is easy too.

On tours however you basically only meet other Americans traveling with you and rarely any Europeans - on trains at least you will be in with lots of locals and folks from all over the world.

Independent travel need not be travail is the point.

charnees

You have a minimum of two 25 day trips if you visit all those places. Actually, more like three!

Choose no more than 5 cities and divide the time between them based on what you want to see in them. Remember that within cities it always takes longer to get around and see things than you expect, just as it takes longer to get around between cities than you think.

Believe us. We've been there many times and know what it is like. It's so tempting to try to see everything, but you just can't.

Aramis

>>it always takes longer to get around and see things than you expect, just as it takes longer to get around between cities than you think.<<

That would depend on one's planning and expectations, I think.

simja

Thank you so much for all your feedback, really appreciate that you are all seasoned travellers and know what your talking about! Will definately need to narrow down the cities we want to go to and throughly plan our end to end transport. Now for planning...

justineparis

We had 26 days in Europe this summer, we did flew into Amsterdam, trained to Paris, then train to Nice, then flew ot Barcelona , then bus to Tossa de Mar, then returned to Paris.

It was too much moving around. Would not do it again.

25 days would be max of 5 places to me.

isabel

Just last night I was mapping out my basic itinerary for next June. Like you, I have about a month. Like you, I plan to include Paris, south of France, the Cinque Terre and one other place in Italy. And I'm thinking I don't have enough time. And I've already been to all these places! (I just want to see them again, see them in more depth, see new parts of them). So yes, definitely narrow it down.

Do you already have your tickets or was into Berlin out of Rome just your plan? Also, which countries interest you most? That information would allow us to give you better advice. But unless Spain is your top place I would drop it, as it is the geographical outlier.

You don't have to go as slow as a lot of the posters here (myself included). There is something to be said for getting a taste of places and then knowing where you want to go back to. One suggested itinerary would be: Fly into London, train to AMS, train to Paris, train to Avignon, train to Nice, train to CT, fly home from Rome. That would be about four days in each of the cities, three in the other areas. Doesn't count travel but each of the train rides I mentioned are not more than half a day, and unlike flying trains take you city center to city center so you don't loose that much time.

PalenQ

I like to travel - yes travel more than actually sit in a city for days on end as many here think is the only way to go - it may be good for them but there is another school of thought as well - I like seeing Europe from a train car (or car) moving between cities - so whatever if your cup of tea fine - do not be intimidated by FodorGarchs who think their way - where you must spend a week in say Paris or not even go there at all - is the only way.

adrienne

Pal - everyone is expressing their opinions, and offering valuable comments, and there's no need to put down other people because they have a different travel style from yours or to call people names like Fodorgarch (whatever that is and whoever that refers to).

Express your opinion or not but stop putting down other people and their travel styles.

Aramis

adrienne - I'm puzzled.

You facetiously tell the OP to "enjoy the train stations" if they choose to attempt a proposed trip that you "would not enjoy" but then subsequently present yourself as a defender of each individual's travel style?

PalenQ

Express your opinion or not but stop putting down other people and their travel styles.>

Well I think you misread my thoughts or maybe I did not express myself clearly enough - here is what I said:

<it may be good for them but there is another school of thought as well - I like seeing Europe from a train car (or car) moving between cities - so whatever if your>

I said it may be good for them - I meant yes whatever style one wants is good, obviously - I do not mean to put down other travel styles at all and I should have made this more clear.

nytraveler

Agree that there are many different styles of travel - and some people want to move very quickly.

If the OP chooses to do that - based on educated information - that's fine. But it is apparent from the first post that the OP isn't really experienced at this - and wants input on their plan.

They may choose to see many places out of train windows (we do lots of road trips - which many people deride versus train travel) - but it's only fair to give them the views of many experience travelers to choose from - and point out things they may not have thought about.