Thursday, October 18, 2012

Traveling in Europe. Suggestions?

Soll ich nach Deutschland gehen, oder nicht? Das ist die Frage....

I'm leaving on my first official travel break this weekend. I'll be flying to Vienna, Austria Saturday morning with Jacqui and staying there for 3 days. Afterwards, we will be taking the train to Budapest, Hungary and staying there for 3 days before flying home. It looks like it will be lots of fun, especially since I have never been to those areas of Europe before. We'll be staying in hostels during the trip and doing the whole "wander around and find something cool" thing while in these cities so there's also a little bit of mystery in all of this. No matter what, I'm going to approach all of this with an open mind and see what this trip has to deal to me.

Now, back to my original question: Literally two weeks after I get back from Budapest, I have another week-long travel break which I have yet to work out. Some friends want to go to Madrid for the week, but I have some friends coming in to Copenhagen who I have to meet. Plus, I'm looking for more of a short break since I miss just being able to stay home and relax in the silence of an empty house. So, instead of going for an entire week, I'm considering going somewhere on my own for a few days and spending the rest back here in Denmark. Berlin is currently my top choice - I can currently get some very cheap flight to and from Berlin (about $80 round trip) and a very nice hotel for about $200 for 4 nights, leaving me plenty of extra for food and any shopping/sightseeing I want to do. But I still am not sure about anything. Does anyone have any suggestions for some relatively affordable places to go to in Europe?

I'm looking to do 11/10/12 until 11/14/12 which is a Saturday to Wednesday. Most of Europe is in their off-season so hotels are cheap in general and flying is decent on Easyjet and the like. My budget is around $400-$500 in total, flight, hotel, and food and such included.

A city where I can understand (or at least somewhat understand) what's going on would be preferable, though I'm open to anything. I speak French and English fluently and my German can get me by in a pinch.

So, any suggestions or even advice would be greatly appreciated.

Vielen Danke/Merci Mille Fois/Thanks a Bunch/Tusind Tak!

JP

6 comments:

  1. The thing about Berlin is that it's comparatively new, as major European cities go — not so much history or charm, although it does have museums and Potsdam is minutes away. Why not try Cologne or Heidelberg? You could stop off in Mainz (Gutenberg) on the way to Heidelberg or make it a day trip from Cologne. Also very much worth a day trip from either or a visit in its own right is Trier, with its buildings from the Roman Empire and medieval town center — a beautiful city.

    Strasbourg, reachable from Heidelberg or Cologne, I would expect, is worth seeing.

    As for language, I think you'd be okay in Germany with English and French. A bit of German is definitely a bonus.

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  2. I was thinking of going by train. You could fly to Cologne and hit the other places by train or bus, I'm sure.

    If you fly to Munich, which has more history than Berlin and also good museums (plus the clothing optional sunbathing area in the Englischer Garten), you can easily get to Regensburg by train or bus, and it's well worth a day trip. Doubtless there are also day trips to Neuschwanstein, the "fairy tale castle" of Ludwig II.

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  3. Who's footing the bill for all this travelling fun? lol. Lucky you. - Wayne :)

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  4. Brussels was one of my favorite cities traveling, and from there, a short day trip to Bruges aka "fairy tale city"

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