Europe Advice

[Bring the Payne]

Ok, so this isn't a dive related trip but I thought someone could give me a little insight into my best options. The girlfriend and I are going to Europe a few days after Christmas to spend New Years there. My plan is to fly into London then it's on to Paris, Basel City, Switzerland and finishing up in Rome (where we will fly home from). What is my best option for city hopping? Eurostar? Cheap airlines like Ryanair? This will be my first time in Europe so I have little to no idea what I'm doing. My goal is to do our traveling as easily and efficiently as possible without breaking the bank. Someone point me in the right direction!

[JugglingMonkeys]

Here are some links to try for European airfares:

Low Cost Airline Guide

SkyEurope, Central Europe's first low cost low fare airline

easyJet.com

Mobissimo

[Bring the Payne]

Originally Posted by JugglingMonkeys

Here are some links to try for European airfares:

Low Cost Airline Guide

SkyEurope, Central Europe's first low cost low fare airline

easyJet.com

Mobissimo

JM, I am really looking for someone that has experience flying these low cost airlines more than the actual airfares (I've already seen a million airfare sites). From what I understand you have to pay for luggage weight and they fly to oddball airports. So I dont know if it's something I'll be interested in. As far as trains are concerned, I'm a little confused. If Im traveling from London to France to Switzerland to Italy do I need a 3 country railpass with the discount for the Eurostar so I can get from Lon. to Paris?

Anyway, thanks for the links JM, I appreciate the effort!!

[dallasdivergirl]

I have flown on easyjet and it was pretty much like south west. I will say that I did pack lightly for that flight so I didn't have to worry too much about weight. You could fly from 2 airports in London & I flew into the regular Amsterdam airport.

On the train deal, I bought tickets to each destination instead of the rail pass. So, I did from London to Swindon & back and also Paris to Amsterdam and back. I did the assigned seating instead of the just sit anywhere on the train tickets. The trains weren't bad but there was one guy that would not shut up and we were a captive audience.

Either way you travel there, it's pretty easy. Also, I bought a paid for every rail or plane ticket before I left so I had them in hand before I left.

[Bring the Payne]

Thanks for the input DG.....I just bought our tickets today so I guess I'll get it figured out soon enough!

[Rick56]

My family lived in Sweden for a year back in 2003/4 and we took advantage of the opportunity to travel extensively around western Europe. There are so many variables that it's hard to provide any concrete advice. An overarching consideration might be how much time time you want to be travelling on the few days you'll be there. We could have easily spent a week in just one city like London, Paris or Rome.

One thing to look into is whether you can schedule your 'between city' travel at night in a sleeper car. This worked well in Scandinavia where the train system is phenominal, and it saved us the cost of a hotel room. However, some train systems (Italy?) may not be so restful. The flip side is that you miss seeing the countryside and miss interacting as much with other passengers.

If I was flying into London and out of Rome, I'd definately take the train between cities, but I'd probably jettison one of the stops (probably Basal) just to have more time in the other places. For local transport, I wouldn't rent a car for the big cities (parking is really hard and expensive) but rely instead on trains, buses or taxis.

You didn't ask, but travelling in western Europe was really pleasant even without knowing the local language. If we needed to interact with someone who didn't speak English, we found that a smile, and a willingness to speak slowly, work though what we needed with hand signals, drawings, etc. almost always worked. We also found very little in the way of anti-American attitudes. The people we talked with may well have strong negative feelings about American foreign policy, but that did not seem to translate into negative feelings about us.

Have fun!
Rick

[Bring the Payne]

Originally Posted by Rick56

My family lived in Sweden for a year back in 2003/4 and we took advantage of the opportunity to travel extensively around western Europe. There are so many variables that it's hard to provide any concrete advice. An overarching consideration might be how much time time you want to be travelling on the few days you'll be there. We could have easily spent a week in just one city like London, Paris or Rome.

One thing to look into is whether you can schedule your 'between city' travel at night in a sleeper car. This worked well in Scandinavia where the train system is phenominal, and it saved us the cost of a hotel room. However, some train systems (Italy?) may not be so restful. The flip side is that you miss seeing the countryside and miss interacting as much with other passengers.

If I was flying into London and out of Rome, I'd definately take the train between cities, but I'd probably jettison one of the stops (probably Basal) just to have more time in the other places. For local transport, I wouldn't rent a car for the big cities (parking is really hard and expensive) but rely instead on trains, buses or taxis.

You didn't ask, but travelling in western Europe was really pleasant even without knowing the local language. If we needed to interact with someone who didn't speak English, we found that a smile, and a willingness to speak slowly, work though what we needed with hand signals, drawings, etc. almost always worked. We also found very little in the way of anti-American attitudes. The people we talked with may well have strong negative feelings about American foreign policy, but that did not seem to translate into negative feelings about us.

Have fun!
Rick

Wow Rick thanks for the input! I'd love to be able to spend more time there but Im going to be limited to 2 nights in London, 3 in Paris, 2 in Switz. and 3 in Rome. With the exception of London to Paris I'll probably end up flying.

Also, thanks for the last input, about the attitudes and helpfulness of the locals. It's nice to know it will be easy to get around and get help if needed. I actually had been thinking about that so you must be a mind reader

[DivingsInMyBlood]

Proberbly too late too help since you got the tickets, but I fly air zoom when i go back home to england to see my family, their a pretty new airline with some good rates and they fly all around europe and a while ago they started to fly to canada too.

The American people are loved aboard its just the politics which are not.

[Bring the Payne]

Not too late, I only bought my tickets from here to London and Rome back home. I still need to get from london to paris, paris to switzerland and switz. to rome. I'll be sure to check air zoom out! Thanks.

[dallasdivergirl]

one of the things I got was a book with pictures of bathrooms, food, trains, buses etc so that you can just point to the pictures when asking for help.