Preplanning for June 2019- help us focus

I encourage you to focus on either Ireland or Scotland. We spent 15 nights in Ireland when our children were the ages of yours and could have easily stayed longer! Our initial plan involved splitting our time between England and Ireland; limiting ourselves one country turned out to be a wise choice. As you plan be sure to build in a couple of "down days"-time for a load of laundry or for your girls to just relax at the place where you are staying. Enjoy planning your trip!

"Also, if anything I've said about us or our travel likes make you stop and say "Oh, you'd HATE x, don't go there, or you HAVE to go to Y" let me know. I tend to way over plan and have a hard time dialing back..."

Alas, I can't make your planning any easier, because I think you're being quite reasonable. You're starting early, and nothing you've posted is a red flag to me. And with 16 days, none of your suggestions is way out of line as an initial idea for the time you have

I will even make it harder by saying that no place you've suggested requires extensive non-English skills, although of course the more of a local language you can speak or understand, the more you get out of a trip. And while there's lots of beef and pork on menus, there's also lots of other choices.

The one thing I'll say is that getting between Great Britain and Ireland either involves a short flight or much of the day (getting to ferry terminal, ferry itself, getting from ferry terminal). There's so much to see in either Ireland or Great Britain that you will probably have a better (and certainly easier) trip if you limit it to one or the other. If you are interested in Great Britain outside of London, remember that you don't even have to use London's airports if they're not the most convenient. Look into flights from your home to Manchester, Glasgow, Birmingham, or Edinburgh (you didn't say where you're flying from, so this may or may not require connections). Similarly, if you do want to combine Ireland and Great Britain, there are flights from all kinds of Irish airports to all kinds of GB airports; there's no need to backtrack extensively.

To find out who flies where from a particular airport (very useful in planning), look at that airport's Wikipedia page - a great trick I learned on this Forum!

If you want some ideas for Glasgow, Manchester, and Edinburgh, here's my report from September 2016: https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/trip-reports/uk-trip-report-glasgow-manchester-liverpool-in-september-2016

So many choices, I know how hard it is to decide. Consider that wherever you start, you may have to fly to your next destination. Check out the site https://www.rome2rio.com for travel distances, using all modes of transportation.

We enjoy castles, and cathedrals, museums (art- not really modern, but most others, science and natural history), enjoy outdoorsy/nature things (but are not extreme athletes). We enjoy cultural history, but are not big on military history. We're also into music, including classical music

Based on this, Vienna sounds perfect for you! Our trip to Vienna started in Paris for one night to cure jet lag; then two nights in Strasbourg for a taste of Alsace; Munich for 4 nights; and Vienna for 5 nights.

Strongly advise a sit down family meeting for the sole purpose of getting DH and daughters very involved in the planning. With four people who have diverse interest, no one is going to get to go to / see / do everything they want. And everybody is going to have to go to / see / do something they're not crazy about. But the more involved everyone is in the planning the better trip you'll have. After the meetings (there should be more than one) and you have a rough draft so to speak, then we can help you fine tune things. Since you "... tend to way over plan..." consider building in "unplanned time" to allow for the spontaneous fun things you never thought about that always seem to pop up.

Like Harold, I don't see any "red flag" issues. With two weeks I'd stick to one region. Flying "open jaw" into one city and home from another (multi-city option on airline websites) will save you the time and cost of backtracking in Europe. Try to spend at least two or three nights in every city, or more if it's a big city, so you don't have to pack and unpack and spend time finding hotels and getting around. And example for 14 days (with a transatlantic day at each end) might be Prague-Vienna-Budapest with 4-5 nights each, or Oxford-York-Durham-Edinburgh with 3-4 nights each, or Bayeux-Amboise-Sarlat with 4-5 nights each. You get the idea.

We did a wonderful two-week trip in the U.K. in May of 2014 that included all of your wishes. I called it the “UK sampler”as we visited England, Scotland, and .wales, with a mix of city (museums, cathedrals and culture) and countryside ( scenic beauty, castles, walking).

We traveled by train on the route London : York : Edinburgh : Highlands ( Bridge of Orchy): Glasgow : Wales: London. You would minimize time in London as you have been there. There are lovely cathedrals in York and elsewhere nearby ( Durham). Edinburgh has a fantastic science/ natural history/ culture museum and a castle, Wales abounds with castles. Glasgow has the Charles Rennie Macintosh architecture and design sites, plus a very interesting Transport museum. Talented buskers on the pedestrian street in Glasgow.

Lots of great food including seafood, wonderful vegetables, and other dishes that appeal no those who eschew red meat. Lovely scenery and walking everywhere, including within Edinburgh ( Arthur’s Seat), the Highlands, and Wales.

In Scotland and Wales, people sitting near us in restaurants often wanted to talk with us after hearing our American accents, and that was nice. We exchanged contact information and are still in touch with some of them.

Austria might work too, but note that Vienna has palaces, not castles.

So what are your thoughts, Eleanor? Do any of these suggestions appeal to you and your family?

Harold, thank you for the airport tip! I have wondered several times which airlines fly into which airports! Great tip!

Definitely some helpful trips, especially the ones about considering transportation. I think if we do go the Northern route, we'll probably focus on Ireland, since it was our mutual love of Celtic music that initially brought my husband and I together :) The other thing that might be a factor though, between Ireland and a continental trip is weather- if we end up going in early June, we found last time, that London in early June was a bit cooler than we wanted for our summer vacation. If scheduling conflicts make us schedule in July, that could be a draw for Ireland :)
As far as involving the girls- I wish I could. They're not particularly helpful in the early planning stages- they tend to be better at "which of these castles do you want to visit" not which of these countries do I want to visit, and I really don't want to plan an itinerary for every single place we might visit in order to get their input on which places we should go. My husband and I are thinking of rating possible destinations in order of interest, though, so we can get an idea of which places hold the most common interest. Maybe we'll watch some videos with the girls, too, to see if it sparks anything.

With regard to "...As far as involving the girls...", what can anyone say other than just love them and hope for the best.