Ribota

Greetings fellow travelers,
My family and I are staying in Gijon, Spain for 20 days with family, followed by 10 days in Paris. In the north of Spain, besides visiting the city of Oviedo, can you recommend any close trips in this region?

I hope to take some 3 night trips to Madrid and possibly Valencia, Andorra, Barcelona, depending on the train connections & cost.
I am searching for a GPS to help me navigate the cities we visit. Has anyone tried the Garmin nuvi 1370 or can recommend one with Europe city maps?

Any experience with the Eurail France-Spain pass? Still have to research if RENFE or FEVE are covered. And will the Gijon-Paris trip be covered.

Since I am a mom traveling with my 10 year old son I am also concerned about safety.

Thank you kindly for your advice and comments,

Ribota

Robert2533

I'm not much of a fan of using a GPS to navigate in a city. A decent street map should be all you will need. Pick one up at any tourist office. If you have an iPhone or BlackBerry (T-Mobile), the mapping works fine.

I also recommend skipping Andorra unless you interested in a giant shopping mall.

Eurail passes are not a good option in Spain. It's much less expensive to plan you trips and book online with Renfe.

There are dozens of great places around Gijon worth visiting. You can hop on the FEVE and make day-trip to almost anywhere in the north. FEVE offers it's own discounted tickets, but the cost of purchasing a one-way ticket for a day-trip is normally inexpensive and can be purchased at the station from a ticket machine.

Check out the route maps (PDF) at www.feve.es/html.php?id=33

ribeirasacra

I am a bit confused.
Cab you confirm exactly how many days you have in Madrid. I see three days but then you are wanting to go to 3 other locations all of which are more than just a day trip away from Madrid.
Then you are in Gijón for 20 days. But what form of transport are you going to use to get around the area? What are your interests and what time of year are you planning this trip for.
How long are you planning to take for the trip from Gijón to Paris?
Without this information then answers are going to be given could be quite a waste of time.
Eurail ( do you mean Eurorail?)passes do not include booking of seats on major rail lines like RENFE so that has to be added to any costs. I also do not believe that you can use them on the FEVE lines.
GPS is only as good as the mapping of the country. If you take a look at Google map s take the hybrid view and you will see that not all the country roads are in the maps where as they are on the photo. In cities they can be quite good as they should be able to get you around the one-way street systems much easier than a paper map. So it is a balance. I would suggests you have a map as aback up to the GPS.

Ribota

Thank you for your your replies.
We arrive in Gijon second day of July and will leave from there early August.
I am searching for some day or overnight trips around Gijon.
The FEVE pdfs will surely help, THANK YOU!

My son and I are in Paris from July 20-30 and I am considering 3-4 nights in Madrid to visit El Padro July 16-20. Still searching for kid friendly places to visit and an economical hotel.

Using the library to prepare for this trip; history, art, classics, nature etc.

Thank you for any suggestions,
Ribota

ribeirasacra

Booking dot com is a good place to find hotels. Then find something to suite your budget.

You are looking for kid friendly places to visit maybe this would be ok?
http://www.parquewarner.com/