Visiting Europe for a month this summer

TheMetetron · #1 02-03-2007, 04:26 PM

So it is a possibility that I made a similar thread to this before in OOT, but I can't seem to find it. Regardless, my plans are getting a lot more concrete and I am going to be purchasing airfare and booking hostels in the next week so I figure I'd get some last minute advice on that. Also, I need to start planning the more specific things I am going to be doing in each city.

As some background, this is a trip I am going to be taking with my brother who is 25 (turning 26 while we are in Paris) who has a normal 9-5 job. Hence, this will not be the mega-baller version of Europe, but rather the normal college student version where you stay in hostels. He got a month of paid time off from his work so we could do this, I know we don't have a ton of time, but he'd like to hit the highlights and enjoy as much as he can. Also, don't suggest Eastern Europe. We are pretty much staying in Western Europe for this trip. A later trip of Eastern Europe is not out of the question but that isn't the point of this trip.

You will notice we are mostly flying from city to city. This is pretty much how it is going to be after a lot of debate back and forth. Cheap and quick are the priorities here and taking a train is both more expensive and slower in most instances. In most places, we will be spending 3 days; the exceptions are 4 days in London, 4 days in Paris, and only 2 days in Milan. I will be leaving from Buenos Aires, he will be leaving from San Francisco. We will be meeting up in London.

Here is the tenative schedule:

Sat 7/21 - Thu 7/26: London, United Kingdom

Flights: He is going from San Francisco to London Heathrow on Air Canada with a stopover in Montreal. The flight cost is $1121 roundtrip. He arrives in LHR at 10:15 AM. I am going from Buenos Aires to Amsterdam on Iberia with a stopover in Madrid for $1508 roundtrip. This flight arrives in Amsterdam at 11:15 AM and I will then be taking an EasyJet flight from Amsterdam to London Luton for $53 that will arrive in London at 1:50 PM. I am open for any suggestions on how to get to London cheaper. I am having my flight going roundtrip to Amsterdam because that is the last city we will be visiting. Changing this to London is also doable. It should be noted all of our flights leave on the 21st, but we don't arrive in London until the morning/afternoon of the 22nd.

Hostel: We will be staying at The Generator for 4 nights at a cost of $25/pp/night. It is rated 79% on Hostelbookers and seems to have a good location. Bed linen and towels are included. It has free continental breakfast daily and internet (can't tell if it's free or pay).

Thu 7/26 - Sun 7/29: Madrid, Spain

Flight: London Gatwick to Madrid departing at 7:40 AM and arriving at 11:10 AM on EasyJet. Cost is $99/pp. I should mention we decided to take the early flight whenever possible to maximize our usable time in each city. I'm really upset because this flight used to be much cheaper, but appears to have gone up quite a bit lately. Oh well.

Hostel: We will be staying at Mad Hostel for 3 nights at a cost of $21/pp/night. It is rated 85% on Hostelbookers and like all of my other picks appears to have a good location (as much as I can tell having never been to Madrid). Linens and breakfast are included in the price. Free internet and wifi included here.

Sun 7/29 - Thu 8/02: Paris, France

Flight: We are going from Madrid to Paris Orly on EasyJet departing at 4:40 PM and arriving at 6:40 PM. The cost is $53/pp. I couldn't find anything reasonably priced for earlier in the day or we would have done that.

Hostel: I am really looking for suggestions here. I can't seem to find anything I like too much. Right now the plan is to stay at Village Hostel which got an 80% at Hostelbookers for $29/pp/night. The price includes breakfast. I'm sort of iffy about the location here. It doesn't appear to be anywhere near the center, but is on a metro line. Also, there is a decent chance I don't stay at a hostel while in Paris and instead try to crash at a friend's place.

Thu 8/02 - Sun 8/05: Copenhagen, Denmark

Flight: Paris, Charles de Gaulle to Copenhagen on Sterling Ticket leaving at 10:05 AM and arriving at 12:00 PM. The cost is $78/pp.

Hostel: I can also use some help here The best I've come up with is Hotel Løven. It has a good location, but is pricy at $47/night/pp. It is actually one of the cheaper options. I am also considering this place which I guess is just some lady's house that she rents rooms out of on the outskirts of Copenhagen. It would require taking a train into the city and depending on the cost of that and if the lady cares what time we return, I may go this route. It'd be sort of nice for my brother to see some of the more small-town Danish lifestyle that I've had a chance to experience. I am up for any suggestions on both Copenhagen and Paris as I feel pretty lost.

Sun 8/05 - Wed 08/08: Berlin, Germany

Flight: Copenhagen to Berlin Schoenefeld on Easy Jet leaving at 9:25 PM and arriving at 10:25 PM at a cost of $37/pp.

Hostel: We will be staying at The Generator which is the same Hostel that we will be staying at in London. It is $18/pp/night and includes breakfast, bed linens, and towels.

Wed 08/08 - Sat 08/11: Rome, Italy

Flight: Berlin Schoenefeld to Rome Ciampino on Easy Jet leaving at 7:05 AM and arriving at 9:10 AM at a cost of $53/pp.

Hostel: We will be staying at Alessandro Downtown at a cost of $36/pp/night. It is centrally located and rated an 85% on Hostelbookers.

Sat 08/11 - Mon 08/13: Milan, Italy

Train: Oh my god, a train ride! It's the end of the world! Yes, we will be taking one train ride from Rome to Milan. Our train leaves Rome at 9:30 AM and arrives in Milan at 2:00 PM. The cost is $66 for a 2nd class ticket.

Hostel: The choice at the moment is Hostel Piero Rotta, but I am open for suggestions. The hostel is $25/pp/night and includes breakfast. It is a bit out of the way and apparently the walk between the hostel and the metro has hookers lining it. Also, seen some noise complaints. I'm torn here. The other one I would stay at is over twice the price but obviously better. Saving $50+ is probably somewhat meaningful to my brother though.

Mon 8/13 - Thu 8/16: Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Flights: We will be arriving on the wonderful world of Easy Jet (I just realized all of our flights except for one within Europe are on EasyJet). Our flight leaves Milan Malpensa at 6:45 AM (ouch!) and arrives in Amsterdam at 8:40 AM. I have a flight out of Amsterdam on the 16th at night and my brother has some ridiculous notion of taking a ferry back to London and leaving from there on the 17th (some weird obsession with crossing the English Channel).

Hostel: We will be staying at The Bulldog at a cost of $38/pp/night. It is rated over 90% on Hostelbookers so I have no questions that it will be a good choice. Includes linen with a good location.

Total Transportation Cost Within Europe: $442 (not including public transit within each city)

Total Hostel Cost: $746 for 25 nights

I am looking for feedback regarding the itinerary in general (but don't stray too far or start recommending Prague), as well as the hostels in Milan, Copenhagen, and Paris. Also, I would like to see some people recommend things to do/see in each city, especially things that can't be missed. Any good recommendations on restaurants, bars, discos, museums, etc in any of the cities is of course welcome.

As time goes on, I will add information regarding the public transportation in each city as well as my list of restaurants to eat at and places to go / things to do. I have only been to Copenhagen and Amsterdam out of the cities we are visiting and in Copenhagen I had a Danish guide so I remember nothing and I only visited Amsterdam very briefly during long layovers.

I will hopefully by July speak semi-fluent Spanish so we won't have any issues in Spain with language. London obviously not going to be an issue either. Amsterdam and Copenhagen both have large percentage of their populations that can speak English as well. I'm a little curious about how much trouble we will have in Italy, Germany, and France though. Any thoughts/opinions on this?

That's it for now as it has taken me forever to type thing whole thing out. I look forward to your comments, suggestions, and criticisms. I hope this thread proves useful by the time it is all said and done. Of course a trip report on this whole thing will be done after I return to BsAs.

adsman · #2 02-03-2007, 04:42 PM

Met,

I'll just give you advice on the Italy sector. Milan in August is unbearable. The city empties at this time and is left to any visitor foolish enough to wander in. It is not just the heat but the humidity. I've lived in the tropics and I was stunned at how horrible Milan is at this time. It's also not that great a city, compared to the ones that you're visiting. I think you can do much better here.

Your entire trip is cities. Why not take that weekend in Italy to get out into the countryside? Instead of hitting Milan you could go a bit further North to Lake Como or Lake Garda over towards Verona. The Alps are the place to be in Summer and the nightlife on Garda Lake is sensational.

If you're really stuck on Milan I'll ring a couple of mates who live there and ask what's good to do at that time. English is fairly common in Rome and Venice but that's about it.

kipin · #3 02-03-2007, 05:03 PM

Your schedule is way to strict.

There is no way you will want to follow that schedule when you get there. What I would do if I were you is come up with a list of cities you really want to get to, and just make it a point to get there. Or have a general idea of the areas you want to travel in and let the wind take you along.

As for taking trains vs flying, in my experience, trains are a lot better if you are traveling between countries that border each other. I'm not sure how much European travel experience you have but the cheap carriers in Europe advertise as flying into Paris, or Oslo, or Frankfurt but in actuality they fly into a neighboring city that will be like 1.5 hours outside of the city so then you have to pay another 20 euros to be bussed from the outskirt city to the main city.

The eurail pass (http://www.eurail.com/) Allows a lot of flexibility and works really well in my experience.

ahnuld · #4 02-03-2007, 05:05 PM

skip milan.

eurail is fine, but im not sure if its cheaper anymore. Flights seem to be the new way to do europe, but I trained around last summer and it was fine. Also, try to go to barcelona if at all possible, definitely worth it.

fish2plus2 · #5 02-03-2007, 05:13 PM

Met did this thread already and he said they wouldnt have enough time for trains.

kipin · #6 02-03-2007, 05:20 PM

OK I just read your itinerary and will comment on the cities I stayed in.

Copenhagen, Denmark: I stayed at a Hosteling International Hostel on the outskirts of Copenhagen that took like a 20-30 minute bus ride to get into the main part of the city. ( http://www.danhostel.dk/vandrerhjem....=uk&id=144 ) I think this is the same company, but their location seems to have moved to a better location. Their facilities were clean and the staff was good there from what I remember.

I walked around this city a lot and took pictures. If you are into museums at all the National Danish Museum was pretty good. I don't have a calendar out but if you can avoid being in Copenhagen on Monday you will have a much better time. A lot of the touristy things to do are closed on Mondays. At least at the time of year I was there (late September)

I don't know if you are into graffiti at all, but if you are you should definitely try to check out the rebel town Christiana. ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freetown_Christiania ) Its a hippie town that has like 800 residents and it had the best graffiti art I've ever seen. (A couple pics are on my website http://www.kipin.net )

I know there was some talk of the Danish government shutting Christiana down when I was there 1.5 years ago so perhaps it no longer exists but its worth looking at if you are trying to kill a few hours. Also, hash is really easy to score if you are into that thing (The dealers all stand outside on "Pusher Street" and offer it to you - I declined [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] )

Berlin, Germany: One of the best parts of my last trip was taking a free walking tour sponsored by this group ( http://www.newberlintours.com/nbt/ ) It was awesome and the guide was very knowledgeable about everything. All the guides are also native English speakers but they also speak German so it is pretty cool.

If you have the chance to do this, it is definitely worth checking out. I also went on their pub crawl and had a lot of fun. You get good discounts on drinks at bars and get to meet a ton of travelers.

I havn't been anywhere else on your list besides Paris and I don't really feel all that confident giving advice on Paris.

TheMetetron · #7 02-03-2007, 05:21 PM

[ QUOTE ]
Met did this thread already and he said they wouldnt have enough time for trains.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yeah I remember this discussion coming up. Basically, flying is much cheaper and as you can see the schedule is packed. No time for overnight trains and the like.

This decision has already been made so I'd more like to focus on individual cities as well as the hostels I need help picking.

TheMetetron · #8 02-03-2007, 05:31 PM

kipin,

That is exactly the kind of post I am looking solicit via this thread. I will look into your recommendations more in depth later, but they look interesting so far. Thanks a bunch.

Even though I've been to Copenhagen, I didn't see a lot of the touristy stuff. I was in an apartment getting drunk a lot and going over to friend of a friend's houses. So I'm definitely looking for advice on Copenhagen. I've spent extension time in the Randers/Aarhus/Viborg area if anyone is interested though [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

Not that it is all that relevant but I can speak passable Danish. Ordering train tickets, food at restaurants, asking a girl to give me a blow job (Sut min pik din kælling)... things of that nature. Not sure if this will be helpful or not.

TheMetetron · #9 02-03-2007, 05:33 PM

[ QUOTE ]
Met,

I'll just give you advice on the Italy sector. Milan in August is unbearable. The city empties at this time and is left to any visitor foolish enough to wander in. It is not just the heat but the humidity. I've lived in the tropics and I was stunned at how horrible Milan is at this time. It's also not that great a city, compared to the ones that you're visiting. I think you can do much better here.

Your entire trip is cities. Why not take that weekend in Italy to get out into the countryside? Instead of hitting Milan you could go a bit further North to Lake Como or Lake Garda over towards Verona. The Alps are the place to be in Summer and the nightlife on Garda Lake is sensational.

If you're really stuck on Milan I'll ring a couple of mates who live there and ask what's good to do at that time. English is fairly common in Rome and Venice but that's about it.

[/ QUOTE ]

Thanks for the Milan information. The only reason we were going there was because the flights are much cheaper from Milan to Amsterdam then from Rome to Amsterdam. Also, my brother wanted to take a train at some point so it seemed like a decent way to see the Italian countryside.

I am definitely not opposed to cutting Milan down to just one night while in-transit or cutting it out all together. I'm game for any other recommendations you may have instead, but it needs to be fairly easy to fly from wherever you suggest to Amsterdam.

ISF · #10 02-03-2007, 05:54 PM

I think I actually stayed at the bulldog in amsterdam like maybe 6 years ago. Think it was only like $15 then. Trip sounds like fun.