Europe Virgin Seeks Plethora of Information

I think you have certainly come to the right place to help you on your great adventure!!! Start with Rick Steve's Book Europe thru the Back Door which has lots of great advice. You initial plan seems good to me to start in London then to the continent. Do not buy one way tickets, book multi city tickets such as into London and home from Rome. you can take grain from London to Paris then fly to Rome and home from there. Also look at this forum for ideas about packing, transportation, money saving advice etc. I would write down questions you two have, then search here or internet for answers. You can learn so much from travelers.here who have learned a lot and recovered from their mistakes and I am certainly one of them. I have learned so much thru experience and a lot of help from this forum. You will.also. what a great idea for the two of you. I personally do not see the need for a travel agent with all the help out on the internet. Also you may make a few mistakes when traveling but it is not the end of the world but part of the adventure and experience.

Should I go to a travel agent?

Probably not, but if you have never done any travel planning it might be an idea to consider

Is it better to start/end in one place over another?

Given the time of year and your choices, I would start in Italy and work my way north

Once we fly there, are trains the best way to get from country to country?

Paris/London is easy by train and traveling among your Italian destination is best done by train.
The Paris/Italy is probably better to fly.

For best results on your other questions relating to 'budget' your providing a numeric value of what you can spend makes it easier to provide useful advice. None of your destinations are known for being 'cheap'.

For lodging booking.com is a good place to do research, and it's usually best to book directly with the lodging itself.

For flights you can do research at skyscanner.com. In your case you would want to select the 'multi-city' option to fly into Rome and home from London.

What is a 'few days' ? Best to count how many nights you will spend somewhere when planning.

Kristy and daughter, welcome to the forum. Lucky you to be traveling to Europe.

It looks like to you have two weeks in Europe? If so, I think you are trying to see too much. You can easily spend two weeks in London and Paris with day trips to surrounding areas. Take the EuroStar between both.
OR spend two weeks in Italy, flying into Venice and out of Rome because flights are easier. Take the train between your three cities and day trips to villages.
Every time you move from one city to another it costs you at least 1/2 day of time and sightseeing

Read Rick Steves guide books as starters for information. Ask lots of questions on the forum and use the search feature and Explore Europe tab for more info.

After you decide what you want to see most, lots of us are budget travelers and can help you find hotels and things to see.
Kathy

PS I'm prejudiced against travel agents. In this day and age, you can find and book everything on the computer yourself. It just takes research and friends to help you. That's why we're here.
Bon Voyage! or Buon Viaggio!

Welcome to the forum!
As Gail said, boy have you ever landed in the right place! Everything you need to plan your great adventure can be found with help from the nice folks right here plus a good guidebook (or two, or three...). No, you do not need an agent. To be perfectly honest, too many of them haven't traveled much further than their keyboards.

You've gotten a head start knowing where it is you'd like to go. Budget? You will be traveling during high season when accommodation prices can be their most pricey BUT you're another step ahead being willing to look at hostels (many have private rooms), and you might look at monastery accommodations too; you'll get some recommendations for some of those from posters here who've done them. Hostels? https://www.hostelworld.com is a great place to start. You do need to pay attention to where the individual properties are located so that you're closer to the things you want to see versus away. (Rome: Take a look at The Beehive; been a top hostel property for years, it's conveniently located, offers private rooms and social gatherings, and is rated "Superb" on Hostelworld. It does book up quickly so if you find openings for your dates, jump on them unless you see something else you'd prefer: https://www.the-beehive.com)

Another tip right off the bat is that all of the cities you list are very walkable so you don't need to spend lots of $ to get around, and they're best seen from one's feet anyway! London and Paris are more spread out than the 3 Italian locations so you'll likely want to take the occasional Tube, Metro or bus ride. Yes, high-speed Trenitalia or Italo trains between Venice, Florence and Rome (some nice price breaks can be landed if booked in advance) and plane from Paris to Venice. Also to book ahead: Eurostar train from London to Paris.

Where you do NOT want to skimp on is your sightseeing! DO spend for the things that will make this trip all that you wish for it to be! There are oodles of great things that are free, such as many museums in London and endless glorious churches in Rome, but I'm sure you have a wish list of other treasures that involve tickets/reservations? That's a little bit down the road at this point but if you share what those are, we can help with the official resources for ticketing and maybe a worthwhile tour or two. Just a start? Now go get those guidebooks; your public library should be an economical place to take a look at some before purchasing one to take along. You're going to have so much fun!!!

Some excellent advice so far. You really dont need a travel agent for independent land travel in Europe. Google Flights for air tickets and booking.com for accommodations are very good resources. The Man in Seat 61 website can teach you all there is to know about European train travel.

But the first thing you need to do is plan your itinerary. How many days (nights) in total. How many in each place? And do those 2 reconcile? Reading the various sections of this site is a good first step. I'd start with the Travel Tips, and the Trip Planning section. Get a few guidebooks, including the RS Europe Through the Back Door. Watch some of the RS videos that are applicable including his planning guides. And as your planning progresses, come back here to ask more specific questions.

Try to get as much time as possible for your trip-leaving on a Sat and returning on a Sun will add two additional days. I think you can do these 5 cities in that amount of time. Absolutely fly open jaw-in and out of different countries.

Hi, Kristy, if it's at all possible for you to take 3 weeks, that would be ideal. You could spend 10 nights in Italy, and 4 nights each in London and Paris. That gives you 2-3 extra days to travel between the three. If you don't have 3 weeks, maybe shoot for 18 days?

Either way, I would look at flying into Rome; spending what time you have in italy there and where ever else you choose, then travel to Paris (flying there is your best option unless you want to spend 11-12 hours on a train), spend your time there, then take the Eurostar to London and finish your trip there, flying home from London.

Or reverse that. I don't think, weatherwise, it really matters where you are over a 2-3 week period. In a way, it might be better to start in London so you don't have a language barrier right off the bat, and London is really easy to make your way through. It's also very expensive as others have noted, but there are cheaper places to stay. I would recommend Premier Inn, which is a UK-based chain of hotels and they are located all over London. They are clean, comfortable and relatively inexpensive. Keep in mind that the earlier you book, the cheaper the rates will be.

Don't be afraid to come back and ask questions. I guarantee that trying to go through all these responses (including mine) will be overwhelming, so take it easy and take one step at a time. But do think about your budget. Figure out how much you want to spend overall, and how many places you can conceivably go to in the time you have. As I mentioned getting from Italy to Paris will take some time unless you fly, but flying can be expensive.

One good way to check flights is through Google, which has a site dedicated to looking for flights and giving you prices. You don't book them on Google; it's just for looking. https://www.google.com/travel/flights You can check foreign flights there, too. I just looked at Venice flights to Paris, and they range from $500 to $800+, so they can be expensive. Trains would be cheaper, but again, you're looking at an 11 to 12 hour train ride. You might consider leaving Italy for a later trip, and maybe choosing something closer like Amsterdam, or Munich and so on.

Just keep in mind it's your trip so you can to decide what you want to do.

I hate to contradict Mardee, but I'm positive you can fly May flights from Venice to Paris for a whole lot less than $500. I picked a random day in May and found budget airline flights for under CAD $100pp. Even Air France had flights for around CAD $150. Prices from Rome were similar.

Welcome to our little family, Kristy and daughter

In terms of pricing and room nights, can we clarify about your daughter - is she an adult or a teen?

Do either of you have any mobility issues? Places with stairs and no elevators/lifts are sometimes less expensive.

You've had a lot of really good advice above, so I won't add even another pile. But as things develop I may chip in suggestions or answers.

There are lots of us here with loads of knowledge and experience, and sometimes we have different suggestions to each other. That's great because you can choose which sounds better to you.

Are you doing all the planning or is it a team effort?

Wow, thank you each and every one of you for your quick and informative responses!

To clarify a few things, our budget is around CAN $8000. My daughter is 22 so it’ll be two adults. We are planning this trip together. I promised her I’d take her to see the Eiffel Tower if she graduated with her French Immersion. She did so in 2021 and between Covid and saving up, we’re finally going to make it happen next spring 😊. I’m a single mom so this is a LOT of $ for me. But she’s a great kid and we’ve always looked forward to this vacation together.

Since neither of us has ever been overseas, we are trying to fit a lot of places in. I have a friend we want to visit in London and obviously we have to go to Paris as that was the reason for our trip all along. But both of us are most excited for Italy, hence why we’d like to spend the largest part of our time there. We are keeping our expectations for sightseeing to a minimum in each location so we’re not ruled by a strict itinerary, but we are planning on seeing a few big monuments in each city. We both agreed that we’d rather spend our money on things to do rather than nicer accommodations, but we may spend a few days at the end in a nicer hotel as a treat. :)

I hate to contradict Mardee, but I'm positive you can fly May flights from Venice to Paris for a whole lot less than $500.

What? Me, wrong? Ha ah, I'm sure you are right, CJean. I looked at some random flights in May on Google flights and did find those numbers, but they didn't include many of the budget airlines, so I would imagine there are deals to be had.

Kristy, I think that amount is very doable. And if you want to go to Italy, you should. It's a beautiful country and consistently has the best food of any place I've been.

Your first step really should be figuring out which country to fly into and which to fly out of. Definitely do the open jaw/multi city booking. Just an FYI, when you look for flights on Google Flights, make sure you check the "multi-city" open (instead of one-way or round-trip). Try different combinations to see what prices you get (i.e., fly into London, fly out of Rome and vice versa).

You can also do searches on this forum for lots of great information. I would suggest filtering your searches to look for threads that are within the last 2 years, especially if you are looking for hotel and restaurant information.

Kristy,
Great advice so far. All the suggestions for references are good. You might also check out Hostelling International (hihostels.com) to see what is out there. And I strongly recommend the suggestion to count nights, not days, in a place, because your travel from one city to another takes up part of that day. Thus you are better off not counting it as a day in a city. You may have a half-day to sightsee, etc. when you arrive, but then you will have a happy surprise, instead of a disappointment at ONLY having a half day there.

Just an example of a possible itinerary with London, Paris and Rome.
Fly to London on a Sat (day 1) (Any Friday night flights leaving late? Stretch out those days if you can.)
Day 2, arrive in London
Day 3,4,5 London
Day 6 Travel to Paris (you will probably have a half day to enjoy some of Paris on this day with an early Eurostar train)
Day 7,8,9 Paris
Day 10, Fly to Rome (with early flight, a half day to see some of Rome)
Day 11,12,13,14,15 Rome (maybe take the first 2 or last 2 of these days in Italy for Florence...Paris>Florence>Rome)
Day 16 Fly home from Rome on a Sun

You could drop a day from London or Paris to add to Rome, or vice versa. Take a look (guidebooks useful here) to determine what things are the most important to you in each place, then see how many days it may take for you to do them all. Whittle away what won't fit, adjust your days in each location if need be, then you can get a good start on finding accomodations for those days. IMO determining what the most important things to see is the place to begin, so you can move forward in your planning. Many of the helpful people on the forum can give you an idea of how much time you need for a particular adventure. (I do think trying to see all 5 places is a lot in 2 weeks, but with good train and flight choices, it can be done, but you should plan on more limited sightseeing.)

Best of luck in your first trip to Europe. It will be a wonderful journey for you and your daughter!

Sounds like a very exciting trip for you both. I personally would recommend one week split between London/Paris and then one week for Italy. To make the best use of time, I recommend taking an evening train from London to Paris (this is normally how we go since we go after work). If you have a train around 6pm or 7pm, you get almost a full day in London (you need to be at the station 1-1.5 hours before the train). For dinner you can get something at St Pancras station to bring with you (we usually get sandwiches at M&S) and then you arrive in Paris, head to your hotel, and you're ready for a full day in Paris the next day.

I would suggest then looking for flights from Paris to Venice (you will find a lot on low cost carriers, just ensure you are careful about selecting sufficient baggage allowance when booking), and then getting a train from Venice to Florence, then Florence to Rome, and fly home from there.

You've received a lot of great advice above from others already, and this is definitely the right place to come back and ask for more. Good luck!

just thinking about London it is worth knowing that if either or both of you are Harry Potter types the studio experience just north of London (really easy by public transport) gets rave reviews from people of all ages and nationalities and so books up way in advance.

oh, and congrats to your daughter!

Kristy, welcome. Have you considered taking a tour? Rick Steves has small group tours that make it easy by taking care of the logistics, while giving you enough free time to explore on your own. And you can add days on your own before or after the tour. A tour gives you more time to enjoy each others company.

I strongly suggest you take the time to read some guidebooks and watch some videos (here on this website) to get a feel for what you might want to know. The Rick Steves guidebook Europe through the Back Door, is a good way to get an overview.

Important note, you can plan to fly into one city, and out of another using "multi-city" (aka open jaw) fares that are closer to round trip fares. Some people aren't familiar with that option.

When planning to visit London in May be aware of the public and school holidays that can impact on hotel prices. The first and last Monday of the month are public holidays ( known as bank holidays in the UK) and those weekends will be very busy impacting on hotel and travel prices. With a tight-ish budget avoiding those weekends will save you some money.

I would lean towards splitting the time between London/Paris and then Italy. One week in each is such a short time, but better to get to one place and stay several days than to try and race from place to place, day by day.
For planning, there is no need to use an agent if you are thorough and plan well. They will put a spin on your plans that is generally not all that well informed. Read, read and read.
A dirty little trick to start your own planning is to look at someone else plans. Look at what a RS tour of Italy entails. Where do the tours go, what are they doing and in what order? Cherry pick the tours for ideas and destinations. Then go off and research those ideas and see if they make sense to you.
For each location, there will be a handful of must see locations. You mention the Eifel tower.... sure. In one solid day you can see and visit that and then Notre Dam, walk along the Sienne, scoot over to Champ de Elyse, visit the Arch de Triumph and possibly find a relative's name on the carvings and then have a wonderful day. Then another day, visit a few museums....save the Louvre for a full day.
London, more of the same....it's so big, but being touristy there is easy.
Break down each place that way and then figure out the accommodations to make it work.
I make lists and then whittle away until they make quasi sense. Train travel does work. In Italy and outside of Paris in France, I like to have a car, but for your trip, public transportation will be perfect.

Italy, you need more than a week in Italy to visit Venice, Florence and Rome.
You could easily spend a week only in Rome.
Take the trains for sure. There is a high speed train from Venice to Florence and then Rome.

I suggest that you need 3 days in Venice, 4 in Florence and 5 in Rome as a minimum.

London and Paris are great and you need to know that lodgings in those major cities are expensive.
You will easily spend up to $300 a night in those cities and this is not a five star hotel.

Take a took at tours. We like Gate 1 Travel that has very affordable group tours.
Consider buying guidebooks. Rick Stevens has some great guidebooks.

You don't need a travel agent, but you do need to do research. Check TripAdvisor.com for help on tours, lodgings, etc. Read the reviews to pick well.
Note, landing at Heathrow airport just getting a taxi into downtown London can easily cost $125-$150. Check out taking the bus service for National Express busses from Terminals 2-3.

Be careful with your personal items, pickpockets in Paris and Rome are ever present.

For cheap hotels, look at https://www.monasterystays.com/
Basic rooms, most with en-suite bathrooms and breakfast. I stayed at monasteries in Rome and Florence. Central locations, easy walk to sights. Prices have gone up but September 2024 a single room was under €100. Prices are usually twice that for a double.
I use the monastery stays website for research but book direct with the monastery. I have gotten better terms that way, e.g. extended stay pricing, better cancellation policies.

In London and Venice I have stayed at affordable B&Bs:
London this year was https://bb-london.co.uk/
Venice three times is https://www.cortecampana.com/

Also affordable in London with convenient location is http://www.cherrycourthotel.co.uk/
But be forewarned the rooms are very small.

Since I travel solo and on a budget I look for centrally located, safe neighborhoods.

PM me if you have questions.

Speaking of safe and secure, and getting way ahead of the planning process, be sure to wear money belts for deep storage of money, credit cards, ATM cards and passports. My favorite is https://www.stashbandz.com/pages/travel-money-belt Wear it UNDER your clothes for security.

Keep asking questions! There are a lot of pieces to the planning puzzle. But putting it together is part of the fun.

Buy some guidebooks or check the catalog of your local library system and request some. Check google maps for any other appealing sites not listed in the guidebooks. You don't have to go to the most popular places if they are not appealing to you. Make a list of museums and sites that look appealing to you and your daughter. Type your list. Check google maps for opening and closing times. Check site websites for opening times not listed on google maps. Turn your list into a supposed day-by-day-itinerary. See what places need advance reservations. Make any necessary advance museum reservations. Edit your itinerary and type the times of your reservations. Do any museums in Paris need advance reservations? Make your hotel reservations only after you figure out exactly how many nights you need based on what you are seeing.

I spent 8 nights in London in July 2016. The authorities at Heathrow airport made me wait in the airport jail for over 3-1/2 hours until the lady responsible for doing this finally interviewed me and wrote 2 pages of drivel based on what I said and then took my picture and fingerprints and then I watched them search through my bags really completely; all because I took too long finding the information about my flights back to Detroit in my e-mail when I arrived at the passport-stamping booth, and I had printed my information and left it on my couch by my mistake. I am a bearded single man and atheist traveling alone if that matters. Carry all your printed information, reservations, tickets, and printed itinerary, in a rigid folder, or folded in half or thirds in a pencil case!

I have not traveled to any part of France yet. You probably could combine Paris and London in one trip.

In July 2017, I spent 13 nights in Italy, in Florence, Rome, and Naples. I didn't make time for Venice. The more cities you add, the less time you have for museums and sites. Many travelers probably just pick one or two museums in a big city and are happy to skip everything else. But instead of picking the number of nights I will spend in a place first and then randomly filling up my time, I would rather figure out what I will try seeing and then seeing how many nights I need in a place.

In London, I took the commuter train (it goes underground in many places and above ground in some places) to near my hotel and walked less than a mile the rest of the way. In Florence, I was able to walk from the train station to my hotel. There are local buses but I didn't use them but I wish I had.

With some effort it would be possible to buy all your tickets and make all your reservations without the need for a travel agent. I have never used a travel agent, but I also don't have kids to occupy myself with.

Search for prices for plane tickets for all the possible path you could travel in to see which makes most sense.

If you see just London and Paris, it would be best to start in one city and end in the other. I arrived and left from Rome because I that was the best flight I found. In Italy I took the trains between cities.

Have you considered just limiting yourself to England or France or Italy? If you fly between Paris and Rome or Venice, you will surely have to spend more time at the airports than at the train stations.

I have had good luck with most of the hotels I reserved on booking dot com. Competing sites include hotels dot com and expedia dot com.

Most travelers probably eat restaurant food most of the time but I figured out that there are foods I can buy at grocery stores and eat in my hotel room or on benches outside. Also I have stayed at places where I was able to cook lentils or sweet potato, instant hot cereal that didn't have salt or sugar, pre-cut lettuce, and so on. I was doing this because I am afraid too much restaurant food is unhealthy and the money I might have saved is just a coincidence. I know most travelers would find my food habits unappetizing but I didn't get any complaints because by coincidence I don't have any travel companions. I ate restaurant food at least two times in Italy but not in London. I wish I had made my trip longer and gone outside London, maybe at least to the town of Bath and Stonehenge.

For a 13 night or two week trip, you don't have time for England, France, and 3 cities in Italy, unless you skip a lot of museums and sites, which seems rather rushed and lacking to me

After reading RS "Europe Through the Backdoor" I followed his advice to find lodging close to your sites, i.e. in the old part of town or near a subway station. That way you're not far from the sites or your lodging for a siesta. With central lodgings, you're close to the train station. You just have to pack light, so you can walk easily to your lodging (either a rollerboard or backpack straps).

Hostels are great places. The young people love to share advice. I've had good times watching World Cup soccer on TV with friends from around the world. However, I had a nephew who drove to a hostel outside of Florence and never had a chance to get into the city to meet us.

Flights within Europe are cheap, but the airports are way outside of the cities (2023 flight from Berlin to Rhodes was €150 or 2018 €50 Crete to London). The initial costs don't include checked bags or the time and transportation out/in to the airports. Trains are very efficient, allow you to see the countryside, and are from town center to town center.

RS guidebooks are great about giving information on public transportation.

My advice to friends who are hesitant to visit Europe is to take a tour. That way you'll learn the public transportation and realize 200+ million Europeans have it easier than we here in the US. GAdventure is a Canadian tour company, which like RS tours, introduces you to the public transportation. After that you realize you can do it yourself.