DH and I have been tossing around the idea of spending 4 to 6 months in europe after retirement (2 years off). We've been to a number of countries/cities over the past 8 years (7 trips in all,each for 2 weeks) but this will give us a chance to really experience living as a part of the culture. I looked into renting a caravan camper and the quote was over 23,000e plus petro - a large sum. So, as an alternative, I'm thinking we should establish 4-6 home bases with rental apartments and then day or weekend trip from there. We've been to most of the 'big' cities and loved them, but also enjoyed the dolomites, tuscany, black forest and andalusia. Has anyone on this forum ever planned and then executed a long term trip like this? Any suggestions???? thanks so much -

cmeyer,

Thank you for posting this. I have had this dream for quite a while, though it's a bit early for us to start planning. I am also very interested in suggestions, so topping...

I have not done that long a vacation trip, only for a month or a bit more, but my one comment is just something from your description that seemed unusual to me. That is that you have never even spent more than two weeks in europe, on vacation, and are thinking of planning a major stay of 4-6 months there.

IF you do book up 4-6 apartments for that period (short-term vacation rental apartments usually need to be booked far in advance, and in any case, require completely deposits and payments that are unusually totally nonrefundable if you don't cancell well in advance). So this is a major major commitment of money to something that you have never even come close to trying.

In short, I would think you could start out by choosing one area and staying there 4-6 weeks first, before you plan some major trip of 4-6 different stays like that.

IN fact, I don't know what your finances are like, but I don't see the reason for doing all that at one time instead of spreading it out over some years -- unless you have enough money that you could continue to take lots of vacations and trips to Europe even after your one stay of 4-6 months. You know yourself, but I personally would much rather concentrate on one city/country/culture at a time to get the most out of it. Partly that is because if I were going to stay in a place, I would want to learn about it and study the language to get the most out of it and immerse myself more in the culture. You cannot study seriously so many different foreign languages and get any competence in them.

If course, if you already know French, Spanish, German, Italian, very well, that would not be an issue. Since you said one of your main goals is to really experience living as part of the culture, I just would think you could do that better if you studied the language and concentrated more on one place each time or something.

There is also the issue that you have never even stayed away longer than 2 weeks -- what if you hate such long stays and you've laid out thousands of dollars for apt. rentals in advance, etc.

Good thoughts - I did not mention that DH worked in Germany for 5 years; 3 weeks over and 1 week home each month.

Hi CM,

Before you set off on your 6 mo trek in an RV or 6 months in 6 venures, I suggest a 1-month vist to 3-4 locations to see how much you enjoy being away from home.

We find that after a month away, we get a hankering to return to our little house in GA.