OPINIONS NEEDED.....Can I do this trip?

[coachknight24]

Taking my family to Europe for the 1st time this summer....and I would love opinions on whether the following itinerary is doable. Looking at June 13-30.

I have been to Europe twice....but both times were 20+ years ago and they were to play baseball, where I just showed up and didn't have to do any of the planning or organization.

This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for my family that I have saved up for the past 9 years to do. Please give any & all info (including side trips, must see places, adjustments you would make, etc) so I can make this the best trip possible for my family.

Thank you in advance for any help. Jim

Trip

Fly into Rome
Short flight to Santorini
Short flight to Budapest
Train to Bratislava
Train to Vienna
Train to Munich
Train to Zermatt
Train to Monaco
Train to Nice
Fly out of Nice
(might substitute another location for Monaco and Nice and fly out of Milan instead)

THOUGHTS???

 

[Pauline]

Welcome to the forums! Most of us here like to slow things down a bit on trips, see more in fewer places. I think you are going to too many places. You have 17 nights. Going to these 9 places gives you 2 nights in most places. You will spend too much time traveling between places.

You must have good reasons to go to each of these places, but I think several need to be cut.

My suggestion:

Fly into Rome. 5 nights. Rome is amazing. You could include a day trip to somewhere else in Italy - Pompeii? Tuscany?

Train to either Vienna or Munich. 3 nights.

Train to Zermatt. 2 nights. I love Zermatt and the train ride to and from will be fabulous.

Train to Nice. 5 nights. Nice is a great place with good trains to do day trips - Menton, Cannes, Antibes.

That is just a quick suggestion. You would save money too, not flying or taking so many trains.

What age are your kids?

 

[Ian Sutton]

I fully agree with Pauline, that an itinerary like that can be immensely draining, spends far too long wasted getting between locations, sat around waiting for those connections, checking in and out, being in a constant state of packing / unpacking, leaving little opportunity to get clothes washed, so the luggage weight is bigger to accommodate the extra clothes.

On top of that, you're responsible for organising all of that, and ensuring the schedule is adhered to. It's a monumental amount of work, such that you'll probably struggle to pre-prep for each location, resulting in a feeling of bewilderment as you arrive in each location, which you'll barely get over before having to move on again.

The best trip possible, is one that really tailors itself to your family's interests, and doesn't short-change you in how long you spend in that location. If you've got any insight to share about your family's interests / aspirations, that will help focus down on some key locations, or even suggest alternatives that might suit them better.

Given it can be hot in mid-late June, I'd suggest taking Rome and Monaco off the list. Big cities in hotter areas can be pretty awful experiences in summer.

Santorini a good early summer option, but feels like you haven't got the time to fit it in and get any real benefit from it. Right location, but in the wrong itinerary.

If excluding Nice & Monaco & looking to another location before flying out of Milano, then staying on Lake Maggiore should get you a cooling breeze, plus more chance to relax. It doesn't look too far from Zermatt, but I haven't checked connections.

----------------------------------------------------------

So, what might a manageable trip look like?
- Leg 1, covering 2-3 cities in central / eastern Europe, e.g. spending 3 whole days in each. Fly into one of these.
- Leg 2, mountains of Zermatt
- Leg 3, Lakes of Italy (Maggiore), flying out of Milano Malpensa

That gives a clear flow, of energetic city exploration, taking in the culture, food, drink and the sights..... then being presented with natural beauty and some superb walking, along with (presumably) more rustic food... finally relaxing into the lakeside setting as the weather warms up a little more and you can then really enjoy the weather in such a setting.

So rather than a blurred rush everywhere, you've got a much clearer transition between the stages, which should make it feel less stressful, and may help excite you about the transition, rather than dreading yet more travel chaos.

 

[BEERMAN]

I edited my first post because it wasn't helpful and the more I read this may be a legit question. "short" flights still require several hours in a day, some of those trains will eat up a day. You are planning a 2 week vacation with over half the days requiring travel. The loop you laid out is huge in scope. This sounds like someone planning literally a once and only once in a lifetime trip? We have certainly done 1 and 2 nights and moved on, but the travel to our next destination is always minimal, such as Luzern to Lauterbrunnen, Sirmione to Verona etc I think our longest train travel day ever was Florence to Lugano (pick up daughter) to Zurich, the Italian train employees were threatening a strike is why we did that in one day, saw very little in Zurich. Which brings up the probable hiccups in the current travel industry.

You may have a great reason for hopping to all of these places, but you and your family will be exhausted at the end. On a positive note, we love train travel and routes can be very scenic. Good luck with your planning.

 

[Allen]

The pressure of a ‘once in a lifetime’ condition can make it awfully difficult to devise what most on this site would consider an enjoyable itinerary. We’ve all been there on our first trip, believing it will be the last and wanting to squeeze everything in. But as Ian warns, the experience of the constant stress and waiting time involved in making so many connections, as well as the wearying packing and unpacking, can progressively taint the most sexy itinerary. Given your mission, I would be fine spending just 2 1/2 days in major sites like Rome and/or Vienna, but note that finding an appealing home base for day trips by train or car can help one worry less about staying too long in one spot while also reducing some of the downsides of more frenetic travel; so I would recommend spending time to prioritize identifying just a few such ‘home base’ spots best suited for touring your absolute hottest interests that also allow for a couple of desirable and not too distant day trips.
Unless of course you guys just love being on the go despite the (to most of us) prohibitively high costs in time and energy and missed opportunities to get more of a taste of a place before having to pack up again. And if one is lucky and determined, there may come a way to a second ‘once in a lifetime’ experience later on to see things that had to be missed the first time around.
Good luck and enjoy the fun of planning it all out.

 

[MaisonRose]

Taking my family to Europe for the 1st time this summer....and I would love opinions on whether the following itinerary is doable. Looking at June 13-30.

I have been to Europe twice....but both times were 20+ years ago and they were to play baseball, where I just showed up and didn't have to do any of the planning or organization.

This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for my family that I have saved up for the past 9 years to do. Please give any & all info (including side trips, must see places, adjustments you would make, etc) so I can make this the best trip possible for my family.

Thank you in advance for any help. Jim

Trip

Fly into Rome
Short flight to Santorini
Short flight to Budapest
Train to Bratislava
Train to Vienna
Train to Munich
Train to Zermatt
Train to Monaco
Train to Nice
Fly out of Nice
(might substitute another location for Monaco and Nice and fly out of Milan instead)

THOUGHTS???

How ambitious! Bless you all. This looks very much like a rail pass kind of plan and might work especially using night trains. It could be so much fun to plan: check out the rail journey contributions on YouTube!
Sad to say, it pops out at me, Skip Monaco (I live in the S of France)
I’ll follow this because I’m want to see what your family’s interests are.

 

[Ian Sutton]

How ambitious! Bless you all. This looks very much like a rail pass kind of plan and might work especially using night trains. It could be so much fun to plan: check out the rail journey contributions on YouTube!
Sad to say, it pops out at me, Skip Monaco (I live in the S of France)
I’ll follow this because I’m want to see what your family’s interests are.

Even on a cut-down itinerary, it very much could be a trip that majors on train transfers (and frankly taking a train is an awful lot more enjoyable to me personally, than the cattle-herding of modern airports). Trains allow us to easily walk around, bring a picnic, play cards or another game, do knitting etc. There's a lot less painful waiting around & queuing.

I also think the sleeper / night-train, even if only once, might be one of those memorable experiences for @coachknight24 and the family. Ideally on the modern ES* services. We once got a sleeper train from Ferrara to Bari, and whilst memorable and we're glad we did it, was a little old / noisy / overly hot, so having a more modern equivalent should be better. Having a croissant and coffee delivered by the conductor as a wake-up call in the morning made both of them taste way better than they would have done normally!

 

[artnbarb]

How old are the kids? Did they have any input or special requests for any of the locations?

Hoping to hear from the OP again, once they've had time to digest all of the (great) suggestions so far.

 

[Pauline]

The poster @coachknight24 hasn’t been back to the forums since he posted. I wonder if we are being trolled? I searched to see if he had posted the same question on another forum but can’t find it. If you are there @coachknight24 please post and let us know your thoughts.

I’d like to know why you chose each of these destinations. And the age of your kids.

 

[LoveToTravel]

I think there are many cities for 17 days, and and they are not nearby cities, so you will spend a lot of time in transportation. My advice to visit one or 2 cities less

 

[drummer]

Taking my family to Europe for the 1st time this summer....and I would love opinions on whether the following itinerary is doable. Looking at June 13-30.

I have been to Europe twice....but both times were 20+ years ago and they were to play baseball, where I just showed up and didn't have to do any of the planning or organization.

This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for my family that I have saved up for the past 9 years to do. Please give any & all info (including side trips, must see places, adjustments you would make, etc) so I can make this the best trip possible for my family.

Thank you in advance for any help. Jim

Trip

Fly into Rome
Short flight to Santorini
Short flight to Budapest
Train to Bratislava
Train to Vienna
Train to Munich
Train to Zermatt
Train to Monaco
Train to Nice
Fly out of Nice
(might substitute another location for Monaco and Nice and fly out of Milan instead)

THOUGHTS???

That's less than 2days per location.
Personally, I always allow at least 3:

• day of arrival (arrive as early as possible).
• 1 full day.
• day of departure, (depart as late as possible).
  
  

 

[VictoriaJZ]

Think of it this way = you are exposing your family/kids to something that they might want to do again == it may be a 'once in a lifetime' family trip but hope it will spur future options for your kids == because of that, and depending on the age of everyone, rushing around and not getting to explore and know a place makes the trip meaningless == on the other hand, if you go to a place, stay there several days and explore and then move to a 2nd place and do the same, you'll whet your/their appetite for more. We were able to take our kids to Europe when they were little and they enjoyed it enough to continue doing it into their 20s and 30s. On their own dime [and learning how to smartly budget as well]. So focus on finding a place or two where you all can enjoy yourselves and learn something and become curious and wanting to come back for more. Good luck!