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Threaded Responses [ bottom ]
 | Bendependent [email] said at 4:55 AM 07-24-2006:
also, tickets to dublin seem to be only $10 more... |
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| Bendependent [email] said at 5:40 AM 07-24-2006:
geez. i just found one for $206 from NY to london... |
 | ed [email] said at 8:20 AM 07-24-2006:
I would go to Prague to visit my friend Nikki and spend the entire time letting her show me all the cool stuff I hear about but never will get to see. I would eat tofu with her, but I would not drink the coffee, because I hate coffee, and don't do caffiene in general, anyway. I would bring one point three billion dollars. (This is a fantasy, after all.)
PS - I would fly into Dublin, because it sounds more exotic, laddie. |
 | art [email] said at 9:46 AM 07-24-2006:
~ I would start in London and then head through Belgium to Amsterdam and then spend the rest of the time in Germany and Austria because they are fun places and beer is plentiful and cheap and there are great mountains and castles to explore on the Germany/Austria border. Then I would head to the Czech Republic to finish up.
If I had one word of advice Ben it would be don't try to do too/see everything. Get to know the places you are visiting by being a few days in each place.
~ Money is a tough one, you could maybe get by on $50 a day? Also I wouldn't bring any money and would rely on ATMs everywhere.
~ You can buy national train passes, which might be better if you concentrate in two or three countries. You have to use the Eurail pass a bit to get your money's worth. In fact, I would recommend renting a bicycle in Belgium and biking your way from hostel to hostel through the countries I mentioned above. You can stow your bike on the trains if you decide to move more quickly. And you have to buy the Eurail pass here before you go. |
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| art [email] said at 9:51 AM 07-24-2006:
~ and buy an International Youth Hostel guide and cross check with the web for recommendations of places that look good. We recently stayed in a hostel (or almost did) in Freiburg Germany but when we got there they had 120 8th graders staying there and we were a bit overwhelmed
~ Also the bike paths there are amazingly well laid out - they are a completely independent system of roads that go from village to village, etc etc |
 | crystal [email] said at 10:17 AM 07-24-2006:
I went there on tour so I was kind of chauffeured around, BUT the cities that I really enjoyed were Berlin, Barcelona, Madrid and Amsterdam.
You HAVE to do to Berlin Ben!
If you go to Barcelona, make sure you see the Gaudi park. Park Guell. It is amazing.
Then of course you have to go to Amsterdam. Just go to the center of the city and visit a "coffee shop." they have crappy coffee but good drugs. "coffee shop" is the key word. :) get high and just walk around the city. it's that beautiful.
Europe rules. I have some friends in Amsterdam that I could hook you up with.
Your trip will rule! |
 | kaycee [email] said at 10:50 AM 07-24-2006:
Steven and I have friends in Paris. We say boo to Berlin.
You are supposed to be coming here for thanksgiving though! |
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| kaycee [email] said at 10:51 AM 07-24-2006:
.. or thats the california rumour, anyways... |
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| Bendependent [email] said at 11:10 PM 07-25-2006:
yeah...
given the choice...
i'll meet up with you guys again soon. |
 | gen [email] said at 11:02 AM 07-24-2006:
Good for you! Talk to Matt Neale - he might be able to offer you shelter in London. My friend Annie is doing her Master's in Hamburg, Germany - I can put you in touch with her. |
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| gen [email] said at 11:05 AM 07-24-2006:
And Denis (my ex, of sorts) is working out of Geneva now... Though he spends as much time jet-setting around the world as he does in Switzerland. |
 | anotherben [email] said at 8:57 PM 07-24-2006:
buy a cheap bike and a tent when you get there and just ride from town to town. drink beer. sleep in fields. write sonnets. |
 | myriam [email] said at 11:01 PM 07-24-2006:
If you're on a budget I would skip flying into London. It's painfully expensive and it is expensive to get across to the Continent, too. I would just fly into Paris, then head to Amsterdam, over to Germany and around where Art and 'em recommended! Or go down south through Spain and to Portugal...my favorite country... and even across to Morocco if you like. But London is... kind of dull and depressingly, deflatingly expensive, in my opinion. |
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| myriam [email] said at 11:08 PM 07-24-2006:
Also, Eurrail passes are total ripoffs--it's the hidden secret of the biz. Be sure to take your old student ID, scratch off the date, make yourself look young (ha!), and you're good to go! Most countries offer amazing student discounts on train fare (up to age 26 in France and I believe in Germany and Spain, too, but I could be wrong about those guys) and that will be your cheapest bet. The eurrail pass has all kinds of weird restrictions on it that make it almost impossible to use effectively. that's all! |
 | meredith [email] said at 11:58 PM 07-24-2006:
Bring twice as much money as you think you'll need and half as many clothes. |
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| art [email] said at 10:01 AM 07-25-2006:
excellent advice - less clothes and hit the laundromats once week (although there aren't too many of them) |
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| myriam [email] said at 11:05 AM 07-25-2006:
yes yes yes. Polyester blends dry almost instantly and you can wash them in a hostel sink and practically put them right back on to wear. |
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| Bendependent [email] said at 6:10 AM 07-25-2006:
thanks for the advice! keep it coming if you can think of anything else.
i found a ticket that flies into london and has an open ended departure from from either london or milan, italy a month later - for $441 round trip (with taxes & fees and everything). I think I'm gonna jump on it later today.
I still have no idea about the trains though. They're pretty confusing. How can I find the best train deals, and how much is a good price range for them?
I like the bike suggestion. Kim really wants to go snowboarding somewhere. As of now I'm thinking London, Belgium, Amsterdam, Germany (not sure best route), Prague, Vienna, either Venice or somewhere in Switzerland, and then depart from Milan...
Too much for 30 days?
I'm thinking that Spain, Netherlands, France, & UK/Ireland might be better as separate trip(s). Maybe next summer I'll try to do Southern France & Spain / Portugal once the travel bug sets in after this trip...
Any thoughts on how much I should try to budget for? I have a lot of blanks to fill in...
$441 : Round trip plane
$085 : Passport
???? : Other transport (trains / ferry)
???? : Bikes
???? : Hostels / etc
???? : Food / Entertainment
I wonder how many places I could find to stay. I also wonder how many comic books I can tote with me to give away along the way... |
 | katie [email] said at 8:53 AM 07-25-2006:
someone suggested that london is kind of a pain in the ass if it's the continent you want to see (myriam?). it's true. london is ridiculously expensive and hard to negotiate on a budget, plus, once you're done with it, you have to get off the freakin' island and back on the continent where all the fun cheap stuff is, and that costs more money. the trains in britain don't work on the same pass system as those in the rest of the continent, so you have to buy a separate train ticket to get from london to the coast, then either a chunnel ticket (pricey, but you can say you did the chunnel) or a ferry ticket (cheaper, but a lot of fun).
if you're set on flying to london, northeast france where the ferry lets off is a great jumping-off point to get to the lowcountry (belgium and holland). the ferry takes you across the english channel and lets you off at calais, where you can get a quick train to brussels or amsterdam. if you go the chunnel route you wind up in paris, i think, which presents another set of problems entirely. to get to any other country from paris takes at least four hours by train unless you shell out for the high-speed TGV.
look at raileurope.com eurail.com. or railpass.com. the deal with these passes is that you can't buy them once you get there, you have to get them here in the states. they're a great way to get around because they're so flexible. you don't have to set an itinerary, you just have the rail pass and when you want to go somewhere, you go.
remember that in november, northern europe is going to be very, very cold. biking through switzerland in the snow might not be your idea of a great vacation. snowboarding can be had all over the alps - your best bet is probably to stay away from the chi-chi resorts and find something in austria for a day, if you plan on going to vienna, or switzerland or northern italy on your way to milan. go to a bookstore or the library and look at Time Out Ski and Snowboard Europe - good tips for budget travelers.
Rail pass: anywhere from $200-$500
-try the eurail selectpass: http://www.raileurope.com/us/rail/passes/eurail_selectpass_saver.htm
Hostels: $30-$50 per night
get a hostel card and you get discounts:
www.hihostels.com
Food: is: EXpenSivE. You will spend more money on food/entertainment than you think. If you wind up not budgeting enough for your entertainment expenses, you're going to be stuck in Belgium with no option but to eat mayonnaise-laden french fries for sustenance, and I know how you feel about that. Try to go to grocery stores and put food in your backpack, and don't eat out but once a day. Even $40 a day for a month comes to $1200, and you'll be in some places where you'll want to spend more than $40 in one day. My advice is to win the lottery and bring a credit card.
i'm so jealous, ben. |
 | brad [email] said at 1:47 AM 07-26-2006:
Brussels is supposed to be boring, and expensive, I think. Everyone says Amsterdam is great, and most people I've talked to have had good things to say about Berlin and most of Spain.
But if money is a big concern, don't spend much time in Western Europe. If you're going to be there a month, maybe Berlin, Vienna, Prague, Krakow and Budapest would be a good trip. I hear way more people complaining about the expense of London than raving about what a great city it is. I'd look at flights to other cities. Maybe Priceline it. |
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| myriam [email] said at 9:34 AM 07-25-2006:
SHIT. I just did a huge train response here and got an "internal error" when I hit submit. Dammit. I gotta go to work but I will try to reconstruct it later. I had links and everything :( |
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| myriam [email] said at 9:46 AM 07-25-2006:
How come it lets me put anything else here EXCEPT the helpful response I've typed out?!?! Stupid apache server internal errors! Ok. Here goes AGAIN:
Argh. I'll summarize, before you buy any tickets:
1) I agree with everything Katie says, except
2) do NOT buy a eurrail pass. NOT NOT NOT. Unless you travel literally every single day (you have to use them continuously... as in "continuous trips") you will wind up buying regular tickets anyway and then you're out the price of the pass. I don't know a single person who was glad they bought one once they got over there. Your best bet is to:
3) Look up prices in advance on each country's train website in order to budget, and then buy your outgoing ticket in the train station in each city when you arrive there. That way you'll get your ticket like 2 or 3 days in advance of when you need it (so the cheapest seats will still be available) and you don't have to stress about it in advance. You'll get able to get youth or student discounts in most places, but budget without that just in case.
--Here I had the French national train website but I am taking it out to see if that's what's fucking up my ability to post, somehow--
4) Finally, another good way to save money is to totally avoid overnight sleeper trains. Unless you spend loads for a private first class cabin, you will be sleeping with 5 strangers + untold numbers of loud obnoxious teenagers and creepy old men who didn't buy a ticket and are literally cramming the hallways. You won't be able to sleep for fear one of these strangers is going to steal your stuff, because it happens ALL THE TIME. Plus it is way uncomfortable anyway and the sanitary facilities are the same as the ones for the rest of the train. So save your money and just try to crash for awhile in a regular seat on the train--you'll just need something to put over your eyes to make it dark. We ended up doing this and it was much calmer than the way more expensive sleepers.
Ok I think that was it! Although I put it better last time... |
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| myriam [email] said at 9:47 AM 07-25-2006:
Ok ben, I will IM you the link to the french national rail. It's sncf.fr but then there's a little link to the english version, etc. |
 | dianne [email] said at 6:38 PM 07-25-2006:
if you come to paris, you can sleep on my futon. great museums here. |
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| brad [email] said at 1:31 AM 07-26-2006:
Keep your cash separate from you wallet, and don't carry anything in your back pocket. Or buy a belt made specifically for carrying it (not sure exactly what they're called). Be suspicious of anyone who seems too friendly. | |
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