Newbie Needs Help planning 45 day Itinerary for Europe
 

Hello! My b/f and I (22 + 26) are planning a 6 week backpacking trip for Sept-Oct of 2011. I know I'm planning a little early but I wanted to post a rough itinerary to seek much needed advice from seasoned travelers.

Anything on cheap transportation (airplane not preferred as our backpacks might cause too much of a hassle), best route plan so we don't have to double back anywhere , food (willing to splurge a little on that), cheap accomodations (budget hotels ideal but hostels are good too), and some awesome sights (historic, achitecture, just anything you think can't be missed)

We've about $5000 to spend per person on everything excluding airfare and possibly railpasses if the trip calls for one, but I'm wondering if that budget is a little tight. Of course we'd be careful with our spendings but we'd also like to enjoy a little. Not big partiers but haven't met a glass of wine I didn't like.

So here's the breakdown so far::

England:
>>London 4-5 days (daytrip to Bath and Stonehenge is one day good?)

France :
>>Paris 6 days (daytrip to Versailles)
>>Languedoc 2 days (daytrip to Albi)
>>Provence 2 days

Spain :
>>Madrid 3 days
>> Barcelona 2 days
>> Seville 2 days

Portugal :
>>Lisbon 2 days
>>Lagos 2 days

Italy :
>>Florence 2 days
>>Venice 2 days
>>Cinque Terre 2 days
>>Rome 5 days

have a few remaining days to disperse in places we're enjoying. Didn't want to plan everything down to a tee. I have a few must dos for each location but wanted to get ideas from fellow foderites first.

I think my biggest problem right now is trying to figure out where to fly in and out of that will be the most budget friendly. Transporation to and from areas are also kicking my butt. Thinking of doing open jaw ticket but the logistics are harder than they seem. We're very excited as this is our first time in Europe and since I'm a serial planner I've been consumed by the process. Apologies for the very long post but thanks in advance as any help would be very much appreciated!

-Kay

Kay,

Ok, I will start. You will probably get a lot of response to your post.

Firstly, congratulations on your first trip to Europe, also for the long 45 day trip. I have been to all of the countries you list and about half of the cities. It looks like a good itinerary but you really need to organize it in a streamlined fashion. Also, $5000 per person is just over 100 dollars a day which I think is a bit light given some of these expensive cities. Also, you have some very short ie 2 night stays which could quickly get old when you are on the road for that many days. I would scale back the number of spots and do more day trips (and also allow some time to just relax.)

Logistics. Flying into London and out of Rome makes the most sense to me. You could hit London then train to Paris. From Paris fly to Lisbon, then go from Portugal to Spain to France to Italy by train if you can.

Maybe do something like this: go from Lisbon to Algarve to Seville to Madrid to Barcelona to Cote d’Azur to CT to Venice to Florence to Rome. Some of these train rides will be very long, so get a map and check it out. Anyways, some things to think about.

For the London/UK section of your trip check out travelodge - if you book 3 weeks in advance you can (but not always) get a room for £19. A hostel in London can be £15-20 a night so worth it.

How much do you enjoy the actual travelling? You will be spending half your trip on trains. Make a descision, do you want to see a few places well or see lots of places just looking out of a train/bus window?

Personally I'd bump either Spain/Portugal or Italy.

Uk - France - Italy (or Spain) are both logical routes, I also think some sort of rail pass would be a good idea.

How about

Fly into London (btw you didn't say where you were flying from)

London with day trips (8 days, your day trips would reduce time in London to 2/3 days, the day you arrive you will see nothing but a jetlag haze ehich gives you just one actual day, and that is not enough.

Eurostar to Paris -1 day (OK it's 3hours on the train but checking out of London Hotel, checking in for train, checking into hotel, freshen up - it takes most of the day)

Paris (6 days)

Overnight train to Nice - just for the experience - it won't be cheaper than a hotel or hostel

Nice/provence/northern Italy for a week - do your relaxing here, maybe hire a car to see a bit of Provence. This also gives you time to catch up on laundry

Trains in Italy, 1 week northern Italy, 1 week Rome.

A couple of years ago I had a short bereak to Verona and took the train to Venice for the day - personally that was enough for me.

Fly out of Rome.

We did a similar trip three years ago. We flew into Rome, traveled through Italy, Southern France, Spain and Portugal, then flew from Lisbon to London, took a ferry to France and flew home from Paris.

When my daughter and I traveled by ourselves we stayed in youth hostels. They were great. When we traveled as a family we were in hotels. We found the Campanile chain in France and Spain to be reasonably priced, however they may be out of your budget. I spent hours on Venere.com looking for affordable rooms.

Transport - understand the likely waste of money (and time)on Railpasses, - read at least - http://europetrainsguide.com/Advice/...ot-to-buy.html

A resource for train travel is - http://www.seat61.com/ - a fine effort (until redirecting to agencies which deal with RailPasses), but this resource, again, suggests you are probably better dealing direct with the national rail carrier of the individual country to save money.

Spain and accommodation - there is very extra little value to find when staying in a hostel - compare with hostals (spelling), pensions and small hotels.

I suggest cutting back on the short stays by visiting fewer destinations. Fewer destinations with more quality time will allow you to really enjoy each destination and also save some money and time on transportation. It may also be less exhausting.

Whatever you eliminate you can plan to visit on future trips.

Definitely do an open jaw (multi-city) flight. It would make no sense (expensive, time) to backtrack.

Wow! I really didn't expect replies so quickly! sorry about not posting where i'll be leaving from. To clarify I'd be leaving through ORF airport in Virginia, US. I've done some dummy bookings through kayak.com for open jaw flights and they ranged from 790-950. too expensive? Where can i go for cheaper flights? i had hopes of taking advantage of student discounts but my b/f is a bit too old (26)

Krgystn: first and foremost, Thanks for starting off with such a terrific reply! I was hoping to avoid airports mainly because our backpack will probably be above the weight limit for smaller airlines. I also heard that airports in Europe are very troublesome. However, it will probably save a lot of time. Do you know how much a flight from Paris to Lisbon will cost?

Sassh: I don't really mind the road that much. I'm Vietnamese so the trip to my country a lot of times is 20+ hrs., so 5 or 6 hrs. in a car,train, plane doesn't really bother me. With that said I would much rather spend time exploring than traveling. We might cut out Portugal (we were only considering it because it is so close to Spain) but Spain and Italy definitely cannot be scrapped as there are many places that we'd like to hit in these countries. I've a couple of extra days left what places would u suggest I base at and/or make daytrips too?

cferrb: I never thought of that route. I'm checking on some tickets prices to see if it would be cheaper to fly in and out of those cities. Did u use a rail pass going through those areas and if so did u find it useful? Also how much was your flight from Lisbon to London? I'm sure u had an amazing time!

I've been reading more on railpasses but have gotten confused. Too much researching!!!! In your opinion with those areas that I've listed would u do a rail pass or would a combo of point-point tickets + bus and maybe a flight or two be cheaper? Still working on the itinerary so nothing is set in stone but we'd really like to see as much as possible without running ourselves ragged. Sample itineraries with transportation info anybody? Thanks again for all of the quick replies everyone and sorry for yet another long post!

You must look it to what visas you need before you get too deeply into planning and booking, if you have a Vietnamese passport, if you haven't already done so.

Have fun planning and touring Europe ;).

Anything on cheap transportation>

Well train travel is not always so cheap in Europe but for such a trip i would think it the best way to get around - esp for the many big tourist cities you are going to where cars are liabilities - huge parts of towns like Florence, Rome, etc being off-limits to private vehicles and parking problematic and expensive when found.

I am partial to trains and have literally done trips with railpasses annually at least for four decades - even when i first went some of the trains where steam-powered (yup an old fart) and now they go up to 200 mph.

Anyway for such a long trip and wide-ranging - like i did several times at your age (the Fodor mantra is you have to spend a whole week in every city - forget it as young folk often like the travel part as much as the places - hop overnight trains to save on hotel/hostel costs and to relocated easily - any two cities far enough apart seems to have overnight trains running between them.

Anyway to help plan a European rail trip for the clueless and novices i always spotlight these info-laden sites: www.ricksteves.com; www.seat61.com; www.budgeteuropetravel.com - be sure to download the latter's free and superb IMO European Planning & Rail Guide that has a chapter of rail travel in each country with suggested itineraries, maps, etc.

hetismj: oh no! i'm american. hehe just originally from VN. I have a 10 yr US passport though. =D

For cheap flights in the UK and Europe, take a look at Ryanair and EasyJet, though you are right, they are troublesome about luggage. But as long as you read their fine print and follow their rules, you can manage.

Trains are the best for travel in Europe, in my opinion.

I do think you should leave out Portugal if you can.

If you fly into London, then to France, then Spain and then to Italy, that is in IMO the most manageable itinerary. There are flights and train links from Barcelona to Italy and you can fly out of Rome. Or reverse the whole route.

Plenty of time yet though = )

Check out Let's Go Europe - the best IMO guide/resource for young backpackers - unparalleled IMO coverage of zillions of hostels - both official HI Hostels and the many more cline-oriented 'private' hostels that are more centrally located - have bars, etc. In any major bookstore or library.

Hi KayDoll ,
Congratulations on what will be a great trip. You are not starting your planning too early at all. There are a lot of logistics to figure out. Besides, a big part of trip planning for me is learning about new places and why I want to go there.

We are planning our second trip to Europe and plan to do a combo of train and car. Last time we did a lease car for three months. When you get a final itinerary you can compare the train prices to passes. You might end up getting passes for a few countries and individual tickets for the shorter rides. You can check out http://www.whichbudget.com/ to see what airlines fly where.

See...there is a lot to do.:)

Michele

Six months after we married, we spent six months in Europe, mainly in Spain. (It was a looooooooooong time ago.)

One of the things I remember most was getting to know a place. It is not that I do not like seeing many places, but there is a deep sense of satisfaction about knowing the quirks, charms, and customs on a certain city or town. So I would consider spending more time in certain locations. We all have our favorites and prejudices on these boards, but I doubt anyone would disagree about a full week in Paris and London. And you will cut down on your transportation costs.

Kay, here are a couple of other things to consider. For budget, think about it in major categories like this:

Airfare from USA
Lodging
Meals
Other Transportation (ie. train fare—-you can determine this pretty closely before you go)
Misc daily expenses/attractions

This way you can play around with the numbers until you get to your target budget (this works great if you put it into a spreadsheet.) As far as daily expenditures, remember that every tower you climb, every villa you enter, every museum you go to will charge you at least 5-20 dollars. This adds up fast.

Finally, remember that 2 nights typically means 1 day in a city which is very rushed.

A lot of god opinions here. Mine would be to skip UK, it is the most like US, (though I would like to see Stonehenge) and you already have WAY too much to do. That way, you will have more time, money and energy for the more "exotic" locations. And $900 for open jaw to europe is a very good price!

After reading all of your inputs we've decided to cut Portugal and extend our London and Paris stays. I'd like to stay in an apartment if we stay a week or so in these areas but do not know where i can find apartment rentals.

PalenQ:: I've already bought let's go Europe and have checked out a few RS and lonelyplanets guides from my library. Going to check hostels once I get the itinerary done but are there any u recommend?

So how does this sound::

London 7 days .... Day trip to Bath and Stonehenge

Flight to Italy
Rome 5 days
Cinque Terre 2 days
Florence 3 days
Venice 2 days

Train to France
Provence 3 days
Paris 7 days .... Daytrip to Versailles
Languedoc 3 days .... Daytrip to Albi

Train to Spain
Seville 2 days
Barcelona 3 days
Madrid 3 days

Fly into London and leave from Spain. Does that sound like a more relaxed itinerary.

Rick Steve's is to travel writing what Barry Manilow is to rock n' roll. His is an insipid narrow view of the world.

Here is my less than humble opinion for guide books:

Frommer’s and Fodor’s-Good on restaurants and hotels, poor on history and culture, small town recommendations non-existent

Rough Guide and Lonely Planet-Opinionated and edgy, good on history and culture, terrible on restaurants and hotels

Cadogan-specialized for a specific areas. Quietly helpful, especially Spain

Eyewitness and National Geographic-Like stereotypical models nice to look at but little else.

Rick Steve’s-I would rather be lead by a blind man

Michelin Green-probably the best for sites.

Time Out-excellent for the large cities

I really think you're shortchanging Spain. I'd add at least 1 day to Sevilla in order to make time for a daytrip to Cordoba. I'd add a day to Madrid and do at least 2 daytrips from Madrid (Toledo and Segovia). I'd add a day to Barcelona - 4 days will give you just enough time for Barcelona but I doubt any daytrips. I'd also add 2 nights for Granada - a shame to visit Andalucia and not see the Alhambra. These would be my minimum recommendations. It would be great if you could add a couple of days in Ronda or Arcos when traveling between Granada & Sevilla.

Actually I'd add 2 days to Sevilla for a total of 4 days (with 1 day for a daytrip to Cordoba).

I agree with CathyM but only if you are interested in history and architecture. I am, for example, so I would skip Madrid and maybe even Barcelona and just stay in Seville and Granada or maybe Malaga.

But that depends entirely on you = )

I like the rest of your itinerary though = )

Actually, let me add something - I didn't mean Madrid and Barcelona are not rich in history and architecture. My personal preference would be to see Seville, Granada, Cordoba, and Malaga.

= )

I got to say this - Stonehenge is about a 1 hour site. That's about it. There is nothing else to it, it is in the middle of nowhere. Honestly, it is very cool to think about how long they have been there, how they got it set up and what it was used for but after that, there isn't anything nearby. I've been there numerous times, only because I lived in the UK, and use to travel to Newqauy/Lands End. And each time I went, it was a good spot to stop, stretch and of course show the new person I was with at the time Stonehenge.

With that out of the way - London is a great place to visit, and if I was to suggest cutting out a part, it would be Portugal. I know you said you want to avoid flying, but even with the discount airlines jacking up the price of the ticket due to a heavy bag - the cost will most certainly be less than a train from say italy to Barcelona.

You can fly Iberia or Vuelling airlines from Rome to Barcelona for under $120 per person w/up to 20kg bag check. You are going to spend that easily on a train, plus spend triple the time on the train. I would say based upon the logistical route do the following:

Fly to Venice
train to Florence, CT and then to Rome
Fly Rome to Seville
Train to Madrid
Train to Barcelona
train up into Bordeaux
train to Paris - provence trip can be done from Paris
then train to London - fly out of London back to the US.

Now you just need to decide how to split up your days.

chazz, that is a great, creative routing!

Kaydoll - with the last proposed itinerary, which i find to be perfect - both in time alloted to each stop and time to travel in between - i would look at a Eurail Select Saverpass - a 3-country pass good in Italy, France and Spain. Saverpass is two or more names on one pass for folks traveling together and cheaper than two single passes - too bad one is 26 as no longer able to do the Youthpass, for folks under 25 - but with the Saverpass - first class which does have many many benefits IMO - if you take the single adult first class EurailSelect Pass price and add it to the Youthpass price, which one person could get but in 2nd class - with the Saverpass you both go first class for the same price one would with a solo first class pass and solo Youth or 2nd class pass. And with the distances you are traveling this pass will save you lots of money and also provide flexibility in case you want to change your plans as you go along.

IMHO two days in Venice makes it doubtful whether it's worth going there at all - it's nothing for a city that needs minimum two months if you want to see all of it. Though hardly anybody can stay that long, of course, in two days, you won't even have time to start scratching the surface. Two days Venice, that's an emergency schedule, not what you'd want to get on a 45-days-trip. So if you're not that eager to see it, I suggest skipping it altogether; or if you are, to assign at least four days to it.

Hi KayDoll,
Apartment rentals are the way to go when you are in a city for a week. Really saves on eating out costs. You can get some laundry done and it is just a change up from your regular routine. A little home away from home to come back to at the end of every day.

Lots of people have stayed at these apts in Paris http://www.parisbestlodge.com/ . The owner, Thierry is very attentive and helpful and highly recommended. You can also get a lot of recommendations from this site.

A lot of people don't like Rick Steve's books but don't discount them. They have a lot of basic advice for the first time traveler. I really felt familiar with a city before I arrived due to the info he provided. Of course there are lots of other guidebooks but his are very budget minded...which is what you want and need.

Michele

Hello all! Well first I want to start by saying thanks to everyone for all of your help and that it's inspiring to be among such passionate people! We all have our own tastes and styles as well as likes and dislikes so I love that I'm getting so many different types of recommendations and opinions. Since my time frame is so short I'll only be able to go to a few places and i'm finding it very hard to narrow it down as there are so many places to go with so much to see!!!! I know that I won't be able to fully immerse myself into the culture (as much as I'd like to be able too) so the main objective is to see as many places as we can without spending too little time in each place. We'd love to travel wildly and see everything (without running ourselves ragged of course) with the knowledge that we will be back on day. I'm still researching several things for each of these countries so we're still a long ways from having a final itinerary.Please keep the comments coming! And if anyone has anymore information about apartment rentals it would be very much appreciated. Thanks again!!

To economize you may want to consider B&Bs - like in Florence i recently stayed in a B&B right near the train station for 30 euros - much less than any hotel -in a flat with the family but private room with bath-shower in it and humungous breakfast - just Google B&B in any city - Rome too has some near the Termini station.

KayDoll, two threads on apartment rentals (in Venice and Rome, respectively) that may be interesting for you:
http://www.fodors.com/community/euro...comodation.cfm
and
http://www.fodors.com/community/euro...odistricts.cfm

PalenQ: might u be able to email me the name of this B&B and do they have a website?

KayDoll, try bedinflorence - they have two B&Bs close to SMN, B&B Peterson and B&B Cassia.