Itinerary Help - Belgium, Paris, London

What a wonderful way to spend your anniversary. To make life more simple and waste less time, if you end your trip in London, why not fly to BWI from Heathrow? You won't lose a chunk of the day on the train back to Brussels (plus you lose an extra hour because of the time difference). Now you have me curious about Crawley. Time to do research. :-)

Thank you very much! We already have out tix, but perhaps we can amend, as that's an excellent point. We have friends at Maidenbower Baptist Church in Crawley; excellent place.

Note that Eurostar tickets are much cheaper bought months in advance, non-changeable. I don't know about "good food" in Belgium, but I've enjoyed all the cities from Brugge to Brussels. Amsterdam does not pair as well with London as do Paris and Brussels, because of Eurostar. Remember to allow time for Immigration clearance before train departures. Aren't there areas of England you haven't seen?

I agree that the schedule is busy, and the open-jaw Transatlantic flight is good beginning to repair that. Would you consider leaving out London? You did write about past travel, but you didn't give a clue like "We love London" or "We love places they speak English all the time." I would observe that discrimination against English speakers in Paris is absolutely a thing of the past. You should not consider that as an issue.

Bruges is considered a very romantic destination, but there are lots of other pretty places in Belgium. It depends on your personal tastes. For example, the art museums are much better (and more varied) in Brussels and Antwerp than in Bruges. Bath, England is often considered romantic.

Hi Nicholas -
Congratulations on your upcoming anniversary!

My first thought? Yes, this is too busy an itinerary for the time that you have. Arrival day in Brussels is mostly a loss as is departure day. This leaves you 8 full days to work with. With that amount of time, I'd stick with just London and no more than 2 locations in Belgium. Paris for only 1 day involves a lot of time/$$ in transport.

First question? Do you have to fly both in and out of Brussels? Having to backtrack is problematic and consumes time you could spend sightseeing. It would make better sense to fly into Belgium and out of London, if possible.

You haven't mentioned which parts of Belgium you are interested in but I'll throw out something like this just for starters:

10/16: arrive in Brussels/ train to Ghent
10/17: Ghent
10/18 Ghent/Bruges
10/19 Bruges
10/20 Bruges: anniversary
10/21 Train to Brussels/Eurostar to London
10/22 London/Crawley service
10/23 London
10/24: London
10/25: fly home from London

We liked Bruges and Ghent very much and would personally think of Bruges as a lovely place to spend an anniversary but you may have other ideas? Have you been before?

Firstly, thank you so much for your thoughtful replies!

I should mention that we got our plane tickets on the cheap ($280 per ticket, through WOW; and yes, I understand they're "economic"!). I am checking to see if we can change to 'open jaw', but am not certain that is an option. We do plan on taking Eurostar.

Like I said, Crawley on 10/22 is a very large desire of ours. I would lean toward making 10/22 (or maybe take off the morning of 10/23) our last day in the UK, and then head back to Belgium for a couple of days, so as not to be rushing for our flight.

English speaking is not a huge deal for us, even though I only speak English and Spanish, and my wife knows a bit of French. We love quaint, romantic places, good food/beer/wine, etc. We aren't in a hurry, don't need tours or too much structure. Honestly, we would see riding the Eurostar as a nice experience if we can just be together, and enjoy some time alone (we have 4 kiddos at home!).

On a side note, we are in our mid and late-30s, we love culture, art, music and again, quaint, charming bucolic places!

Thank you, Kathy; how helpful to have a concrete itinerary suggested!

We have never been to Belgium, but I think you might be on to something with the anniversary in Brugges, and then finishing up in London. The one issue we have is that we already bought our tickets, and got them very affordably ($280 per person) through WOW.

In short, though, your idea of Belgium and then England just feels good, and I will be looking into changing our departure city to London.

Hi Nicholas - happy anniversary, in advance, and I know you have your air tickets already, but for what it's worth, Crawley is just outside London's Gatwick Airport. On a long flight layover years ago, I headed into town to a movie theater and caught 2 movies - lovely community!

Also, we visited Bruges 9 years ago and I recently had an enjoyable week in Ghent this spring. Good thing you saved some money on your plane tickets . . . food is great in Belgium, but not exactly cheap!

You can see Brussels in a full day and Ghent and Bruges together in one day. I would spend more time in Paris and London than more days in Brussels.

You can see Brussels in a full day and Ghent and Bruges together in
one day.

I'll respectfully disagree with that. We didn't have a lot of time in Brussels but spent 4 nights in Bruges, with a day trip to Ghent, and will be back for a stay in both next time. There's a lot to see depending on what you're interested in. Good food and GREAT beer too!!!!

Evenings and early mornings in Bruges are especially lovely. :O)