Good base with cheap airline connections

For what it is worth, I am using Bologna as a base next winter, but my links will be by train, as I am focusing in the proximity.
April is no longer off-season.
TBH, when I was younger and every dollar mattered, I poo-pooed the 'base' concept as it meant paying the return transport fees every time you left. I am staying a month in Bologna with a significant discount on that rental, otherwise I am moving between cities. I have one backtrack to Bologna, and may leave luggage at the train station, but am carry on only, it isn't a big factor.
If I understand you correctly, all this convolution is for 10 days of travel? And you think you can save on an airport hotel room rather than pay the pesky fees? It sounds like a lot of work from this side of the question.
What about an airport locker instead of a whole hotel room? Some airports have free showers, or if you enroll in a Lounge program, many of them have showers so you can do your repacking in private. What about trains or buses to link places and forget about the convolutions?
But I get this is your dream and flight is the name of the game.
All that being said, every airline has route maps. I suggest you look at the maps for the airlines you are considering and see what is the common city amongst them...for home bases.
I hope DW has the same dream.

I'm not sure I see any actual advantage of doing it that way, other than the packing issue. It doesn't seem a cost or time efficient way of seeing a few places in just 10 days. I have rented an apartment for a month in one place and used it for a base to visit other places by train on day trips. But I'm too much of budget traveler to pay two hotel charges for the overnights in other places. Maybe I'd do that once while staying somewhere for a month if it was worth it to me to have an overnight somewhere else. I just pack light so I'm not lugging a big bag when I switch locations and have no problem doing laundry so I don't have pack so many clothes. And be aware that you won't always find those €30 flights to all the places you want to go at the days and times you want to go.

I'm sure there are others who will find this a good option to see several places in a short time, after all there are many ways to travel and there's no real right or wrong way - just the way that works for you.

It seems that your goal is to find a single base city to fly out of to numerous other places in Central/Southern Europe.

There are several disadvantages at such a strategy.

1)Wasting a lot of time flying to other destinations- It is a pain to have to fly these days, getting to the airport hours ahead of time. Then paying expensive taxis, etc. to get to your hotel.
2) You focus on so many locations, listing mostly countries, implying that you wish to cover more places than just major cities. If you are going to travel extensively in large countries like France, Spain, Italy and Germany then WHY do you need to fly so frequently from a single base city. Just travel by rail or rental car instead. Of course, the islands that you mentioned that would not work so well.
3) If you have a base city to fly out of, do you plan to keep your lodging for that city even though going elsewhere? Why would you waste money that way? If not, what is the advantage of a single base city?

Perhaps, I misinterpreted you overall plan.

My extensive experience in European travel has been to not try to travel more than sightsee. Some people post itineraries visiting cities for one or two days and are continuously traveling, wasting time touring.

Also, don't try to cover Europe in one trip, plan to come back and do more.

My wife and I did four weeks just doing the English and Welsh countryside with a few cities like York, Stratford Upon Avon, Winchester, Cardiff, etc. We had only three days were we traveled more than two hours to go from one place to another.

If you wish to spend 90 days in Europe and do several countries, then FIRST determine WHAT and WHERE you want to go (that will require research). Use Tripadvisor to find THINGS TO DO in each location. Then try to connect them all with transport, minimizing that as much as possible.

Using a city as a base works for a while, but generally not for three months. When we did England and Wales, we did use Chipping Campden in the Cotswolds as a base for 6 nights, visiting the Cotswolds, Oxford, Blenheim Palace and Stratford Upon Avon by car or train. Bologna would be a great base city for visiting Ravenna, Padua, Venice, Florence and Verona.
Augsburg, Germany would be great for visiting Munich, Garmish/Fussen, Nuremberg and The Romantic Road.

Good luck with your planning.

It sounds like you are inventing a new version of "day trips" most everyone does by train. I won't use your term crazy, but it is a rather unique approach.

IMO, time is the most valuable commodity while touring and you will be wasting a lot of it. Even if the plane trip is only an hour, you will spend at least five hours minimum on a roundtrip flight. That does not include trips to and from airports. Your time availability to see much of any city will be lost. Plus, not all flights are direct at the times you may prefer and that will increase your time spent traveling.

I never like to be too negative, but I would suggest you forget commuting by plane and just set up an itinerary with a train excursion for countries within a general geographic region for your ten days. While most will agree, ten days is a short time to see much, if you just want to hit the high points of major cities, it is doable with some high speed trains.

You could do Austria, Southern Germany and Switzerland in ten days, albeit a sampling of Europe. Fly into Vienna and make your way to Zurich as your entry and exit points of Europe. Good luck in your journey.

Thank you for all the valuable advice.
To be honest this is only a thought and I haven't done the math to determine if there really is any advantage to paying to keep the hotel at the base city.
I think to allow my wife to enjoy such a trip ; having a base hotel would make her more comfortable even if it adds an expense.
Would allow us to fly back at any hour and still have a bed, shower, etc... waiting for us. The idea of a lounge shower or similar experience will not be something she would like.
An aside... I plan all trips and always a surprise so my wife never wants to know any part of the plan. I only give her tips on how to pack.

I listed many places but my desire is to pick just a few places we really would like to see if in reality of so many amazing places and so little time may never make a trip to otherwise ; hopefully that makes some sense.
Instead of seeing major cities or experiencing areas I am primarily thinking of specific Bucket List type places that might be difficult to include in an itinerary otherwise.
We have been to Europe many times ; at least one trip a year over the past 10 years - minus a couple lost years due to Covid.
Have done fast trips to see many places and longer trips to explore and get to know a place so understand those pluses and minuses.

I know this will take much planning to figure out on which days of the week these "super cheap" flights actually fly and make it all work into the plan.

To better explain ; here is a super rough itinerary I just thought up using Google Flights Explore from Bologna.
I have been to some of these places so not really "My Plan" just a draft to see what is possible from a specific location.
Mixing in different climates which shows off the advantage of being able to pack per location.

Fly Boston to Bologna on points via Air France with a 2 night free stopover in Paris along the way.
We have been to Paris twice but wife likes it and the free stopover is a new and free option for Points/Awards bookings.
KLM does this as well so could do the same thing with Amsterdam for other base cities.
For Bologna Air France through Paris would be the only option
So night 1 is overnight flight to Paris
Night 2 in Paris
Night 3 in Paris
Fly to Bologna
Night 4 in Bologna
Night 5 in Bologna - could take a train daytrip to Padua today
Fly to maybe Amman, Jordan and see Petra
OR maybe Zadar, Croatia and see Plitvice Lakes National Park
OR maybe Corfu, Greece
Night 6 and Night 7 in chosen location
Fly back to base
Night 8 in Bologna
Fly to next location ; maybe Nuremberg and rent a car to see Neuschwanstein Castle
OR maybe Vienna and drive to Lake Hallstatt
OR maybe somewhere I could reach in Switzerland and go to Wengen/Murren area via train.
OR forget the mountains and do a warm weather place like Tenerife, Mallorca, Malta, etc...
Night 9 and 10 in chosen location
Fly back to Bologna
Take train to Venice
Night 11 in Venice
Night 12 in Venice
Fly home to Boston from Venice via Air France.

So without any single overnight stays ; everything 2 nights would hypothetically get to see
Paris, Bologna with day trip to Padua, Petra, Neuschwanstein Castle, Venice

In reality I am only using BLQ airport to arrive and then for 2 trips mid trip.

Now the exact days may not work out to do the above plan, like I said just a rough sketch
I suspect other Bases in other countries I would come up with an entirely different plan with no locations in common.

Just adding complete knowledge this is not advisable for every trip nor for everyone ; as initially mentioned full disclosure I know this was a crazy thought/dream I am only now exploring to see if it makes sense or not in reality.

Above is 7 or 8 nights of a hotel in Bologna near the airport ideally with a 50 euro or less budget per night ; so 300-400 euro for that expense. If the hotel has some kind of free airport shuttle between airport back and forth journeys and airfare extra fees I think it would wash out that expense and allow us to travel much easier to those other locations.
Mixing in a wide variety on 1 trip is really the only point.

I agree with Threadwear, that your idea isn't crazy, but its logistically horribly inefficient and would result in an immense waste of sightseeing time; which is your most valuable commodity on such a short trip. A one hour flight would take at least 3 hours each way. So at best 6 hours for each RT. And none of your examples are short flights. Nor are your daytrip excursions witin those side trips really feasible. Not to mention the waste of time returning to the base city just for a change of clothes. Plus the waste of money on a hotel you are only using as a luggage locker and shower. Yet you're willing to splurge on the places you travel to. Seems like false economy to me. If you want to plane hop, then do that but don't waste precious time on unnecessary return flights. Use the money you are wasting on a base hotel to pay for luggage on your flights.

PS. If you attempt this, be prepared to be sleeping in the spare room for quite a while on your return.

I am not sure you need 3 hour waits in airports if you are flying within Schengen countries...so that may cut down some 'wasted' time. Some people here also dissuade daily country moves as we work on the principal that every move takes up half a day. We have been proven wrong, by light packing organized travelers. So, it can be done, and it would be an adventure you can regal for some years. Sometimes an out of the box adventure needs to be done to test our limits and imaginations. You have identified where you want to spend money and where you want to save. I hope you will give us a trip report when all is done. I'd be curious what the final plan is and how you both reacted to it.

If sticking within Schengen countries and no checked bags I am comfortable showing up to the airport one hour before flight time from the "base" city. I anticipate the base airport being on the smaller side.

7 or 8 nights of a hotel in Bologna near the airport ideally with a 50 euro or less budget per night ; so 300-400 euro for that expense. If the hotel has some kind of free airport shuttle between airport back and forth

I did a quick search for April 2024 and I couldn't see any hotels around the Bologna airport with free shuttle anywhere near €50 (about $55)/night. I did see some around €85 (about $95)/night. I don't think you'll do much better than that.

You're working on a very small budget, so I wish you luck if you decide to pursue this.

"PS. If you attempt this, be prepared to be sleeping in the spare room for quite a while on your return."

You cracked me up with this.... My trip already booked for this Sept to Europe may already have me in that predicament.

I missed the hotel budget. If you are not aware, Bologna is big for conferences and expos so lodging prices can really vary. You may want to keep that in mind before booking flights....unless you have already booked hotels at your accepted price point.

Nancy: Not set in stone budget at all. Will not be a budget trip overall.

I only gave rough parameters, Bologna may not be the most ideal base cost wise and increasing the nightly rate is also not a deal breaker.

Used to budgeting 250 Euro or so per night hotels and now with Inflation that is more like 300-350 Euro per night so whatever I would pick would be more budget minded than typical for us.

Feb might be a cheaper time and for these type of places in the off season booking so far in advance may not get me a better rate.
I also have Hilton and IHG points ; sometimes those chains have cheap on point redemptions for these type of airport locales so might cost $100 per night could be only $50 worth of points I already have (sometimes and in some places)

But I am not set in stone doing this either. Might just do something similar without the wasted returns and just pay the extra airline fees for the bags ; exclude my base idea and just fly into and out of a place that works with the cheap flights to do those extra locations.

Really came about trying to think of something with variation for vacation time in Feb. ; a wide mix of what to see, weather, etc...

My guess is that you have little hope of finding a hotel room near the Bologna airport that is acceptable to your wife at much under $100 per night, and you might have to pay over $120. (I looked at rates for this November.) And that's without considering the availability of a free airport shuttle. I suggest doing some research on booking.com. I checked three large hotels near the Bologna airport that have shuttles; they all charge for them.

I don't think you'll have better luck at very many airports in western Europe. Maybe in Podgorica, Montenegro (lovely country, not a very interesting city) or one of the airports in Romania or Bulgaria.

Doing this with planned train trips would be wonderful. I think you're barking up the wrong tree when you plan to take a 10- or 12-day trip and hop around all over the place by air. Look at the minimum cost of a round-trip flight to Nuremberg, a car rental, and two days of your time, primarily for a 30-minute visit to Neuschwanstein.

That said, here are three satellite airports used by budget airlines that are actually in (outside of) attractive smaller cities: Girona (Spain, near Barcelona), Treviso (Italy, near Venice) and Bergamo (Italy, near Milan). It's quite likely that only RyanAir uses them, so that's not a plus.

Don't forget that on a trip such as you hope to take, one cancelled flight could bring the whole thing to a screeching halt.

Good points acraven
Yes, I may have in my top of head planning wrongly guessed at the cost of budget near airport lodging.
I posted after having the thought to discuss and am fine if everyone thinks a bad idea. I had done no more than 30 minutes of research on my actual idea/plan.

Will check out the airports you did mention. if I make the plan a reality I will spend many hours fine tuning.
Also the point of one cancelled flight being a big problem is a great one for me to ponder. I think doing without a base I could be even worse off in that scenario but yes that is a big risk and I assume greater in Feb than April due to weather. As much as Ryan Air gets a bad rap they actually do have a good reputation in regards to being on time and rarely cancelling ; compred to the other budget airlines.

I get your overall point but in the case of Neuschwanstein.
$60 R/T per person flight RyanAir, rental car figure $150 for 2 nights ; would stay 2 nights right at the castle on the grounds for $120 per night (already know a place) add gas and will be less than $600 to see a place that we have always wanted seems like a real bargain to me.
And we are not skimping on the destination at all ; just the surrounds. Not a 30 minute type see it and leave concept. Even if we spent 10 days doing a Bavaria trip driving the romantic road I would not allocate more than 2 nights at the Castle.

Would apply a similar logic to any place of desire, would spend likely 2 nights at the exact location we want to visit.
The Castle I think would look very nice in the Winter - early Spring with snow around.

Tried to visit on 2 different prior trips we were nearby once in Feb and once end of Sept but weather did not work out so switched last minute to other locations both times.

It's my understanding that Neuschwanstein can only be visited on a tour, and the tour lasts no more than 30 minutes. Plenty of people who went to Neuschwanstein when they were already in that part of Germany have reported being disappointed and regretted going.

I can't imagine spending $600 to see just one sight, so we obviously have very different emotional responses to spending money!

Yes, that is the correct the "inside the castle tour" is probably no more than 1 hour and I would not put high expectations on it.
Many indeed are disappointed in that tour and if not properly prepared in the crowds as well that visit the castle every day.

Like any famous places the spot is totally overrun mid day ; exactly when I will try to avoid it.

For me the draw is to be on the grounds of the castle, walking around at the viewpoints for sunrise/sunset hours in the beautiful nature surrounding the castle with the exterior of the castle the only thing of interest to me.
That is why I would like to go.
There is only one lodging option that grants all hour access to the grounds and allows one to drive and park at the castle. Most visitors are totally unaware of this possibility and very few spend more than just those couple of miserable mid day hours.

One could say the exact same thing about St. Mark's Square in Venice. Lovely in the evening and early morning ; absolutely miserable other times.

YOUR ITINERARY:
So night 1 is overnight flight to Paris
Night 2 in Paris
Night 3 in Paris
Fly to Bologna
Night 4 in Bologna
Night 5 in Bologna - could take a train daytrip to Padua today
Fly to maybe Amman, Jordan and see Petra---

(You plan to fly to Amman and see Petra in one day. NO WAY. Petra is some distance from Amman. Also, a flight to Amman would take several hours. You would probably need to spend two or three nights in Jordan just to see Petra from Bologna)

OR maybe Zadar, Croatia and see Plitvice Lakes National Park (Flying to Croatia or Corfu and back in one day, NOT. you would need to take at least two nights. I have been to both places and you need more time to see both places. You need a FULL day just to see much of Corfu -full day of 8 hours-- also you have the logistics of travel and local transport, etc.)
OR maybe Corfu, Greece
Night 6 and Night 7 in chosen location
Fly back to base
Night 8 in Bologna
Fly to next location ; maybe Nuremberg and rent a car to see Neuschwanstein Castle--
(AGAIN, Nurenberg is not good for that castle, it is many miles from Fussen. Munich is closer)

OR maybe Vienna and drive to Lake Hallstatt
OR maybe somewhere I could reach in Switzerland and go to Wengen/Murren area via train.
OR forget the mountains and do a warm weather place like Tenerife, Mallorca, Malta, etc...
Night 9 and 10 in chosen location
Fly back to Bologna
Take train to Venice
Night 11 in Venice
Night 12 in Venice
Fly home to Boston from Venice via Air France.

@geovagriffith, there are three days alotted for the outlier location....Days 5,6,7. Not so terrible.

@geovagriffith: any where I would fly into from BLQ I am allocating 2 nights at
Sorry my initial post stating Overnights likely confused things was not my intention to actually do any single overnights unless a very close location and the flight times were early morning in and late evening out kind of thing.

The specific airports listed in my hypothetical example were selected due to coming up dirt cheap options from BLQ so are ones were the budget airlines are flying to and from BLQ.
if actually choosing Amman Jordan for Petra may add a 3rd night in that case and extend the trip another night overall.

Really could do something far different like same Paris, Bologna start but then go to Tenerife for 2 nights, then fly to Mallorca from Tenerife for 2 nights and then Amsterdam from Mallorca for the end of the trip before catching a direct flight back home from AMS. That would be a no base type scenario. All using cheap budget airline flight options.

As a data point, I do see the Fly On hotel is very close to BLQ airport and has a free shuttle with rates for $80 a night including free breakfast

That was for Aug - Sept dates ; maybe off season that drops a little as the months pass. These are the type of places that booking way in advance will cost more.
Not that it looks great, but my original thought was not far off.
There are Holiday Inn hotels near Naples, Italy airport (which also seems a place with many budget flights in and out daily) for $50 equal in points but normally cost $100 in cash ; though no free shuttle there and hotel not nearly as close as the Fly On example in Bologna.

More so then these specifics ; I am curious if others have taken advantage of the low cost flights to plan a wild itinerary not necessarily with a base but with differing locales that just lined up well on specific cheap days of the week.
Is a somewhat new thing, where train trips have been around for decades, are lower risk and obviously work but limit the distance once can travel

Well that is not very nice. My wife is used to my travel plans - both the good and the bad ; this one won't shock her.

I am often the forum member telling those with Italy plans constantly moving about to slow down on their travels :)
So of course I expected similar responses and hard to explain why I feel the need to move about so much with this trip.

Perhaps a free shuttle is a perk at FlyOn if you book directly, but that would be something to check very carefully, because on booking.com's "Amenities" list for that hotel, it shows up as "Shuttle service (additional charge)". The other two hotels out near the airport are listed the same way.

In case Corfu is a place you really, really hope to go, I'd suggest checking on the winter weather there. The Ionian islands are quite different from the Aegean islands. Corfu is lovely and green because it gets quite a lot of rain. Even in April the average low temperature is 48.6F (per Wikipedia), and on average it rains about 13 days in April.

I won't call you plan crazy, but did consider it. However, I'd suggest you think about it a bit longer.

If you are trying to make short trips somewhere on a budget airline, keep in mind that they are often not that frequent. Yes, Ryanair flies from Bologna to Amman, but only twice a week. So a one night stay there is not an option. And as mentioned it is not a short flight, the flight time is over 4 hours so when you add airport formalities, immigration and customs, it is probably a 6-7 hour trip.

We used to take those whirlwind trips to Europe. But since we started traveling slower we've been able to see so much more and get so much more our of our trips.

We like to pick a central location and do day trips out of it. Like stay in Bologna or in Tuscany and visit Florence and Venice on day trips. Tuscany has many day trips to places like Siena and Volterra.

Then move to another city by train. Say go up to Innsbruck and take on The Alps in a rental car. Salzburg is a good day trip from there.

You really need to go on Google Maps and plot out some of the cities you are wanting to see--and the distances between the places. Some of these countries are much larger than most people realize. I'm not up for a 7 hour train ride.

As for your desire to see Petra. We were in Israel 3 weeks ago, and the flight up to Frankfurt was 4 1/2 hours. It's farther than most realize going down to Israel or Jordan, and that's a different trip all together.

We're flying to London in 3 weeks and taking a budget airline down to Rome. My wife was wanting to take a larger suitcase than normal, and I told her I'm not paying $75 each way for that bag. And I'm not hauling that heavy thing. She's going to use her normal 21" swivel wheel ultra light carry on bag.

Another good way to see several islands and/or cities in the MED is taking a cruise. The ship is your base and you don't have to fly to get to the ports.

The Eastern Med (and Aegean) are particularly good for a cruise.

For you military veterans I'd recommend Ramstein Air Force Base. You can fly space-available "hops" to locations all over the world. We've flown all over hell and creation.

I decided the having a base idea really doesn't make sense for any trip less than 3 weeks.
I am sure many here thought this was obvious from the beginning; so thank you to the forum.
Many posters pointed out the logistics of the wasted time to keep going back to the same place and others pointed out the schedule infrequency of these cheap flights make one way bookings much easier.
Whether it was the many replies or just putting pen to paper or in this case keyboard to screen makes you analyze things more thoroughly I am not sure but appreciate those that did reply.

I likely will still do some hybrid of this plan without a base, picking 3 (most likely) not close locations that work within the cheap flight schedules to make them work giving each location 2-3 nights plus either some nights in Paris or Amsterdam. In this case paying for all of those extra fees/bags. This is an aside but I think many of you can get away with either an overhead carry-on or a checked bag ; but we unfortunately usually require both if going to more than 1 location or more than 1 week trip.
Me due to photo gear which I will not check (amount can vary per location which is why for 1 quick trip an underseat bag can suffice) and my wife due to her shoe thing. That is why for us those fees really add up as both the in cabin overhead carry-on and the checked bag are extra costs.

As far as the cruise suggestion: the photography thing has me against the concept of cruising. I want to be on location during the hours when if on a cruise you are on open water so it does not work at all.

Personally I think the base plan could work well for someone in a different situation ; for an example an e-worker that decides to go to Europe for 6-8 weeks. Then taking trips every weekend or using in a few vacation days here and there to take trips ; keeping the same base cheap by the airport hotel with good wifi the whole time.
If anyone wants to keep the thread going I think there is value to identifying good base locations with a good amount of cheap direct connections.

Barcelona, Naples, Bologna were 3 good ones I came up with that were served by multiple carriers; but stopped researching once I shifted gears.
As far as value for others from this thread maybe if you read through it made you realize there are some really cheap airfares for Inter-Europe travel (often cheaper than slower trains and ferries) if you have flexibility to make your travel plans work with their schedules and search hard for the best deals.

mreynolds,
Interesting to see the evolution of your planning process.

Regarding managing your trip with carryon luggage, I am sure you could do it, but there is one huge disadvantage.

That being having to do laundry a lot more. Having hotels do your laundry is expensive. Doing your own would mean a lot of washing in your hotel room sink or bathtub if you have one, or finding a local laundromat.

First, I will address doing your closed in a laundromat. They are called launderettes in Great Britain. On our four week trip to England and Wales, we did our only laundry three times, about every 9 days. We had the normal large checked luggage. If you do carryon, you will be doing laundry probably every 5 days. I would wear the same trousers (I wear kakis) 3-4 days and shirts about every 2 days. If you go in the summer and it is hot, you might have to change clothes every day if you are out in the hot environment.

Also, we found launderettes in Britain because there is a website that has them all in that country with maps. Not sure every country in Europe has that. Having been to Italy, France and Spain several times, I remember that it was very hard to find a coin operated laundry. There just weren't many when we needed them. We did a lot of hand washing clothes in our hotel rooms.

Regarding doing your laundry in hotel rooms, you must be sure that you are in the room for more than one night, since, clothes don't usually dry quickly. Also, you must have a place to hang your wet clothes without damaging floors. We used coat hangers to hang in the showers and/ bathroom.

Regarding Naples as a base, there is much to see in the Naples area, specifically, Naples, Pompeii, Herculaneum, Sorrento, Capri and the Amalfi Coast. It takes about 4-5 days to do the area well. I don't recommend Naples, I recommend Sorrento, which is great.

Enjoy your trip.

Sounds like you have realized the base option and trying to reduce luggage costs is a challenge. I am a retiree and would do it, but then I also only travel with a 21 inch roller and rarely an underseat bag other than a purse. But I am a birdwatcher, so some of that space goes to binocs and other gear for birding, so it can be heavy, but compact. And yes, I embraced sink washing as well.....but I don't let clothing drip dry. Wring out in a towel, or for arthritic hands, wrap in bath towel and stomp on it to reduce water. I also hang in the main room, as that is where the airflow is.
Of course, the pack light may be an adventure for you at some later time.
You can open up some great visits to central or eastern europeand still fit in Petra if you can get the flights to fit.

My bigger annoyance is actually that Carry-On in the overhead has now become Optional not included!
Having a carry-on and paying if you need to check a bag makes perfect sense to me ; but this new policy which almost every airline is adopting is garbage where you get a tiny under the seat allowance and then have to pay crazy money for a carry-on ; plus more on top of that for a checked bag.

With most of the budget carriers ; once you add those extras costs in to the base rate you can often get a package deal with front row seats, priority boarding, ability to change dates also added at the same overall cost so usually opt for that with those types of airlines.

In general we are more on the luxury side of travel I would say so don't mind paying extra for convenience like taking taxis, staying in nice hotels most of the time, paying for more bags vs. not doing laundry, etc...

I am not against trying it but probably not there yet ; maybe in a few more years we will be adopt lighter packing and reap it's benefits.
But try to save on airfare and the like when we can as I see no value in paying massively more for a little more room for a still few uncomfortable hours time. I am not really going to enjoy a flight on Ryan Air or one on Delta/Ethiad/Air France/KLM, etc... nor am I really going to ever enjoy sitting in a business class or similar seat for hours so is just levels of bad you are paying extra for in my opinion.

After an initial gasp, I enjoyed reading this thread & think the idea might be great for the right kind of traveler, so thank you for suggesting it. To help reduce those baggage fees, consider a free stopover on a major carrier like those offered by KLM for Amsterdam & TAP for Lisbon? I've also read you can tack on an additional one-way flight to a RT on UA at no cost in Europe, but don't recall exactly how to book it. And of course there's the ubiquitous airline credit card to waive those fees. And about those shoes...

I hear you about the annoyances of the upsells on luggage. Canada has 2 new budget airlines so Air Canada has cheaped up to compete. Their base fares are pretty inexpensive, but only allow one underseat bag (smaller than US underseat bag measurements, but bigger than Ryan Air). The next fare bundles other things in making it over $120 more each way.....rarely making it worthwile to take a trip away. But I finally found a bag to maximize space in allowed underseat measurements. I think now I am good for a cruise or week trip in good weather. Part of me just wants to do it to them my nose at their bundles.

Yes, stopover programs are wonderful and especially in situations where the airline is partially owned by the government can really be a win-win for all.
TAP's program is wonderfully easy, have done that before. You can actually choose Lisbon or Porto on some routes.
Also Iceland Air has a very easy to use stopover program.

Air France (Paris) and KLM (Amsterdam) have one but is complicated in that those flights can only be booked over the phone and are for award/point tickets only (one way or round trip). I have tried booking the Air France one and led to more frustration than anything else but it is new so hopefully will improve and be built into the Flying Blue website soon.
Fairly certain Sata offers stopovers between US and Europe in the Azores for no extra charge.
United does have a somewhat confusing option to tack on a Inter-Europe flight for free if you book a R/T on points from the US to Europe.
The Middle East area has really adopted these and even include a free city tour or discounted hotels I believe as part of their programs. Turkish Air for Istanbul, Qatar for Doha and Emirates for Dubai.
Hopefully more will follow suit.
Not sure if Aer Lingus does this ; if not they should.

Another reason to plunk yourself down somewhere for an extended period of time would be taking language classes. I've done that twice (in Nice and in Orvieto) for two weeks at a time. It could work for longer if the base has good transportation connections for short trips; language classes usually are morning-only or afternoon-only, so you have a lot of half-days free. That worked well enough in Nice on the days I had morning classes (so I could travel from around 1 PM until 8 or 9 PM if I wanted to); Orvieto was more of a challenge in terms of short side trips.

An additional advantage of spending a lot of time in one area (whether in the same city or in two or more places close together) is the occasional availability of a well-priced, long-term sightseeing pass. I've found such offerings for Campania (Naples area), Piedmont (Turin), Lombardy (Milan), Friuli-Venezia Giulia (Trieste) and for the entire country of Finland. I'm sure there are others. The annual Finnish Museum Card (currently about 75 euros) will cover nearly all my sightseeing expenses for about four weeks, spread over two trips. It seems to allow re-visits, which I'm going to put to the test in June, because there are some interesting new exhibitions at museums I visited last year. Even though I qualify for generous senior discounts at most Finnish museums, the card will save me a substantial amount of money.

For those old enough to qualify, the annual senior rail cards sold by several countries really begin to pay off when you spend more than a week or two in one country.

mreynolds, a bit more agressive version of what I do on many trips. I stay in Budapest and travel light on short trips. For you, stay at the Astoria Hotel where the direct bus to the airport stops (I think its about a $3 ride).

I just checked 4 days in June and the list included (direct, all under $100 and most under $50):

Stockholm London Prague Rome Santorinia Milan Bari Belgrade Athens Istanbul Brussels Barcelona Berlin Warsaw
Basel Sofia Thessaloniki Malta Pisa Bologna Brescia Marseille Paris Dusseldorf Stuttgart Nuremberg Zadar Targu Mures
Chania Tel Aviv Baku Kutaisi Rhodes Podgorica Skope