Three weeks in Europe, can we make these stops?

Wow,your itin is very spread out. And u are not seeing switz? Looks like u should be in and out of Rome . Gd idea to skip amsterdam and brussels this trip. Concentrate on your key areas in italy. U and your children will have so much fun staying in Italy. If u are tied to Geneva, then incl at least one stop in switz. It is beauiful!on your way to italy. Perhaps berner oberland mtn region, imo most beautiful place on earth, and great or kids. Ck it out.

With three weeks, sure it's possible but lots of crazy zigzagging between places that are far apart. It could end up being very expensive and an exceptional hassle to connect all of these. You are probably looking at more flights (vs. train) than on a normal itinerary. Personally I try to avoid flights within Europe at all costs, have only done it on one of sixteen trips. Any time you get on a plane you are killing the better part of a day. That said, Expedia is a good place to get an initial sense of possible flight connections. I am going to guess that Geneva to Frankfurt it do-able as a nonstop, but check on that. Look into KLM flights to/from Amsterdam. Do you have to fly into/out of Geneva, not convenient to any of the other places you want to visit. Rhine is very convenient to Frankfurt which is really easy to get a flight to, since it's a major United hub. Geneva itself is said to be a bit of a snooze. Even as an experienced travel planner, I have a hard time figuring out what order to suggest for all of these stops. Not trying to be snarky, but it will help if money is no object :).

Money is an object, which is why we're flying out of Geneva - it was that or Venice, and I thought Geneva was more centrally located (and a direct flight). As I'm trying to work things out, I think it may be too spread out. I am thinking that we should focus on Italy and Southern France?

Our other option would be to go into Hanover, germany, and fly out of Venice, but Hanover seems out of the way.

Over three weeks, Italy + Southern France would be much more do-able. (Although the two might not be connected as easily as one might think). Provence and the French Riviera are very worthy of a visit--on of the itineraries I am currently planning covers just those areas. Why do you perceive your flight possibilities to be so limited? That far out there must be lots of possibilities. General rule based upon personal experience, fly into Venice not out of Venice. Getting to/from airport is not that easy and flights out of Venice tend to leave early (like 7 a.m.) With three weeks don't give up on the Rhineland, well connected to other places in Europe.

Sure there are lots of possibilities. But Barcelona, Geneva, Venice and Manchester are close to $700 each right now - any place else jumps up to about 1200 RT. Seems like it's worth it/cheaper to fly into someplace like this and then fly out to where we want to go

this is what I've got so far

June 25 arrive in Geneva spend night
June 26 stay one night in Geneva
June 27 take train to Venice spend night in Venice
June 28 and July 29 Venice
June 30 drive or bus to Sienna, spend night
July 1-3, sienna or Florence
July 3 fly to Amsterdam
July 3, 4, 5 Amsterdam
July 6, drive to Rhineland or head to France

You would find the airfares lower at a less-peak vacation time. I have always found open-jaw flights to be as cheap as the time-consuming extra flights you are planning. With the number of day-killing travel days you are scheduling, you don't have time to spare. Are you aware that many low-cost airlines use less-convenient secondary airports? Add up the luggage, ticket, and reservation fees. You should be flying into Venice and home from Frankfurt, leaving out Amsterdam ( a perfect visit for college students.)

I don't consider Geneva even close to the best of Switzerland, but if you insist on flying there, you should stick with France and northern Italy. I can see two days in Siena with local friends, but only one day in Florence? If this is Tuesday, this must be Belgium!

Tim - so more time in Florence then? What do you mean, if it's Tuesday it must be Belgium? I wish we could fly at a different time, but school and work schedules limit us - we thought about going over Christmas, but decided it would be less enjoyable

That is the title of a comic 1969 movie about frantic travel in Europe, trying to cover too much ground. I haven't seen it, but the term has been used on this newsboard before.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/If_It%27s_Tuesday,_This_Must_Be_Belgium

It doesn't matter whether you add time in Florence, it depends on your interest in the history of Western art. I really meant it as a point that your itinerary is too oriented towards touching a list of bases, and not enough on seeing things that you "know" that you want to see. I see the selection of Geneva as an example of insufficient research about what you actually want to do. I've been in Amsterdam three times. If you consider commuter-rail easy-daytrips, Amsterdam alone is good for five to seven days. I spent three days in Baton Rouge and didn't see as much of the area as I wanted to! You didn't mention Spain, but my wife and I spent three weeks in Spain and didn't see it all. Italy probably has more to see and do than does Spain.

You stated a strong interest in the Rhine, but did not name an area of France that interests you. Did you mean eastern France, near Geneva? Did you mean you want to hit Paris again? Did you select Geneva solely on price, or is it particularly well served from New Orleans? Have you considered flying through Houston?

Another idea might be flying Amsterdam/Milan or Amsterdam/Venice:

Amsterdam 4
Cologne 2 (train)
Boppard 2 (train)
Strasbourg or Freiburg 2 (train)
Zurich or Lucerne 2 (train)
fly to Venice 3
Florence 3 (train)
Siena 2 (train or bus)
Milan 2 (train, Last Supper ... ) fly home

This itinerary is not meant to be definitive, it's just a better use of time than your original. It is difficult to exaggerate how hot and crowded Siena is in the summer. Milan is not the most interesting city in Italy, but it has lots of flights and is more interesting than Geneva. If you are desperate to see Munich, that could replace Strasbourg/Freiburg with air travel. But it's not the best city in Germany, that might be Berlin.

Great. this is helpful Tim. Yes, we actually were planning on flying out of Houston, but upon doing further research, I find that if we fly in the middle of the week - M,T,W, we can get some cheaper fares from New Orleans. France is mainly to get some French speaking in before our daughter (who is in French immersion) graduates and moves onto non-french schools. So really, we probably should spend the majority of our time in France and/or Belgium, but need to go down to Florence (my husband works with folks there) and Sienna.

How hot is hot? We live in New Orleans. LOL

Here are some other ideas. Three weeks is a good amount of time. Let's look at your wishes and prioritize them for this trip. You are flying in and out of Geneva. You have friends and colleagues you want to visit and possibly stay with in 3 cities in Italy and 1 city in the Netherlands possibly saving you some money. You said you want to spend some time in a French speaking area since you visited Paris already with your girls.

You could consider this. Fly into Geneva and stay 2-3 days to get over jet lag, take some excursions on the lake, go up to Chamonix in the alps and be in a French speaking area.

After Geneva (or Annecy) you could take a nonstop EasyJet flight to Venice for about $60 pp. Start your Italian 3 city journey from thereby train. After Italy, fly from Florence to Amsterdam (non stop $130 pp on KLM) to visit those friends. After Amsterdam, fly to Geneva the night ($65 pp easyjet) before your flight to head home.

If it were me, I'd probably skip the Amsterdam friends on this trip. I might ask them if they would like to meet at a rental house in the south of France in July if you really want to see them and just do Geneva for a couple of nights, northern Italy for about 1.5 weeks and Provence for a week.

Last year we had to take 2 flights while in Europe to connect the three countries where we needed to be. Those 2 days weren't the most relaxing days but they got the job done.

You will be in a French-speaking area in Geneva, but I would not recommend spending much time there ---very expensive even by Swiss standards, and a very "business-like" city, not a tourist destination. You can get on a train in the airport and go to one of the smaller cities or towns along the lake for your first two nights. Morges, Montreux, Vevey---all good choices (unless you hit the Montreux Jazz festival, in which case prices will be high everywhere). All of these are in Suisse Romande, the cantons of Switzerland where French is the first language.

Edit: the Montreux Jazz festival runs from June 30-July 15, so if you arrive June 25 you should be OK to stay in the area a few days to rest up and speak some French. Then you can head to Venice---there is at least one direct train each day (or used to be---I did not check current schedules). Otherwise you can change trains in Milan.

With the explanation about France, I'll offer another itinerary, leaving out Amsterdam:

Fly to Venice, even if two segments.
Venice 3 nights as you chose
Florence 2 nights Daytrip to Bologna or Pisa if you get bored. Fiesole?
Siena 2 nights
Fly (Florence?) to any French city on the Mediterranean available, say
Marseille 2 nights
Avignon 3 nights, possibly rent car
Lyon 2 nights if you have a restaurant budget
Besancon 2 nights, visit Perouges
Strasbourg 2 nights
Paris 3 nights and home

I dislike changing hotels this much, but you have a desire to cover a lot of ground. We stayed three nights in Besancon, and used the car for things like following the path of Gustave Courbet. Do you have wine interests? Art? Restaurants? This itinerary could be twisted towards Geneva if you insist on it. But Zurich probably has more flights and is more interesting, especially with time for Lucerne. I also like Belgium, but except for Brussels the best cities speak Dutch. I've met people in Brussels who won't/can't speak French. (Speaking some French is no longer necessary for visiting France, not negating how much it is appreciated.)

I would point out that just going to tourist monuments is not a great chance to use French. If you stay in a small Paris hotel and go out to a bar for breakfast every day, (she) will be able to make the acquaintance of local residents who speak little English. Likewise, if you eat dinner in the same place more than once, you might get some tourist tips from the owner or waiter.

All I can say about the summer is that Tuscany is very hot and the crowds in Siena are awful. We don't like swimming pools that much but we went in every night before dinner.

I'm seeing some great RT one-stop fares from New Orleans to Venice, so I think I may book those. And we are going to just skip amsterdam and the rhine. We are going to do Venice and Florence/Sienna - maybe spend a week total in italy, and then do France. We like staying put in one place for longer than just a few days, so we may look for a homebase in Southern France. Any suggestions??

Pam you might want to start a separate topic in the France forum. I'd give some background about your airports, week in Italy, desires for France, etc. I think you'll get more specific help for this part of your trip if you do a separate topic.

Check open jaw prices instead of having to go back to Venice. They are typically no more expensive than returning to same city for departure. Saves a ton of time, esp when covering as much ground as you are.

I agree with open jaw. I would fly into Venice and out of Paris (lots of flights hence cheaper fares). If you have to get back to Venice to leave will eat up whatever savings you had flying there.

We spent some time in Italy in late June and July several years ago - Venice, Vicenza, and the Dolomites. The Dolomites were lovely, the weather ideal. Venice was too warm and very crowded. Vicenza - I've never been so miserable in my life. Unbelievably hot and humid once we moved inland. Rick advises against summer visits to Italy for this reason - and because of crowds - and himself spends his time north of the Alps at that time of year - done so for 30 years.

So while I like Florence and Sienna very much (we went another year in January and had a great time!) my vote goes for something like Tim suggested...

Amsterdam 4
Cologne 2 (train)
Boppard 2 (train)
Strasbourg or Freiburg 2 (train)
Zurich or Lucerne 2 (train)
fly to Venice 3

...but I would drop the rest and add 2 days to Boppard (to allow time for castle tours, river cruises, chairlift rides, and seeing other villages and to tour the adjacent Mosel River Valley as well) and 2 days to Freiburg/Strasbourg (visit Colmar and/or the Black Forest, which Freiburg isn't.) I'd spend 2 days in Lucerne, and in place of Zurich, I would add 2-3 days in Lauterbrunnen (Bernese Oberland.)

If Paris is to be on the itinerary, you could subtract some of my additions and fly there from Venice at the end of your trip - then home from Paris.