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Updated December European Itinerary - Final Advice?

Posted by on

Hi all,

I posted a couple weeks ago with a rough itinerary for our December/January trip to Europe w/ a quick stop in N. Africa. I appreciated all the feedback I got, and we have made some changes to our itinerary based on suggestions received. For example we'd originally planned to fly RT from London, but will now leave out of Madrid to avoid the trek back to the UK. We also made Tangier, Morocco a day trip rather than overnight to avoid another pack-and-move. We have gotten more details from our family in the UK who we'll be spending Xmas with as to where we'll be, and we'll no longer but travelling from London to Dartmouth, Devon but to Sudbury, Suffolk instead which cuts out a good amount of travel time from London and back. We then took one night out of the UK and gave that to an extra night in Belgium.

We have booked our flights to London and out of Madrid, as well as our flight from Paris to Seville. Nothing else booked yet though until we finalize this itinerary a bit more.

Main questions I still have-
1) We are planning for 2 nights in Brussels then 1 night in Paris---but we haven't finalized this. We have been to Paris before and will stay NYE for sure as we have a flight out of Paris to Seville on 1/1. But should we perhaps just do 1 night in Brussels and 2 in Paris?
2) On our open day in Suffolk County on 12/26, what would be a good city/sight to see that day? We'll probably try to keep it a calmer day before the really hectic part of our schedule hits...but maybe Norwich, Ipswich, or even Cambridge?
3) Any other tips or things to consider changing up before we start to officially lock these places in?

Dec 23rd - Fly out of SFO in the evening
Dec 24th - Land in London early, travel to Sudbury, UK
Dec 25th - Xmas in Sudbury, UK with MIL's family
Dec 26th - Family day somewhere in that region, maybe Ipswich
Dec 27th - Travel to London UK from Sudbury, UK in morning, afternoon sightseeing in London
Dec 28th - London, UK
Dec 29th - Morning train from London, UK to Brussels, BE, afternoon sightseeing in Brussels, BE
Dec 30th - Brussels, BE
Dec 31st - Morning train from Brussels, BE to Paris, FR to spend NYE day and NYE.
Jan 1st - Spend day in Paris, FR---taking 5pm flight to Seville, ES
Jan 2nd - Seville, ES for the whole day
Jan 3rd - Drive down to and spend day in Rota with cousins stationed at Naval Base there and take ferry to Cadiz
Jan 4th - Seville to Tarifa, ES to catch the first ferry to Tangier, MA, spend whole day in Tangier then back to Seville.
Jan 5th - Day in Seville, late train to Madrid
Jan 6th - Madrid, ES
Jan 7th - Flight out of Madrid, ES to SFO

Sudbury, UK - 3 nights
London, UK - 2 nights
Brussels, BE - 2 nights
Paris, FR - 1 night
Seville, ES - 4 nights
Madrid, ES -2 nights

Thanks in advance I have appreciated the input thus far!

Posted by
1901 posts

Regarding question 1, consider that on January 1st, I would guess Paris will be a ghost town in the morning (which might be a good thing in the sense that there won't be crowds, but I'm assuming nothing will be open. Are you taking the Thalys from Brussels to Paris? What time do you arrive on the 31st?

If you swap it around (1 night Brussels, 2 nights Paris), you should probably get a later afternoon or evening train on the 30th so you have time in Brussels to see stuff. Depending on your interest, you could actually get a good feel for Brussels in a half day. That would mostly mean enjoying the ambience around the Grand Place. If you are interested in some museum-going, you'll want the extra day there.

And since you've been to Paris before, the question is what would you do if you had an extra day there on the 31st?

I think it's fine either way, just depends on your interests and expectations of what to see and do in each city.

Posted by
1586 posts

Hi Erica,

Allow me to modify itinerary a bit:

Sudbury, UK - 3 nights
London, UK - 2 nights
Ghent, BE - 2 nights
Paris, FR - 1 night
Seville, ES - 4 nights (Jan 4th - instead of ferry to Tangier, go to Málaga or Marbella to enjoy that day)
Madrid, ES -2 nights

Posted by
9186 posts

And just how are you getting to Sudbury after landing at Heathrow? By train? Bus or car or are you friends coming to retrieve you?

If using public transport beware of crowding. It’s Christmas Eve day. Not only you will be trying to get somewhere for the holiday!

As for sites in London on the 27th and 28th research opening hours for the sites you wish to see. Remember daylight starts to dim around 3:30-4pm in December. You’ll definitely get to enjoy Christmas lights as they will still be up. This is for 2018 but....
https://londonist.com/london/christmas-in-london/when-are-london-s-christmas-lights-switched-on
Lastly use the tfl.gov.uk website if you intend to use the tube or a bus to get around London.

Posted by
15 posts

@Lane - That is a good point that not much will be open Jan 1st in Paris. Since we've been before I'd honestly just be happy walking around if most attractions are closed--but if we did have the extra day I'd love to see Musee D'Orsay, which I missed last time, or go back to the Louvre, as we only had about 1 hour there before it closed last time and we'd love to see more. I was wondering that about Brussels, if we could see the core of it in just 1 day and our extra day better spent in Paris. But I'm sure, as you said, either way would be fine and we'll have to think on that before we start booking. And yes, taking Thalys there--the schedule isn't available yet for December, but assuming the times are usually similar. We'd probably take a train around 8am to get into Paris just after 9am.

@RJean - Thank you! Out of curiosity, why do you recommend Ghent over Brussels? I haven't heard much about visiting Ghent but would be open. Regarding Tangier, we are all pretty set on going there, but Marbella and Malaga have definitely come up too so we'll probably put a little more thought into that one.

@Claudia - We are going to aim to take the train, we get into London in the early afternoon and it seems Sudbury is about 1 hour by train. However we have received that tip previously (about Xmas Eve travel around and out of London) so we do already have that in mind--and our cousin may end up picking us up from London if public transit seems to be too crazy. Thank you for the tips on the Xmas lights and transit schedules. We are very excited for the Xmas lights and holiday markets in London and are glad they will still be up when we are there.

Posted by
1586 posts

Erica - Ghent is a gem of a town. It's a city that will expose you to the real Belgium way of life. Walking through the city of Ghent is like walking through an historical painting, an architectural masterpiece of castles, cathedrals, churches and old merchant houses.

Once you have visited Ghent you will see how wonderful and magical the place is, warm friendly people, food is fantastic, the beer and all its different sorts, but the bars and cafes and to sit outside and sip away with you favourite beer, wine, coffee whatever or just watching the world go by. All of that adds up to the quintessential Belgium experience.

Posted by
15 posts

Thank you for the info on Ghent, RJean! Sounds lovely. Will definitely look more into that location as a stop rather than Brussels!!

Posted by
1901 posts

I agree with RJean that Ghent is delightful and probably more worthy of spending time in than Brussels.

But in your case, you don't really have that much time, which is why I didn't suggest it. I think you'd want two full days to explore Ghent. It's also about a half hour from Ghent to Brussels added to your travel time, plus time to change trains. And because the train station in Ghent is not close to the areas you'll want to see, you'll need time get between the train station and your hotel there.

I'd save Ghent for a trip when you have more time. You can also visit Bruges and some of the other charming Belgian towns on that trip. (Plus in December it's doubtful you will enjoy sitting outside sipping your beer and watching the world go by.)

That's just my opinion. (To be honest, I didn't read your question #3. If I had, I would actually suggest skipping Belgium altogether and adding time in London and/or Paris. Especially now that you've indicated a desire to visit the Musee d'Orsay and spend some time in the Louvre.)

Posted by
15 posts

Lane - yes, I started looking into Ghent and realized that we wouldn't be able to take a direct train there from London as we could with Brussels. That was part of why Brussels came up to begin with---we had a couple days between when we want to leave London and when we want to be in Paris, and figured it was a good stop where we could easily get to it from London then easily get to Paris from there.

Posted by
27925 posts

I don't think ferry schedules for January 2020 are online yet, but I looked at the last Saturday in September on directferries.co.uk and found just two sailings per day from Tarifa to Tangier, at 9 AM and 9 PM. There are also two sailings in the opposite direction, from Tangier to Tarifa, but they are at 8 AM and 10 AM. Therefore, it appears a day-trip would not be possible via Tarifa.

ViaMichelin.com estimates the driving time from Seville to Tarifa at 2 hr. 25 min. I have no idea how much extra time a prudent traveler would allow for navigating to the dock in Tarifa, parking, and going through the boarding procedures, but it seems clear you'd need to leave Seville before 6 AM even if there turned out to be a workable return sailing back to Spain.

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