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Europe Tour recommendations - April-May

Posted by (Omaha) on

Hello all,
I will be in Europe for about 1 1/2 months starting early April until late May, and I would like to see if anyone has some good 'off-beat' options I can look into for my route. I've got Rick Steves' Eastern Europe guide and a few other Lonely Planet guides. My route will start in London, then onto Paris, Torino, Ligurian Coast, Florence/Rome, across the Adriatic to Split and Dubrovnik, into Montenegro (Kotor/Butva), train to Belgrade, Budapest, Vienna, Prague, Berlin, Gdansk/Sopot, and finally finishing up in Krakow. I've only booked the first week of hostels, and am definitely open to ideas provided it keeps me relatively close to the track I'm following. Thanks in advance for your suggestions!

-Paul

Posted by
14520 posts

Paul,

Since you are going to be in the Gdansk (Danzig) area, make sure you spend at least 3 full days seeing that city. Also, I heartily suggest taking the train from there to go Malbork (Marienburg) as a day trip; I did this in July of 2003. The train stops at Tczew (Dirschau) before going to Malbork, very interesting countryside that was formerly West Prussia.

While you're in Berlin set aside a day for Potsdam and, especially, visit Neues Palais, if you are interested in Prussian history.

Posted by
12172 posts

I'll be in Dansk end of July and the top of my list is Malbork (once Marienburg) Castle.

The Castle was the Capitol of the Teutonic Knights who were waging a crusade against the Pagan Lithuanians. It was at the heart of a lot of history that shaped the region.

It's not a secret but the Treasures Room at the British Library was one of my favorites, especially since there weren't many people sharing it with me.

Before Florence. I really like San Gimignano. It's very medieval. The place obviously caters to tourists but you will be there before tourist season (we were there in October) and will get a better feel for the place.

In Florence, Piazza Michaelangelo was a nice place - just far enough off the beaten path to be only lightly touristed.

Between Florence and Rome, Orvietto is another unique hill town. It has a major cathedral, tunnels dating back to the Etruscans and sits on cliffs rather than a hill. It's worth a night IMO.

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