Days to avoid when planning an itinerary

I think Monday's a pretty common day of closure. I don't believe Tuesday is, except for Paris. But even within a city, there can be differences, and often commercially-operated sites (as opposed to government museums) will be open seven a days a week. Example: Some of the modernista sites in Barcelona.

When I was tooling around Palermo, Sicily, in 2015, I noticed that the religious sites (churches and oratorios) seemed to have an usual variety of opening hours. There was always something open for a tourist to see. Don't know whether that was intentional or not, but I liked it.

This subject will be covered by any decent guide book. Rick's good about making that information really accessible, sometimes even providing a summary chart, I believe.

The second Tuesday of each month is known as "Tire Fire Tuesday" in Amsterdam. The locals throw all their old tires into the Prinsengracht canal, dump in some gasoline, and set it on fire. You want to avoid those days.

Big cities with lots of sights usually have some closed on Tuesday, others on Monday. In my experience, Monday has the most closures, so I try to make that a travel day.

In Germany, Monday is the traditional day for many museums or even churches to be closed. Not all of them though, so it pays to check their websites. Often, if there is a holiday on Monday, they will be open.
Good idea to check for holidays in any of the countries you are visiting as this can cause havoc with a vacation if you don't know about it. Stores closed, parades, church services, museum closures, crowded hotels, etc. On the other hand the holiday can add a special touch to your vacation. Trade fairs or large events (like popular marathons) in big cities can also drive up hotel prices and make hotel rooms scarce and restaurants very full and busy.

Check city websites to find out when events will be. You can also check hotel consolidators to see what hotel prices are for your dates of travel as this can be your first clue that there is something big happening. Hotels that would normally be 100€ per night can triple their prices during a big trade fair or event.

Thursdays. I could never get the hang of Thursdays.

Monday is the main closure day for museums and historic sites in Western Europe other than the UK. In France there's a rule in some cities that sites run by central government close on Monday and ones run by local government close on Tuesday.

Monday is the most common closed day for all but the biggest sights. Some in Paris close Tuesdays, I think they had in mind keeping some things open on Mondays, and closing on Tuesday instead, so visitors had some access to sights - but Monday is really common.

When I was in Spain, siesta times were an issue. In all but the biggest sights, places would close from somewhere between 11 and 1 and stay closed two or three hours, sometimes longer. Each place seemed to have slightly different siesta times and guidebooks weren't very accurate at detailing them.

In France, a two-hour plus lunch is similar. Don't expect to pick up a rental car, as an example, in a smaller office between 11 and 2. Unless you make prior arrangements, they are likely to close up completely until they return from their lunch.

The second Tuesday of each month is known as "Tire Fire Tuesday" in Amsterdam. The locals throw all their old tires into the Prinsengracht canal, dump in some gasoline, and set it on fire. You want to avoid those days.

I'd pay good money to see this if it actually happened.

There's no one-fits-all answer. If you are planning to spend only 1-2 days in a place and there's a must-see, then you need to know that when you start planning. If you are spending 3-4 days in a place, it's unusual that you won't have things to see and do on a day when a must-see is closed.

Adding to Chani's point, when I went to Nancy, France (an under-visited gem), I really wanted to see the Musee de l'Ecole de Nancy, but my two days were Monday and Tuesday, and it was closed both days! So, if something is really important to you, check the closing days for that sight; don't rely on generalities about this.

I'll also reinforce a point made above; many stores are closed on Sundays, particularly in German-speaking countries (where it's often the law). This is hard for us from the US, with its 24-7-365 shopping culture, to get used to. If you do need something on a Sunday, head to the train station; since train station stores are usually exempt from the Sunday closing rules, they often have a supermarket. If you're looking for other shopping, do plan on doing it on a non-Sunday. Of course, like everywhere, small stores (where there may just the the owner and one or two employees) often have very irregular hours (say, Tuesdays through Fridays' from 2 to 6 - and nothing else); again, you have to check.

Restaurants often have a closing day once per week, but these vary. Yet again, if you have your heart set on a particular place, check it out in advance. But there will always be open restaurants, so long as you don't need one particular place.

For all big cities, Rick's guidebooks have a two-page rundown of major visitor sites At a Glance, with their opening hours included. For smaller towns, the descriptions are only in the regular text, but it will also be only a few pages. It will rarely be the case that everything is closed, but certainly could happen that the thing you most wanted to see is closed, so highlight those issues as you plan.

What I do might be helpful to some others, especially those who tend not to pre-structure their time at each destination. I take long trips, so some form of organization is essential.

I make a grid seven boxes wide, representing a week. Depending on the level of detail I want, I may put more than one week on a piece of paper. I add the dates. Then for each date I note key opening/closing information. Normally it's closing info, but it can also be late hours at a site, a museum's free day, a non-daily market, non-daily tours of interest, etc.

If I'm not sure what week I will be in a particular city/town (yes, that definitely happens), that city's information will appear for two weeks. I build this as I'm researching the trip and find it very handy. It has saved me a couple of times from taking a day-trip on a day a key sight was going to be closed, and it makes it easier to plan as I go and still hit the occasional once-a-week market.

When I start out knowing where I'll be sleeping on a particular day (not a common occurrence for me), I put the name of the city at the top of that day's block for easy reference.

A made-up example:

Mon, May 13:
[Optional CITY NAME]
Closed: X Mus, Y Mus, Z Mus
Mkt: Town A, Town B
Mus P till 8 PM
Free: W Mus
MLN Tour 10 AM

I either try to arrive in a city on a day when there are many sites closed, if I can find one low-key place to visit and walk around to get oriented I'm doing great, or mid-trip use that day as a rest day and just explore outdoors. Since I'm a bit of a planner I do plenty of research and have my must-sees plotted out, with open days/times noted and that's worked well for me.

Another thing to remember is religious holidays can cause closures at certain sites. We were in Prague for three days and two of those days sites in the Jewish quarter were closed because one day was their normal Sabbath and the other day was a religious holiday. We knew about the Sabbath but not the other holiday so we were only able to walk around the exterior of some of the sites. Oh well, just a reason to come back some day!