NEED ADVICE: 2 Months in Italy + 1 Month through Spain, Greece, and France.

First, you need to be careful to not violate the Schengen zone limit of 90 days. It is 90 days, not 3 months. The cheapest option is always the bus followed by the Regionale train. There is no such thing as EUrail so I don't know what you are referring to with that state. You use the local rain system. Eurail, RailEurope are travel agencies. P2P especially in Italy will be cheaper than any pass, especially if you take advantage of the deep discounts available for advance purchases.

Second, I prefer the backpack style of carry on bags so that my hands are always free. I like dragging a boat anchor behind when I am walking.

Your question is about how to pay for rail? or about bags?

You can't answer rail definitively until you know your itinerary. The rule of thumb is that passes are not such a great deal any more and the best deals are usually advanced nonrefundable tickets. But it depends on a lot of things, including your plans and your age.

Flying can be a very smart choice. It depends.

Luggage is also to some extent an itinerary-related choice, but the rule of thumb is to pack light. No wheels are lighter than wheels.

But it depends on your route and your back.

Frank & Adam,

Thank you for both of your informative replies. This question was intended to narrow down my choices for a backpack for 3 months and for local travel.

I am flying out of LAX on Jan 10. via Air New Zealand with a 3hr layover in London and then from London to Rome via British Airways. This will be my first trip going solo. I'm 24, 5'10", and would say I'm quite athletic, so a backpack would be no problem. I only suggested a suitcase because I'll be living in Rome for 2 months at one place without moving around. Rome will be from Jan-Mar and the last 30 days will be spent traveling through Frace, Spain, and Greece. I will definitely check out Easyjet, local train passes, and other brands for bags.

Could you recommend some bags you have used or know of that is good on weight and price? I chose the Tom Bihn bag as it seemed suitable for 3 months away.

I think you option two is very pricey. $400 for messenger bag is ridiculous and same for the other bag. Expensive luggage tags you as a good mark. You can get just as functional bags at half the price or less. The length of the trip has no bearing on the size of the bag. Three weeks or three months the bag size is the same. Eagle Creek, the Rick Steves site offers very functioning bags at reasonable prices.

90 days from the 11th of January next year is the 11th of April. To comply with Schengen regulations you must leave the Schengen area (all the countries you named except your transit in the UK airport) no later than the 11th of April.

Does that fit your plan?

If traveling from Spain or France to Greece flying is far easier than train - probably cheaper, too, if you plan ahead.

If you will be teaching in Rome, I would think that Schengen regulations are out the window as undoubtedly you will have a working or teaching visa. Have you taken care of that?

I recently spent close to 3 months in Italy using an Osprey Porter and a Patagonia mini mass messenger bag. I did not have a camera so the mini mass was fine. The Osprey Porter does all that the Bihn bag does and is a lot cheaper.

Thanks for your insight, Frank. I agree with you that the bags are expensive, however, when researching for durable travel backpacks, Tom Bihn came up several times and so I figured I would try out that bag.

Nigel, I won't need a visa as the program considers me a volunteer.
Link: http://geovisions.org/program/teach-english-in-italy-2/
That timeframe does fit into my plan, I just have to finalize my itinerary or at least come up with a general outline of such.

Jkc, I will definitely check out the Osprey Porter as well and look for another DSLR messenger bag.

It is an interesting website. It is certainly true that the program calls you a volunteer, and it is true that you pay a fee for the program, but it is also true that you are providing 15 hours each week of work and getting room and board.

The question isn't if the program considers you a volunteer, it is what the Border Control Immigration officer considers you when you stand in front of them at the airport.

It would be worth a call to the Italian Consulate.

I don't know anything about this program but I do know that a number of other programs have come under scrutiny here. You know you have problems if they tell you to say you are staying with friends.

I find it interesting that on the website you linked they give the same visa answer to personal tutors, to full time teachers in schools, and to au pairs. For the full time school teachers they say "generally" a visa is not required - to enter on a tourist visa. Who determines "generally"?

I don't want to dissuade you at all, I wish I had done something like that when I was younger, the opportunities sound fabulous; I just hope you go in with your eyes open and you have no problems.

Nigel, I won't need a visa as the program considers me a volunteer.

As Nigel already said it is relevant what the program thinks, it is what the Italian authorities decide that counts. And from reading the website, it is clear that you are working and as such you need to get a visa or a written statement from the Italian embassy to say that it is not a problem.

As I have pointed out else where, the only person taking the risk in this situation is you, the traveller. If caught you will be deported at your expense, banned from reentry and possibly fined, while the companies will walk away from it. And of all the countries you could pick from Italy is one of the worst because they have strict rules about registering guests, so it is vey easy to come to the attention of the authorities.

I think you have a bunch of homework to do. Where ever you are staying in Italy will be required to turn over a copy of your passport to the Italy police. The visa issue should not be taken lightly because consequences can be severe. There was an earlier posting here about a young lady that overstayed the Schengen zone by one day and was fined 500E. She thought it was three months. Someone else overstayed a couple of weeks and was ban for a year from returning. Do you want to be viewed as an illegal alien?

I have dragged my $100 (20 years ago) Eagle creek bag through Europe for nearly a year and it looks great. Big bucks does not always related to high quality.

Damn, that is intense. I will give them a call and find out more information about it. The representative from Geovisions assured me that I would not need a visa as I'm only volunteering, but I will now confirm. Thank you for bringing this issue to light. This is my first time backpacking of any sort, so I wanted to make sure everything I had was of quality and those bags were reviewed tons of time, but its a good thing I posted here for advice. Definitely have a ton of homework and more research to do.

When you say "I will give them a call..." do you mean Geovisions? If so, think again. It is the nearest Italian Embassy or the nearest Consulate you should contact. Geovisions will reiterate what is on their website. Of course, you could always ask them if they will reimburse you for all your expenses, including airfare, if you are denied entry by Italian Immigration.

I've emailed my rep at Geovisions to confirm again about what has been said here. I will be calling the consulate / italian embassy to find out more information.

My email to GeoVisions:

"Hi,

Could you confirm with your partner in Italy that I won't be needing a visa? I want to double check as I've read that some Border Control Immigration officers may think otherwise. Do I need to get a written letter from the Italian Embassy to say that it's not a problem? Let me know your thoughts as soon as possible, thanks!"

Her response:

"​Hi,

Because you are a U.S. citizen, you will be entering the country on a tourist visa; 90 days is the max allowed. If you'd like the chance to travel before leaving, you have those extra 30 days for travel. ​I should add that your passport will just be stamped on arrival as a tourist. Just tell them your traveling. Also, check the Italian embassy's website before you go for any changes, as we would not be notified if there were any."

I will be contacting the Italian Consulate for more info, but it looks like I should be okay if I just tell them I'm traveling and not there for volunteer work.

In other words they are telling you to lie. hmmm

Lying to immigration officials, taking work without a work permit, all serious offences. Would you so easily commit a criminal offence in your own country? You could get arrested, held in prison and forcibly expelled from the country. I don't know about Italy, but in the UK employers get fined £1000 per illegal immigrant they employ.
Do you have any qualifications for teaching English? Is this scheme legitimate?

To get back to a previous comment you made: "I will definitely check out Easyjet, local train passes". The suggestion was not to get train passes, but just to get normal tickets from A to B for each of your trips. In Italy these are usually cheaper than passes.
Passes are the expensive option they sell to non-Europeans who think "EUrail" is a train company and cannot be bothered to buy normal tickets. The locals just buy normal tickets.

I like the way the Geovision rep weasels out of responsibility for any problems with Italian Immigration by advising OP to contact authorities just in case there have been changes that Geovision doesn't know about. Tread very carefully.

I was thinking about this last night in bed. OP pays $869 plus all expenses. The program provider gets $869. The pupil family undoubtedly pays money to the provider, too.

The provider does pretty well out of it, and runs their business.

The pupil family gets tutoring in a language they need at probably less cash than they would need for a full immersion course, so is less out of pocket, but has to feed and house OP.

OP gets to spend money and take all the risk, and deliver the tutoring. If you say that the weekend are his and the weekdays are for the program and local things then in 2 months there would be around 16 weekend days where he is free to travel. hmmm

Isn't this a big RED flag --
.....it looks like I should be okay if I just tell them I'm traveling and not there for volunteer work. .....

In other words, if I say I am there for volunteer work than I will have a problem? Let's apply common sense here. If everything is above board, legal, then why it would it make any difference what you say?

I took a look at the website, and I have to agree with those who are saying that Geovisions sounds too-close-for-comfort to sleazy. The fact that the poster would have to pay for the experience might get her past the regulations about working. However, calling what they do, "volunteering," immediately raises red flags in my eyes. Looking at it from the host family side, there seems to be no requirement for training for the "volunteer." Contrary to what most Americans (especially politicians) seem to think, good teaching requires training. The breezy assurance that there is a co-ordinator somewhere nearby, if problems arise, is not, in fact, very reassuring. No doubt, some people have a good experience with this organization; but I think it would be very difficult to get a representative cross-section of evaluations. Sounds like a mine field to me.

My sister turned me onto the program as one of her friends did a stint in France successfully, so I figured I'd give it a try. Everything seemed legitimate and I had no worries, until I posted on here haha, so now I'm a bit paranoid that nothing will go as planned. I've met with my host family via Skype and we keep in contact via email, all is well on that front. In terms of the tutoring aspect, I don't have formal tutoring education, however, I have tutored before and have taught English in Vietnam (Hanoi University) briefly as a courtesy to my niece out there.

I was turned off that the rep told me to basically lie about it, so now I'm trying to figure out my next course of action, whether I do what she advised, or I contact someone of higher power with the same question. If they've had this much success for volunteering abroad, I would assume that all the volunteers told officials they were just there for travel.

I found the $869 fairly reasonable for 2 months of stay and meals. I'm uncertain how much of that the family receives or if they even paid for me to come, though I'm sure it'll come up in a discussion when I arrive.

You might want to go to the Italy Board and see if you can contact Roberto. He's the expert on all things Italian, having been born, raised and spending a lot of his adult life there. He also goes there several times a year.

I'm relieved that you've "Skyped" the host family. Don't get "paranoid" just get educated and get all of your ducks in a row.

Don't forget to update all of us here and let us know how it turns out, if you go, and when you get there, keep in touch!

Your sister's friend may have had no problems. But there are many people in the US who have overstayed visas, here illegally, work, sleep, and get by just fine for many months if not years. The problems start when they interact with the authorities. That could well be the same situation with you and this program or the friend. France would have (could have) different rules so it is possible that she was OK. The problem is you cannot depend on her situation being the same as yours.

Volunteering in the US is culture based with a high degree of participation. In Europe volunteering tends to be looked on as taking a job away from someone so these is much less a culture of volunteering. So for the most part volunteering is viewed as working even if there is no direct compensation. There are other agencies, especially Wwoof, that exploit this gray area as directed to US citizens. (I think different rules apply to our Canadian cousins because of their commonwealth status.)

If you think that telling the immigration officer, who will ask why you are visiting, that you will be a volunteer English teacher for two months will cause problems - THEN there is a problem. You have to consider what the risks are. Maybe you will get an tired, end of shift, immigration officer that could less, just stamp your passport and send you on your way. But what if it is an aggressive new officer who asks a bunch of questions. The worst case would be denied entry, forced to turn around and buy an expensive one way ticket home. Years ago I did have the officer ask the address of where we were staying. I stumbled because I had not committed it to memory. Had it in my carry on bag. But while I was digging it out, there was a series of rapid questions about what did I plan to do tomorrow, had I bought any train tickets, had I been to Rome before, etc. A little unsettling as you are trying to answer the first questions and jet lag was not an aid. Remember they will have had some training in how to spot deceptive tourists.

Ask the agency directly why you cannot tell the immigration officer that you will a volunteer teacher for two months. Don't be wishy washy with your question. Pin them down. I know you really want this to work but you don't want to be viewed as an illegal alien either. Settle that question and then worry about your luggage.