Itinerary Advice for a first time, solo traveller

Hey Kirsten! I noticed you expressed a desire to travel in Eastern Europe. Have you thought about an intinerary that encompasses the major cities of the former domains of the Habsburg Austro-Hungarian Empire? This could include Vienna, Salzburg, Innsbruck, Budapest, Prague, Bratislava, Krakow, Lvov, Cluj, Zagreb, Dubrovnik, Trieste, Sarajevo and Ljubljana. You'd have an opportunity to visit parts of Austria, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland, Ukraine, Romania, Croatia, Bosnia, Slovenia and Italy.

Kirsten - You've got plenty of time to plan and you'll find lots of help with specific questions here. Research a railpass carefully. You'll have to buy an adult one at your age (sorry) and it can be cheaper to buy point to point. In the time you have, you can do Rome, Paris and Prague. Try to plan for four nights at least in each destination - it lets you absorb yourself into the local culture and you don't feel so rushed. I remember traveling on my own and how different I felt about a place when I'd been there a few days and found my favorite cafe, etc. Good luck! Planning is half the fun!

My trip will be 8 weeks in total. I know I have a lot of time to plan and I want to hit the beach at some time, see history, eat fabulous food, and get off the beaten track. I have read part of Europe through the back door and I plan to read the rest of it. What is overwhelming me right now is that I need to choose the country I want to fly back to the States from in the next week or so and I cant plan my whole trip before then.

If budget is an issue you may want to skip Rome and Italy entirely. But if not make Rome your return airport and fill the rest in. It is a cinch to travel British Isles to France over to Germany & Austria then thru Prague and make your way down to Italy. But realize the eurorail train ticket will be expensive. You must ck into this with the routing before you get your air ticket.The rail info is easy to use on RS website.

Hi Kirsten, Last summer I did something really similar. At the end of July I flew to London and took a train up to Stratford-upon-Avon to relax in a B&B and adjust to the time. I then went to Lisbon and honestly, was so pleasantly surprised by this raw gem of a city that I would say if you can fit it in, do not miss it (Sintra and the seaside town of Cascais are just marvelous). Copenhagen was my second favorite after Italy, so I say don't miss that either! Like you I wanted to see it all! Anyway, then I flew to Barcelona, then Brussels, took a train to Amsterdam, flew to Copenhagen (daytripped to Sweden), flew to Vienna, and took a train to Venice, then Florence, then Rome and flew back from there. Except for my first stop in England I was in each place 4-5 days. It was the best 6 weeks of my life. I started like you did - with a list of can't miss places, which was a lot longer than 3 haha, and I also wanted to see it ALL. I went for quality over quantity in terms of how many cities in each country to go to. I decided I wanted to see one city in each country, whet my appetite by staying in each for several days, and then later in my life (I'm a year younger than you are), I can go back and do more country-specific tours for a couple weeks. So I say, do it all, if you can fit Portugal and Scandinavia in, do it. With the low-cost air carriers, it is not so bad to travel there. People (not here but on other travel boards) told me I was crazy, one even asked if I'd looked at a map. I didn't care. I planned it all really carefully, did hundreds of hours of research, planned my flights and trains and it was like a well-oiled machine/puzzle and it changed my life. I say go for it all - start with a long list and pare down as you see how the timing and transportation works out. As for starting and ending, i'd start east and work west or vice versa. Starting in England and ending in Italy worked well for me, and I didn't really have to double back or whatever :)

Since your pressing deadline is to decide where to fly back home from, this is what I would do: get out a map of Europe and figure out the three most likely "finishing" destinations. Then choose from there based on flight times/stops/availability and logistics.

Based on the information you've given so far, I would say that the most logical route is to start north and west in Britain and do one of two things:

1) Make a big circle and finish in Italy or France. This would probably mean going north across the 'top' of Europe (Amsterdam, Germany, etc.), do Eastern Europe in the middle, head west and south back to Italy, and either finish and fly out of France or put France right after England/before Amsterdam, and fly out of Italy.

2) Go in a semi-straight line and finish in Eastern Europe. This will probably involve zig-zagging north to south, assuming you plan to go to Amsterdam, Germany, etc. as well as Italy.

One thing to also consider is the flight home itself. It will obviously be shorter/faster to fly home from Paris than Prague.

Also, neither option works terrifically well with Spain, so if you plan to go there, I would say slide it in at the beginning and work your way north from there.

This isn't in your original question, but I have to add: since this is a major Europe trip and you have Rome on your must-see list, I would disagree with the poster who suggested skipping Italy. Then again, I'm very biased. :-)

You've gotten some really good advice already. I did kind of the same thing last fall. I was 27, first trip out of the U.S. and started with visiting my brother in London. I spent 4 weeks total over there (I'm jealous you have 8 weeks!!). I went London to Morocco (w/my brother) back to London, then Paris, Rothenburg, Munich, Vienna, and Prague. I decided to skip Italy for my first trip as I wasn't quite sure about being there on my own. Although Morocco definately wasn't my idea either - I wanted to kind of ease into different cultures, but oh well. Paris & Prague are definately on my don't miss it lists. Germany is just wonderful - I would suggest going there, but I know I just barely scratched the surface there as I only went to Rothenburg, Munich, and Neuschwanstein Castle. Vienna and Belgium have been kind of 'eh' for me; they wouldn't be on my must return or must see list. Although you may have totally different tastes from me. In addition to reading the different books I would highly recommend watching RS's and others' videos of different destinations. Also use google to research places. Definately use your local library for all the resources they have and if you don't have a great library system, see if they can request from other libraries. To answer your question - with your travel plans I would suggest flying out of Prague or somewhere in Italy. Feel free to message me with any questions or anything as I would be happy to help you out. - Kelly

Kirsten, I'm also biased because Italy is one of my favorite countries. So don't skip it! Since your trip isn't until next summer you have plenty of time to research things and figure out where you want to go.

It sounds like your 1st problem is figuring out a departure city so your mom can book the tix. That's easy. Pick any city with good rail connections that your mom can get you a flight from. Why do I say that? Because even if you don't spend a day in that city, you can connect there from somewhere else in Europe and catch your flight. Paris, Amsterdam, Rome, Frankfurt, you name it; they have lots of flights and you can get to them from almost any place in Western Europe in less than 12 hours. And many of them have nite trains so you can even leave somewhere else at 9pm the nite before, arrive around 6-8am, and then go to the airport for your flight home.

Next, I'd suggest (no surprise here) watching the Rick Steves series to get a sense of what cities to visit. For me, a picture is worth a lot, and your gut reaction to what you see will tell you if its something you want to look into more or skip. At that point start digging into the guide books to discover what you want to see, recommended sites, etc. I'd suggest not relying on just one series, but use a few; for example one of my favorite cities in Italy is Bologna, a city RS ignores.

I'll leave you with the thought I learned on Outward Bound, "less is more". It applies to so many things! For many people, their enjoyment of their trip would double if they cut out 2 cities and put the extra 4 days into 1 or 2 more days in other places; it leaves you with time for serendipity to work its magic and give you the life-long memories that propel people to travel in the first place.

I envy her that first trip to Europe "exciting feeling", don't y'all?

Kirsten, have a great flight and a wonderful time in Europe!

Bill

Thank you so much for the great advice! I may be contacting some of you individually later. If there is any more advice keep it coming.

Kirsten, It's great that you already have Europe Through The Back Door as that's extremely helpful in planning. Be sure to go through the "Rail Skills" chapter thoroughly!

My suggestion would be not to try and fit too many cities in. Two months sounds like a long time, but it's surprising how quickly the time passes (I know as I did a two month backpacking trip in Fall 2006, and only visited 4 countries!). Try to establish a fairly logical route, with as little "backtracking" as possible. Don't worry about deciding transportation until you get a fairly clear idea on where you're going. Use Rick's country-specific books for good ideas on lodgings and sights to see in each place.

Where will you be visiting in the U.K.? As you're starting there, that provides one leg of your open jaw flight. I normally use Gatwick when travelling to that part of the world. From England, you could either use budget air or EuroStar to get to Paris, and start the main part of your trip from there.

A few comments on the other points you mentioned. I would skip Scandinavia this time (VERY expensive), but Portugal might be possible depending on your other stops. I normally try to avoid car rentals except for very specific circumstances. It's often more "problematic" to have a car - DON'T use rental cars in the major cities! If you plan transportation carefully, you shouldn't need a car. Definitely include Italy!

If you could indicate a bit about your interests and which places you're most interested in seeing, it would be easier to offer suggestions on cities to visit.

I'll send a PM with a bit of further information.

Cheers!

I echo Ken's advice on the rental car in the cities: Don't. Use the bus or S/U Bahns. (If you go to Germany) Driving on the Autobahn is one thing, but trying to navigate the inner city streets solo is gonna be nerve-wracking, and you don't wanna have grey hair for your 28th birthday, right? ;)

B~

I travelled solo when I was 23 years old and I had a blast throughout Germany and France. I thought it was very easy to get around and I felt very safe the whole time. My favorites were Paris, Munich, Nice and the Rhine area. The beer gardens were so much fun to spend an evening at. Italy was a little intimadating at first as when men would see you are a single female traveller they would harrass you. Men were very creepy on the trains as well. I mastered the "scowl" look though and they left me alone after that. I enjoyed Italy mcuh more when I went back this time with my husband.

Think hard about what kind of traveler you think you will be. There is no shame in wanting to see it all and only see a city for 1-2 days. This can be your taster trip.

Flights from the UK are a bargain to the continent so consider flying the furthest east first.

You can fly to Berlin, train or coach to Prague then do a loop south headed west. Vienna is, eh after you see a few other big cities. I'd encourage you to go to Slovenia and check out Ljubljana and Lake Bled. There are also a few towns on the Adriatic sea. Then you can hop over to Venice, a day trip to Verona. Florence isn't too far away and you can get a cheap flight out of Pisa just about anywhere.

Then out of Paris to get you back to the states.

Paris is worth several days because you can use it as a base for so many day trips and of course museums or just relaxing before you get back to your real life.

I remember my first backpacking trip in 2000. I had no guidebook but had an amazing time being guided by serendipity! I hit London, Paris, Austria, Budapest, Prague (I'd never even heard of it before a traveler in Paris handed me ripped out pages of Let's Go) Germany, Netherlands, etc.

I went back the following summer for 8 weeks and saw more amazing places like Croatia and Slovenia and Poland.

Things have changed with cheap flights and online hostel bookings so keep that in mind but as a single female traveler you can usually get lucky if you find yourself stuck... my favorite places to stay are convents! Cash only, no reservations, first come first serve!

Good luck and happy travel planning!