Vacation In Europe: Any Tips?

Travel, Wine Tourism, and Restaurants Forum
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My brother and I are going to Europe (for the first time) for about 6 weeks in September and October. I just wanted to get some tips from you all. I am mainly looking for must see sights, dos, donts, cheap hotels (this is a long vacation, we will probably do some hostels), and anything worth mentioning. We are still very flexible (the only thing that has been booked is our flights) but as of now we are planning on getting a 5 or 6 day, 3 country rail pass and renting a car when needed. If you don’t want to read the long itinerary skip the next paragraph, I listed the main cities we will be in after it.

The jist of the trip is I fly into London to meet my brother, spend a couple days there, chunnel to Paris spend 5 days. TGV to Avignon, rent car, spend a couple days in CDP/etc. Make our way along the Riviera thru Nice/Genoa/Pisa/Florence (spending time in each) to Rome spend a couple days. Then up through San Marino?, Bologna, Venice (couple days), Milan, possibly Lake Como (or this could be later in trip), Turin, and then back to Avignon to return car. Take rail to Geneva rent car and spend a couple days. Drive throughout Switzerland ie. Lucern, Zurich, Liechtenstein, along with several small towns of interest. At this point its possible we could drive down through the alps to Northern Italy and Lake Como. Back to Zurich. Train to Stuttgart Germany, visit relatives, go to Munich. Train to Dijon. Spend three days in Burgundy. Train back to Paris, spend a couple days. Chunnel back to London, flight home.

London, Paris, Avignon, Nice, Genoa, Pisa, Florence, Rome, San Marino, Bologna, Venice, Milan, Geneva, Lucern, Zurich, Stuttgart, Munich, Dijon

So my main question is are there any must see sights in any of these cities? We will probably hit the typical tourists traps but would enjoy some out of the way areas not crawling with tourists. I saw the recent thread on Paris and got a lot of information from that (thanks). Any general tips about traveling in Europe? Clothing…mainly concerned on types? I am guessing we will see both cold and hot weather. Going to be taking a netbook, a camera, phones, etc. and was wondering if one of those universal electrical adapters is adequate. I am assuming our car chargers will work in European cars?

Any recommendations would be greatly appreciated. Sorry for all the questions and the length of my post. Thanks for reading through it all!

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Lots of questions, Dustin. There was also a recent thread on London, so take a look for that, too.

As for chargers and things–most modern equipment (cell phones and laptops) have switching power supplies so you just need plug adapters. Check the power brick and look for voltage ranges like 100-230v and you know you’re in business. Yes, car adapters work in all Euro cars I’ve ridden in recently.

Clothes are tough for 6 weeks. You’re moving through a lot of different climates–hotel laundry is expensive, as are laundry services. I’d look around for laundromats, usually your cheapest bet. Try layers instead of shlepping a big coat, make sure you have something that will keep rain off, wear comfortable shoes. If you don’t care about blending in, tennis shoes are probably the best, but if you’re eating out in some of the places you mention, you’ll want a pair of leather shoes of some kind. If you don’t have a lot of lightweight, no wrinkle clothes, check out the REI outlet or Sierra Trading Post, they usually have lots of no wrinkle walking pants and shorts and button down shirts that will travel well, and keep up with changing weather.

Make sure you’ve figured out your cell phone service before going over. Roaming for 6 weeks will get pricey. If your phone is unlocked (and most phones can be unlocked by your service as long as you’ve been with them for a while), just go into an Orange Shop in London and buy a top-up card with international rates on it. You link the account to your credit card and can add time to it any where. Look for a plan with cheap data rates if you text a lot.

Hope this helps.

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Bologna restaurant rec: http://www.drogheriadellarosa.it/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Have fun !

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My husband Steve and I just did a 2 week road trip that went something like this. Paris → Reims → Northern Rhone → Provence → French Alps → Italian Alps → Swiss Alps → Strasbourg → Paris. We had no trouble using our car charger for my iPhone.

We had a Citroen C5 diesel which was spacious, comfortable, and fuel efficient. We got about 38 mpg, which was very nice because gas is expensive over there. A euro a liter sounds cheap, but it works out to about $6 a gallon. A navigation system is a godsend- ours got us pretty much everywhere. Make sure you have a very good road map for back-up, though. Our navigation system thought the Petit St. Bernard pass was closed due to the Tour de France passing through the day before, but we knew it was open. The road map shaved a good two hours off the route the navigation system tried to give us.

A few random thoughts…

• At first we made a point of getting on the road first thing in the morning with plans to “stop for breakfast” or “pick up coffee”. Um, no. We learned after two coffee-free mornings to stop into a café. The concept of all-day breakfast is, I think, an American thing. As soon as we figured that out, we learned to really enjoy the ritual of sitting in a café for our morning coffee and croissants.

• Be prepared for toll roads. You can avoid them easily with a navigation system, but they can shave many hours off a long driving day. All the major highways in France seem to have tolls, and they can really add up. We must have spent €30 to get from Strasbourg to Paris. The toll machines take large bills, but be warned: Steve slipped a €50 note in to pay a €3 toll, and his change came out in coins. It was like hitting a slot machine jackpot on the A1. He gave me the change in handfuls. Carry plenty of €1 and €2 coins. [wink.gif]

Switzerland’s different. The roads are among the smoothest and cleanest I’ve ever seen, and most don’t have tolls. Driving in Switzerland gets expensive, though, when you want to use their various marvels of engineering to get through the mountains. We went through one tunnel with a $30 toll, and a car train with a $20 toll. Swiss Francs are almost equal to US dollars in value, so it’s (at least) easier to keep track of what everything costs there.

• Switzerland’s kind of dull. The natural beauty is breathtaking and I think you’ll love the Alps, but the cities just don’t have the same kind of pull (for me, anyway) as France’s. We passed through much of Switzerland without even stopping.

• Someone mentioned laundry. Even the coin-operated machines (in Paris, anyway) add up. With the currency conversion, we ended up spending almost $30 (!) to do two small loads ourselves in a fairly residential part of town. Bring lots of underwear. They take up very little space compared to other clothing, and then you can go longer w/o a laundry emergency.

• In Burgundy, stay at Jardins de Lois. It’s seriously luxurious for €110. Our room was big and comfortable, and the shower was the biggest I’ve encountered in Europe. The price includes breakfast. The owners make wine, and hold tastings right there at the hotel. A HUGE thank you to board member Michael Bowden for suggesting the place to us.

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Err… maybe it’s because you “forgot” to buy the mandatory sticker costing about $50 and that allows you to use the highways in Switzerland. Usually that’s about the only thing the guys at the border crossings check (unless you cross at one of the rare border crossings that aren’t on a highway).

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Err… That’s not it.

We did indeed forget, but the guy at the border crossing never even checked for it. No, what we paid were very specific tolls in two places. One was the Great St Bernard tunnel, and the other was a car train with a name I don’t remember. In both cases, you must pay the toll even if you have the Swiss Autobahn Vignette.

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Melissa, I should have edited your message even further since I was replying only about the “most roads don’t have tolls [in Switzerland]” - actually they do, it’s just an implied toll that you pay once every year when you buy the Autobahn sticker. In comparison a country like Germany really doesn’t have toll roads - but they don’t really have roads either [wink.gif]

Melissa makes a good point about navigation systems, the first thing I did when I arrived in the US was to buy a small TomTom with US/Canada maps and it’s proven to be an invaluable help so far. I would strongly recommend either buying one in France (it will come with Western Europe maps) or even better buy one in the US (or maybe you [Dustin] already has one) and simply buy the Western Europe maps, it will be a good investment.

Another thing to remember is that you can’t really easily relate miles (or rather, kilometers) to travel time in Europe in the same way you can in the US. Using a service like Google Maps (or a GPS system) to get an idea is really important. It might look short on the map but it will certainly feel a lot longer in reality. On the other hand one thing we’ve got (at least in France) and that I feel is much better than in the US is many more rest areas along highways.

Melissa makes a good point about breakfast, it’s a real tradition to go for coffee and croissants in a small café (bar) in the morning.

Now re: your itinerary, the drive between Italy and Switzerland is really punishing because, well, there are these little mountains called the Alps in the way and the valleys are not orientated in the right way (unlike e.g. between France and Switzerland). So I would definitely try to do everything in Italy from the Avignon loop.

In France you have to take into account that unless you really decide to drive straight to Italy and miss everything, you will want to stop in every other village in Provence (at least that’s my guess). So here it depends what you want to do but Nice is probably about the worse “Riviera” experience you can get in my opinion (on the other hand you might stay transfixed looking at the… landscape in St Tropez for a few hours).

In Italy Pisa can be done really quick (an afternoon is more than enough), Florence not so much. And in this area a little detour to see Sienna is really worth it. Rome is good although you might enjoy it a lot less with a car (not sure where you come from but drivers and traffic in NY or LA are really “tame” in comparison to Rome). A couple of days in Rome is short, you might want to spend a full day only at the Vatican… On the way back I thought Turin was pretty uninteresting (Milan is better), you might want to visit a few Barolo producers instead (plus the landscapes around Barolo are simply great). Not sure about your timing but given your route (remember that Italy is a bit like Switzerland in this regard, there are mountains everywhere) you should probably spend at least 2 weeks in Italy.

Switzerland… I’d spend a bit of time in the Geneve/Lausanne area, the lake is really beautiful. After that I like the most the area around Bad Ragaz and Liechtenstein (book a room at the Gupf). Zurich is fine for one day unless there’s a special event: Bahnhofstrasse, Lake, done. Going to Switzerland when there’s no skiing to be done is a bit like going to Colorado in summer: it’s beautiful but quite boring. You might want to take a sneak peak at Austria, too.

Germany… my favorite country in the world (ahem), good thing that you have relatives in Stuttgart, the only reason I could think of to go there otherwise would be to buy some Hugo Boss stuff at their factory outlet. Munich is nice and you will be probably be there for Oktoberfest - you might want to plan for that, or elect to sleep on the pavement (easier when you’re dead drunk). Drive around Bayern and do some castles.

In Dijon you will need a car again, there’s just no way around it. On other hand you will be at the center of the universe so it counts for something :slight_smile:

2 days in Paris… I pity you.

Re: clothes you should definitely get some rain gear and a couple of warm layers. Bring comfortable stuff. Travel light.

Re: the touristy stuff, I know we all want to avoid that but on the other hand it’s touristy for a reason - don’t miss out on the top stuff just for the sake of not doing touristy stuff, I’d say it’s really counter-productive.

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Okay, gotcha. It’s actually not that we forgot to pay the fee, it’s that we never saw any place to do it. We expected to get hit with the $50 charge at the border, or at a toll booth shortly after, but it just never happened. I have to say, $50 is a great deal for an entire year compared to what we paid for a single day in France.

2 days in Paris… I pity you.

Boy howdy. We tried to cram a week’s worth of Paris into four short days, and it was quite punishing.

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Might be more actually, not sure. It’s a great deal unless you go there for a couple of days like I do, and with a rental on top of it (so if I go again I pay again). But yes the tolls in France have gotten quite expensive unfortunately. At least between Strasbourg and Paris you got what you paid for - between Paris and Lyon you can pay AND still hit some major traffic jams headbang

In the US I like to drive the scenic byways because they can be almost as fast as the interstates (I regularly find byways with a 65mph speed limit). Unfortunately in Europe our small roads are really slow and there’s a real trade-off between time and enjoyment.

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Thanks for the responses. I will reply in more depth when I have time to absorb all the information but rest assured it is very much appreciated.

Guillaume: Those 2 days are at the end of our trip. At the beginning we are going from London to Paris and then spending 5 days in Paris. So roughly a week in total.

Ken: Great stuff on the tech/clothes, very helpful.

Melissa: I hear you on the tolls, I think this will be one of the larger “hidden” costs on our trip. GPS is one of the things we are trying to nail down. There are a few iPhone GPS apps we are looking at as well as the standalone units. Just gotta figure out what will work and be cost effective.


Will respond later with more questions/comments. Thanks!

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I think both Melissa and Guillaume have touched on many salient points. When I am travelling over a long period of time, I prefer to pack extremely light and grab clothes at stores in Europe (in fact, I find the quality is higher there even on the more inexpensive stuff) and do laundry as I go along.

Driving in France can be wonderful (as Guillaume says, the rest stops are MUCH nicer than the ones in the US) but also quite a bit expensive (tolls & gas add up rapidly). The highways are smooth and clean and somewhat traffic-free (except for the usual weather/accident/August-related slowdowns). But you do need a car once you’re out of the major, train-serviced areas. There is nothing like driving the smaller backways and finding all sorts of hidden villages with their little ancient (and I do mean ancient) stone churches, town squares, castles, vineyards, and tree-lined roads. You might also stumble onto a cute restaurant or two. Your trip will be slower that way, of course, but also more rewarding.

Most toll booths in France take credit cards now, though having a supply of coins is useful. Don’t forget, on Sundays most of Europe is shut down outside of major cities (and sometimes in them too!). I usually use that day to travel since I can’t do much else.

About electricity: I usually carry 1-2 adapters and a power strip. This way you can plug many different US things into the strip and not have to worry about losing 10 different adapters. Your car charger will work fine, however. Also, if you have a SIM card in your phone, buy a pre-paid card in each country so you won’t be charged ridiculous roaming rates. In addition, it doesn’t cost you a thing when people call you, and you’ll have a local number in each country. Calling the US costs me about 0.80 Euros/minute, which is MUCH less than if I used my Tmobile connection. If you have an Iphone, make sure you disable the automatic data check option or else you’ll be charged HUGE long-distance international data roaming charges. But you might want to check with AT&T about that.

And watch your wallet! Pick-pockets are active in major tourist spots and train stations. Most importantly, keep an open mind and have fun.

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That sounds much better.

Melissa: I hear you on the tolls, I think this will be one of the larger “hidden” costs on our trip. GPS is one of the things we are trying to nail down. There are a few iPhone GPS apps we are looking at as well as the standalone units. Just gotta figure out what will work and be cost effective.

Tolls & gas are actually not a “hidden” cost, you can use services such as http://www.mappy.com" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; to plan your routes and it will give you the exact price of tolls and an estimate of the gas costs as well. Michel is right that you can use credit cards for tolls but I honestly wouldn’t rely it - there’s always a (sometimes large) chance that the reader won’t read your card because it doesn’t have a chip (that’s the price to pay for managing to be 10-year forward and 20-year backward at the same time on technologies), and the charges by your bank might be ungodly compared to the low price of the toll (on some highways you pay everything at the end, on some other you are stopped every 50 or 100 miles to pay 2 euros each time - stupid but that’s the way it is sometimes).

No idea about iPhone apps, what I can tell you for sure is that a TomTom (and I suppose most other major brands) will work just fine. It’s a $200-250 investment with the maps I think, and well worth it.

Talking about roads: absolutely no drinking & driving in France. And I mean, as in absolutely, not even for half a mile. Not like in the US where I routinely see people taking their car after having drunk half a bottle of wine or more. There’s no “can you hop on one leg while humming Billie Jean” kind of BS. It’s directly the breathalyzer and if you’re over the limit you’re in big trouble. Don’t even think about it, it’s really not worth it. Speeding is also generally speaking a bad idea, but if you limit yourself to low speeding at most it will only cost you money - having a GPS system that points out the fixed radars is a good idea in any case. Speed limits in France are 50 km/h in towns (as soon as you pass the sign with the name of the town), 130 on highways and 90 everywhere else, unless otherwise indicated. We don’t have signs for these implied speed limits like in the US so you need to know the numbers in each country. If you like to speed save it for Italy (last time I was there it seemed to be a religion) or the “no speed limit” highways of Germany, there are quite a few of them.

Re: phones in general you certainly have to check the roaming options. I personally use a phone like once a month at most so I’m obviously not the best person to talk about that, but I’d really suggest using your phone for emergencies only and rely on your notebook and Skype for the rest - that’s what I’m doing in the US and it’s often more reliable (I can’t tell you how many times my phone picked up some coverage but I still couldn’t place a call) and much less expensive. Skype has also the huge advantage that you can just put the country you want to call and the number that a local would use and it will figure out the rest on its own. I also can’t tell you how many times I had to try 3 or 4 numbers (swapping combinations of “stuff in front of the number”) to get connected. At least in France it’s easy, there are basically no area or local codes, each number has to be dialed in exactly the same whether it’s around the block or 500 miles away.

Not sure how much French, Italian or German you speak - you should be able to find some people speaking at least some kind of English, especially in the tourist industry, but it’s not a given either.

Sundays… well… yeah I forgot about that. Actually Europe has a lot in common with the West/Midwest in the US, hours are strict and generally short (although it’s much worse in Germany or Switzerland than in France or Italy). It’s all kind of small differences that you’ll discover.

Oh… and since you’re positing here I assume you’re over 21, which means you’re allowed to drink, whatever you like and wherever you like. No brown bag hypocrisy and stupid stuff like that. Alcohol is not sold in arcane shops with 3 IDs and behind locked doors while accompanied by 2 security guys. Everything is available in the nearest supermarket, even fine wine. On the other hand no BYO, which sucks. The prices of alcohol in bars and restaurants is generally fairly high - although beer is super cheap in Germany (cheaper than anything else, even soft drinks or tea). We also have real coffee which despite what everybody seems to think, is not something that has made it yet to the US (unless we’re talking about minute quantities) - and the way to prepare it is quite… different (or shall I say, stronger). Careful with the ristretti in Italy :slight_smile:

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Re: iPhone Apps, I wouldn’t even consider using an iPhone for GPS in Europe. You can’t buy unlimited data, just small-ish bundles, and the cost to go over what you get is insane. Steve found a great deal on our rental car… something like 400 Euro for 10 days, including the built-in navigation through National/Citer. On quirk: European car rental agencies may charge extra if you don’t get the car washed before you return it.

One app I highly recommend for your iPhone that can be used without any signal at all is “Metro Paris”. It’s a map of the Metro, and will help you find the shortest route between any two stations. Another indispensible app for me was “Units”, which converts currency, temperature, distances, etc. I think each of those two was about $1. The $25 French translator I downloaded was almost useless. Rick Steves has a little pocket book of important phrases in French, Italian, and German that was much more useful to me.

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Two comments…

First, the “no BYO” is such a bummer. We ended up drinking a nice bottle of Champagne in our hotel room in Amsterdam with a jar of Pringles when we couldn’t find a nice restaurant that allowed BYO. We did some hardcore detective work just for fun, and eventually discovered a single restaurant in Amsterdam that not only allows it, but encourages BYO.

Coffee. Oh man, Guillaume… there’s a lot of great coffee in the US now. We’ve had some great coffee in Europe, some over-roasted coffee in Europe, and plenty of mediocre nespresso coffee in Europe. I will grant you that the “average” cup in Europe is infinitely better than the “average” cup in the U.S. because of all the pre-ground, burnt-tasting drip crap that’s served almost everywhere here, but I’ve never had coffee in Europe* that compared to the very best artisan-roasted coffees I’ve had here in the Pacific Northwest.

*opinion subject to change once I spend more than two days in Italy, but for France, it stands [wink.gif]

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Sadly, I agree. The scourge of Nespresso [barf.gif] has swamped much of Europe, sad to say. I always have a hard time finding good coffee unless there’s an Illy or Lavazza sign in the window.

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Another great App for your iPhone/Crackberry: Sit or Squat–worldwide database of public toilets, by gps–WITH REVIEWS.

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We mostly vacation in Tuscany and sometimes London.

If you have never been to Florence, I am good friends with the top guide there. I highly recommend spending either a full or half day with him — you will see more of Florence than you would ever on your own. Also - it is very difficult to get a car into “downtown” Florence. We park at the airport and take the bus in. PM me an I can send you Frank’s contact info and (IMHO) the best place to stay.

For phones — buy a cheap unlocked GSM phone here = get a used one on Craig’s list or ebay. Use that as the one you put in the SIMs you get. I keep SIMs for France, Italy, and UK. It is well worth it for local calls and to have your friends here call you as there is no charge for incoming. I keep my US phone handy in case someone needs to contact you from home and it is urgent.

I purchased a Garmin Nuvi with Europe maps - works very well. It also has a “walking” mode which is really handy in the tourist cities. You can download all sorts of POI info.

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A “mediocre” nespresso (actually if you choose the right ones it’s far from mediocre) would still make my day in Nebraska (like say, today), I’ll tell you that much. I’m not talking about a $4 cup of coffee in a super ultra artisanal shop in a hip city like Portland, I’m talking about walking in somewhere for coffee in the morning. For that matter simply walk in a supermarket in France and in the US and tell me what kind of quality of ground coffee you find in both. As you mentioned 99.9% of the coffee brewed in the US is drip coffee that is paler than a glass of diet pepsi half full of ice, and that definitely makes my life difficult over here.

As for Italy, it’s in another world when it comes to coffee - even I will grant them that much :smiley:

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Guillaume, I noticed you mentioned a glass of diet Pepsi half full of ice in your last post and it brought back fond memories of my first trip to Europe. We couldn’t get ice anywhere! People would look at us like we had three heads when we asked for more ice. I’ll admit over time I have started to appreciate a cold drink served in a small glass with little or no ice, but it took a while for someone raised drinking big glasses of sweet tea with plenty of ice.

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You know, that’s a good point. I forgot about that. In the US drinks are preferred ice cold, while in Europe they’re closer to ambient temperature. When you ask for ice, don’t be surprised to get a (small) bowl full of (tiny) ice cubes that turn into water within a few minutes.

My French family actually stocked up on ice trays in NYC once so they could get their fix of huge ice cubes.