Many people have asked me how I figured out our trip and worked out all the details, so I thought I would share a little of how I went about it.

This is a brief outline of how I planned our three week trip in Europe. Please bear in mind that how you plan a trip will depend on at least four things: where you want to go, what type of traveling personality you have, how much you want to fit into each day, and how much you want to prepare in advance. Hopefully this will give you a starting place and some direction in planning a trip of your own.

Since I enjoy planning, I read many travel books, researched our cities to full hilt, and scoured online travel sites for reviews in order to prepare for our trip. You may not have as much time to prepare or want to read as much as I did, but you can still have a satisfying vacation as long as you are willing to put some planning into it beforehand.

FYI: We had about four months to plan our trip, and toured in May.

First: Rough Itinerary

My husband and I sat down together and narrowed down where we really wanted to go. After drawing up a penciled calendar of the days we would be traveling, we filled in the days with a rough idea of flights and cities. We looked at a map of Europe and planned our route from each stop to the next. Our beginning itinerary looked about like this:

Sunday	Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday

Fly	London	London	London	Lon./Paris	Paris	Paris
Paris	Amsterdam	Germany	Germany	Prague	Bavaria	Munich
Salzburg	Venice	Florence/Ro.	Rome	Rome	Fly home

You can see it ‘s a very comprehensive/ widespread trip. We knew the cities we wanted to see and roughly estimated how long we should stay in each place. Some days we left a little vague, such as in Germany, when we would be staying with family.

Keep in mind how long it might take to travel from each place to the next. We found it made the most sense for us to start farthest north and work downward, limiting our back tracking.

We also found that flights into London from the US were considerably cheaper than into any other part of Europe, reinforcing our decision to start there first.

Planning our route was perhaps the hardest part of the process. We really had wanted to slip Switzerland in there somewhere, but after some ranking (and compromising) of priorities, we discovered it had to be left out.

We purchased our flights as soon as we could. There’s still a jury out on whether you can get better deals on flights by booking early or waiting later, but we didn’t want to chance it and ended up getting great seats (not in the middle of five people) as well.

Second: Guidebooks and Hotels

After our basic itinerary was in place, I promptly ordered a stack of guidebooks containing each of the cities/countries we would be visiting. For my style of traveling I found I liked Rick Steves’ books the best. I also liked his idea of how you “visit” a place for the first time as you study up on it, and your actual visit is the “second time”. I really found this to be true. Learning the ins and outs of cities, how transportation works, where things are located, etc. all beforehand is extremely helpful. In fact, I think it was the reason our trip was so successful.

There were some good recommendations on hotels in these books, and after reviewing these hotels on tripadvisor.com as well, I booked our nights online. Only one time did I have to email the hotel and reserve our room that way. You can wait longer to reserve rooms, but I believe we got the best rates, and also our choice of hotels, since we booked over three months in advance.

Something to think about: Since we were going to be buying a Eurail Pass and traveling mostly by train, we tried to get hotels that were near the city’s train station, especially in places we would be only staying one night. This proved to be a money saver and also saved our backs since we didn’t have far to walk. Only in a few cities (London and Paris) did we stay farther away.

Third: Daily Itineraries

After literally reading the guidebooks cover to cover, and taking notes of places we might be interested in seeing, I started making a more specific itinerary of each city.

For example, in London, I grouped areas of interest as much a possible, thus minimizing time wasting and travel, and tried to incorporate a good variety of elements: museums (such as the British Museum), architecture (St. Pauls’ Cathedral), and seeing the city (the Jubilee Walk). Going day by day, I puzzled out how to use our time most wisely and squeeze in the most that we could. Rick Steves does a good job with the practicalities, such as when a museum is open late, or a day that it is closed. Knowing these things in advance saved us a lot of heartache.

During planning, I was worried that we might feel rushed, but in hindsight, we had plenty of time for each sight, and never missed anything we really wanted to visit.

Creating our daily itineraries took me quite a bit of time, (think weeks and weeks), but was entirely worth it in the end. Here’s an example of a few days in Paris:

Arrive at the PARIS GARE DU NORD STATION at approx. 5:17p. Find ATM and get €350. Buy 2 ticket “carnets”. Get to metro: Take Place d’Italie (orange end of line) then get on (pink) line to Les Gobelins: La Courneuve direction. Head west on Port Royal. Check into Port-Royal Hotel (right side). Ph. #01 43 31 70 06

Find little grocery store on Port Royal and then take RER. Go RER B to St. Michel N-Dame on B3 or B5 (CDG direction) Then RER C Musee d’Orsay on C1,5,7,8 line. (Versaille direction)

to MUSEE D’ORSAY. (pp) 21:00 Buy (2) 4 day Paris Museum Passes.

When finished, take RER C to Invalides (Versailles direction); then get on Metro to Champs Elysees in St. Denis direction (light blue), then to Charles de Gaulle Etoile in La Defense direction (yellow).

See ARC DE TRIOMPHE 23:00 climb to top. If we still have, time walk along CHAMPS ELYSEES.

To get home: take metro from CDG Etoile or George V to Palais Royal Musee du Louvre in Chateau Vincennes direction (yellow). Then take (pink) line to Les Gobelins in Villejuif direction.

FRIDAY

Leave hotel by 7:30. Walk to RER and take B to St. Michel then purchase ticket to get to Versailles. Machines “Billet ille de France” and get a round trip ticket “allez retour” Take RER C to Versaille Rive Gauche.

Walk to VERSAILLES. (pp) 9:00 Enter at “Entrance A security” Then walk through gardens to DOMAINE/TRIANONS 12:00 Have lunch at Versailles.

Get back into Paris. RER C to Invalides. St. Denis line to Champs Elysees (light blue). Then to Palais Royal on Chateau Vincennes line (yellow). Exit out to street and walk to Museum Pass entrance of LOUVRE in between Pyramid and rue Rivoli. By Pavilion Richelieu. WC under pyramid in lobby.

Tour MUSEE DU LOUVRE (pp) pick up free museum map first. Follow RS guide.

After, come out at pyramid entrance. Or go to mall underground near metro to eat dinner. Carrousel du Louvre. (go to Chocolate Maison)

See Tuilieries Gardens and walk through the CHAMPS ELYSEES.

To get home -see last night directions.

We pretty much followed this, and every other city’s itinerary, with only a little tweaking during the day. You can see I mapped out our transportation and added other helpful tidbits. We found that we often had extra time in the day, so over-planning is worth the effort. That way you can fill the time with something worthwhile and close by, and not something that you may end up regretting.

After I was done with each itinerary, I uploaded a copy to the Kindle app on our ipod (which we took with us), and printed a copy to be inserted into the “personal guidebooks” I made for us to take. How did I make those? When I was done reading the guidebooks, I used an exacto knife to cut out pages we would need and then had the pages + itinerary spiral bound at our local printing store. Doing this made our luggage much lighter.

After we knew what we would be doing, we estimated how much our daily expenses per city would be and create a budget based on sightseeing, public transportation, food, and hotel bills. We found that using ATMs was the way to go. There is one almost everywhere and we never had a problem with losing a debit card or having our PIN stolen. But we did take some backup cards just in case and also learned their PIN numbers as well. We carried our cash with us in our neck wallets and never had anything stolen from us.

Tip: we used a credit union checking account that charged us minimally with fees, as compared to a traditional bank. Also, some American credit cards don’t work with the new “chip and pin” system in Europe.

Fourth: Getting from A to B

Getting from city to city, or country to country can be simple or complicated. We opted for trains, which meant we could go from city center to city center, not have to worry about parking or directions, and hop on and off with our pass. Since almost everywhere we stayed had excellent public transportation, this was a no-brainer. However, if you are traveling in more rural places, or just from one country to another for the entire trip, a car or plane might be the way to go.

We purchased our Saver Eurail Pass from Rail Europe, a US travel agent. The only downside was having to reserve seats, which cost extra, and was mandatory on many trains. The upside was getting awesome seats in first class and seeing the countryside whiz by.

FIFTH: TYING UP LOOSE ENDS

After we had our trip mostly put together, I did the small yet vastly important things like reserving times at museums and major sites. The last thing you want to do is waste valuable time in line if you can avoid it. Guidebooks can help you know where to go online, and make you aware of potential pitfalls. We ended up only waiting in a long line once in three weeks, and that was because I had a deliberately chosen not to reserve at the Uffizi Museum in Florence online. Bad mistake. We did reserve times at places like the Eiffel Tower and Vatican Museum.

I made copies of important documents and created a tiny copy of important numbers and addresses that could be carried with us at all times. I ordered neck wallets, shoes, travel essentials, and arranged things with neighbors. We made sure everything was set for our children and jobs.

Rick Steves has a good checklist in his books of this sort of thing—everything to help you get ready. His website also has some great forums of fellow travelers offering their advice and tips.

Sixth: Packing Light

Many people teased us when they learned how we would be traveling, but packing as lightly as we did made our trip as successful as it was. We both took carry-on sized backpacks and then a small daybag to sling around our shoulders. That’s it. We limited our clothing, packed two pairs of good shoes, took only the smallest version of necessities, and were able to book it up flights of stairs and past people fighting their “convenient” rolling luggage. About halfway through our trip we gathered our souvenirs and mailed a few boxes home.

Tip: Bring some foot lotion to rub your feet at the end of each day. Prepare for your trip by taking some long walks so your body can handle the standing and endless walking. Invest in some good shoes that will hold up to the rigors of walking and that are waterproof. My husband’s feet got wet and it made for a long day. You might also want to invest in some good quality socks and bring a blister kit as well.

Enjoy your trip knowing you have prepared well in advance and are ready for almost everything!