1st Europe Trip, Help Needed

I think your itinerary is pretty full, and I wonder if you'd want to slow it down a bit, spend a little more time in places like Rome where there are so many wonderful things to see you may not want to have to pick and choose between them. Personally, I've enjoyed trips where I ended up spending most of my time in a couple of cities rather than going through ten cities and taking snapshots in front of places I'm hard-pressed to remember three weeks later when I'm back at home.

It also seems as though you may spend quite a bit of time on trains (in Italy). Just remember that there won't be a train at the exact time you may want to leave, so be prepared to lose a half a day due to the train schedule.

Keep in mind that everything looks great when you're here and excited and ready to go, but you'll get tired towards the end of your third week. I would suggest doing as much research before you leave than waste time when you're there. Check museums for special exhibits.

Hello Krissi. You can do all of that. But a traveller doing all of that is likely to feel tired (and miserable) every day, all day. My first concern, which other people do not talk about here at the Traveler's helpline, is : if your flight from the U.S.A. to an airport in Europe is at night, you will arrive at the airport in Europe the day after you started from your home, feeling very very tired, and stressed, and miserable, because of a lack of sleep. And getting adjusted to the different time zone in Europe takes six days. Some people never get adjusted to it. And most people, sleeping in a hotel room or B & B in Europe, feel tired in the morning when they awaken, every day. I suggest : your first three or four days in Europe, have plans for sightseeing, but if you feel very tired, at any time of the day, go back to your hotel room, and allow yourself to sleep, 2 hours.

Busy, but not overly so. I would agree with the suggestion to leave out Carcassonne and Nice. While Carcassonne is a wonderful place to visit, it's too far out of your line of travel for this trip. And rail/air transportation connections across southern France to Italy aren't terribly efficient or fast. I would put those days towards extra time in Rome, Munich, and London, just to give you more "down time." Ron is right, you need to be concerned about jet lag. But every person reacts differently, and the younger you are, the faster you can bounce back. With four days in Paris, you should be able to adapt just fine. When arriving in Paris, we usually hit our hotel to drop off luggage and ask for as early a checkin as possible. We see some sights and visit some old haunts in the morning, have a nice lunch, then check into our hotel for a 3-4 hour nap in the afternoon, then up for dinner and more touring. Back to bed at a regular time, and we're ready to go the next day!

Regarding item #6: On the Bahn.de website, put in a departure time sometime in the middle of the day, and when the results come up, you will see at the top and the bottom of the "time" column "earlier" and "later" respectively. Click on these to get earlier times and later times. You may have to click on them more than once, or if it is a busy route with lots of departures, you may have to put in a bogus morning departure time and then repeat with a bogus afternoon departure time. You should be able to get all the departures for the day in this way.

Your itinerary is actually pretty good, though as some have said, full. For a first trip to Europe, balance big cities (which are crammed with cool stuff to see, but exhausting) with small pretty places for rest and relaxation. You may want to cut out a place or two and really concentrate on places like Paris and Rome, say a week in each, but take cool day trips to places like Chartres and Assisi. Just my two cents!

Thank you so much to everyone! We have been considering taking out Carcassonne (and therefore Nice) but didn't want to mention it in the first, so we could get any fresh perspectives from all of you. I think that if we take those out and change things around a little, we'll have a much better and more relaxed time! I love the suggested iteneraries and we'll look into making them work. We have to fly in and out of London to and from home however as we already have our tickets (they were an AMAZING deal for June on Northwest Airlines- only ~$680 roundtrip.) Thanks again everyone!

Krissi, Congratulations to you for finding airline tickets that were a low price (flying from Seattle - Takoma airport ?). There will be good weather in Europe in June. Even London can have good weather in June. For an enjoyable time at the Cinque Terre in Italy : I recommend walk on the trail between Corniglia and Vernazza (in that direction). It is a one mile trail. Plan for plenty of time for that walk on the trail, so you can stop at the top of a cliff to gaze at the blue Mediteranean Sea and white foam and rocks far below you, and see white birds circling in the air below you. When I was there, I wished I could have stayed up there for hours. Eat lunch at a cafe in Monterosso.
- Buon viaggio !