How many countries for 10 days- tour or plan own vacation?

I think you'll get a lot of comments about this being a pretty vague question.

Where is your son in Germany? I would say 10 days you can do two countries. If he is in Frankfort you could do Paris to Colamr, Strausberg to Frankfort. Something like that? The Netherlands and Germany or maybe you want to go south and see Austria and Switzerland. I wouldn't bite off more than you can chew.

We can actually have him meet us anywhere in Germany that we decide. Our main interests are in visiting Amsterdam,Italy and France. We will return to the states from Germany. Our son will be in Europe all summer - taking a class in Spain - actually wouldn't mind going there either.....It is a challenge since we only have two weeks. Is it better to try to do a tour or plan ourselves? It seems so overwhelming to try to do it ourselves - BUT - isn't it much cheaper?

It is vague. Europe is a big area. We were recently in Spain for ten days and visit four cities and that was a rushed trip. If you son is in Germany see that area well for ten days. You need to get realistic about what is possible. You might fly into Paris or Amsterdam for couple and then train to Germany and come home from Frankfurt or Munich. Doubt if you could do much beyond that. In someway it is easier to tour than the US because of the excellent rail system and public transit.

There are other threads here that "answer" the question about going on a tour or planning your own trip. Look for them. You will see that it boils down to opinion.

If it is too overwhelming to plan your trip, review the RS tours described on this website and see if one of them fits your wishes, resources, dates, etc.

If you want to try doing it yourself read RS' book Europe Through the Back Door and all the information on this website. You'll learn a bunch and decide if that's the way you want to go.

Good luck.

I don't think it is too stressful to plan it yourself. I think that is easier than finding a tour to fit what you want to see and when you want to see it. Go online and look at a rail map. Decide where you are going to fly in to (Amsterdam or Paris?) and fly out of in Germany and work from there. I don't think you can possibly see Amsterdam and Italy AND fly out of Germany. Germany is big - do you know which airport you'll be departing from?

First Susan look at a map of Europe. Then you need to decide if an open jaw ticket will work or if a round trip ticket is better. If it is an open jaw you can plan a straight line (more or less) trip -- London, Paris, Madrid, Rome. If round trip new to look at a triangle -- Amsterdam, Paris, London. Or Rome, Venice, Milan, and points in between. Every time you change location plan on losing at least a half day if not nearly a day of productive sightseeing. So if you change location three or four times in a 10 to 14 day trip you effective days for seeing and doing things could be reduced to 7 to 10 days. And that does not allow for some down time to catch your breath, do laundry, or catch up on a little sleep.

Late July/August can be a hot and crowd time which means that lines and waits are longer and the heart makes it more tiring. So you just have to plan on doing a little less in that time period -- why do you think they invented the afternoon map? So that you can do more at night when it is cooler.

10 days, hmmm? A'dam, France, and Italy, and a little time in Germany with your son too?

A'dam is specific. Good. But what other cities did you have in mind?

You don't want to waste time on a whole lot of ground transportation with so few days.

Assuming "France" might mean "Paris", and "Italy" "Rome", you might structure your trip like this:

2 nights in A'dam; evening train to Paris on day 3 (about 3 hours)

3 nights in Paris; evening flight to Rome on Day 6

3 nights in Rome; flight on day 9 to "Germany".

Ryanair flies from Paris to Rome and Rome to Germany cheaply. The flights tend to be early morning or late at night. For Rome - Germany, you could have your son meet you at Karlsruhe Baden airport and you could see something in that area the next day; from there, it's only about one hour by train to Frankfurt International for your trip home.

That said, I would not do this trip. I'd see A'dam, Paris and Germany. Germany's border is only a few hours by train from Paris. Italy can be crazy hot at that time of year and not worth the bother. Save Italy for another trip when you have more time and spend some extra time in France and Germany instead.

My opinion on 10 days is 4 stops, plus or minus. I've done 3 (Rome, Venice and Verona and Bath, London, and Paris) and I've done 5 (Porto, Lisbon, Sevilla, Granada, and Barcelona). Five is pushing it and with 3 I wished we'd cut a little and went another place.
I'd plan it myself, however if you say it's overwhelming - you should have someone else plan it. Just be sure to work closely with them.

Ten days on the ground in Europe in addition to your travel days?? It makes a difference. I need to budget 3 days of international travel from the west coast so a ten-day trip means only 7 days on the ground in Europe.

As others pointed out you will not be able to "see" a country in ten days but you can you visit three cities/regions. Four is possible if you have ten days on the ground.

Ten days is not enough time to bounce all over the continent from A'dam to Italy unless you want to spend a lot of time and money on the bouncing instead of the vacationing. Select cities in logical proximity to your first stop in Germany.

I recommend planning your own vacation, it's so much easier now with such excellent resources on the internet. But, (IMPORTANT!!) internet research should augment your basic travel knowledge that you learn from a good guidebook. It is not a substitute for a guidebook. (Sorry to be repetitive but this will save you a lot of grief.) I hate to sound like I'm in sales here, but buy Europe through the backdoor and read the first half. Use the second half to figure out what you are most interested in seeing. Then, purchase another guide book that covers the city or region you wish to visit more in-depth. Then augment that with internet research. If you pick three sites in one or --maybe two-- adjacent countries, self-planning will feel much more manageable.

"better" is a quirky term; it all depends on your tolerance of ambiguity in figuring out how to work the transportation system in other countries, how much work you want to do in finding hotels, figuring out where to go, what to see and how much time to spend seeing them, and so on. My advice for 1st timers is to travel with someone who has already been to Europe and has a sense of the ropes or to take a tour. Since neither of you has been I would give careful thought to a tour, especially one thru the Rick Steves company. In 10 days on a tour you will see what would take most people on their own 15 days to see (and probably 17-18 as 1st timers). Pick a tour of the duration that works for you (and keep in mind like all tour companies "day 1" just means dinner the start of the tour and the "last day" just means breakfast and saying goodbye). If you go to the tours section of this site, you will see that they post the unaltered feedback from the questionaire they send to each and every person who has taken a RS tour; read thru the responses and see if a tour sounds right for you.

However given that you started by asking "any advice on what countries to see and how many we can fit in" maybe you are thinking of a "if its Tuesday this must be France" blitz across as many countries as can be seen. Not what I'd recommend, though.

How long will your son have been in Germany when you plan to arrive i.e. how adept will he be w/ trains, metro systems, hotels, etc? I agree w/ others that you need to do some basic reading to determine what cities/areas you most want to see. Are there books/movies/famous persons you've always been interested in? Find their settings/hometowns and plan for 3-4 days in 2 or perhaps 3 locations. There is a wealth of information, not the least of which is this site whence I've learned much. The planning is half the fun and you feel some familiarity when you reach a destination. Check out RS DVDs from the library after you make some basic decisions about locations.

Thanks everyone for your kind replies and opinions. My son will already be in Europe when we arrive. He is taking a college course in Spain and he has been to Germany before so he wanted to show us places he has been and enjoyed before when he was in Germany.He w8l be touring Europe with his friends after his class and before we arrive. Is it possible to maybe visit Spain,Germany and Amsterdam within 10 days? this would be the time we will probably have on the ground,

Yes, you could do Spain, Amsterdam & Germany. As others have said, you could fly into Barcelona or Madrid, spend 3 days, then fly to Amsterdam, 3 days, and then take the train or fly to Germany. Spend time with your son, then fly from Germany back home. As you said, another thought would be to take an organized tour. Check out the tours on this website or look at a tour with Cosmos. You could always leave the tour early to make it work within your timeframe. Keep in mind your travel days to/from the States. Have fun making lifetime memories on your trip!

I would not do more then 2 countries in 10 days.

I would be considering "cities", not countries. If you traveling in the US, would it matter how many states you saw? If you apply that logic, your choices might be become more obvious.

And, you definitely can arrange yourself- the internet has changed everything about travel arrangements. The question becomes can/do you want to pay someone else to do it for you. I enjoy my time planning/arranging- if you don't, consider paying someone else to.