Trip suggestions - Europe

mel.b

My mum is coming from Australia to visit next year. We always do a trip to mainland Europe as part of her visit and are probably looking at spending around 10 days there this time.

Places that I/we have been previously
France
Paris - loved
Lyon - hmmm
Annency - loved

Germany
Rothenburg ob de Tauber - loved
Nuremburg - enjoyed, really only saw the Xmas market
Munich - only had a day in the city

Italy
Rome - loved
Venice - loved
Florence - didn't enjoy as much as we thought we would
Lucca - enjoyed
Pisa - really it's all about the tower isn't it!
Triano - enjoyed
Western Sicily - enjoyed but really hot when there (July)

Belguim
Brussels - ok
Brugges - loved
Ghent - loved

Switerland
St Mortiz - ok
Zermatt - loved
Wegen - loved
Lucerne - enjoyed

Austria
Vienna - enjoyed
Salzburg - enjoyed

Spain
Madrid - loved
Toledo - enjoyed
Segovia - ok

Hungary
Budapest - loved

Greece
Athens & Delphi - loved

Norway
Oslo to Bergen - (norway in a nutshell tour - 4 nights, loved)


We love smaller towns with history or that are 'pretty' and have character - (yes, as Aussies we don't get this there!) so have loved the visits to places like Bruges, Ghent, Rothenburg, Annecy, Lucca, Toledo and also love scenery (Switzerland).

We both really want to go to Prague so that is on the list for the trip, but the question is where else do we go? Mum suggested Denmark today, so we could do something like Prague - train to Berlin - fly to Copenhagen. It's a bit of a bitty itinerary though

Another thought is mum wants to go back to Florence to buy a leather jacket (!) so we could do that and spend some more time in Italy somewhere - any suggestions? While we love scenery mum's not up to any hiking.

I'd like to go to Barcelona. The trip will be in Sept - Oct. What is the weather like there at that time of the year? We don't want anywhere that is really hot while sightseeing. When we were in Florence in Sept it was 30c and it was a bit much. I'd also like to see more of Scandanvia however I think it's probably a bit expensive.

I haven't mentioned Poland or further Eastern Europe as I don't think mum would be very interested.

Any suggestions on cool places or scenic towns that we could visit? Having a base and being able to do some day trips would be ideal. She'll probably fly into our starting city rather than to Dublin.

keithclancy

You easily do a few days in each with the Train.

Fly into Schiphol with Aer Lingus

Netherlands
Amsterdam
Utrecht

Germany
Cologne

Fly back from Cologne with Germanwings.

All three cities are lovely.

You can buy a standard one way ticket (this lets you complete your trip via Utrecht over a 30 day period, but you only need 10)

ICE 3 Operates on this line:
http://www.seat61.com/ice.htm#.UgC7GKyKKrA

The Rijksmuseum is open again after a long renovation, you could also rent yourselves a little boat and head out for the day.

Beruthiel

mel.b wrote: »

Another thought is mum wants to go back to Florence to buy a leather jacket (!) so we could do that and spend some more time in Italy somewhere - any suggestions?

I thought Siena was beautiful.

San Gimignano is much smaller but also lovely.

Balmed Out

Not that impressed with Florence??????

Aachen in Germany is nice as is Avignon in France neither very big and both with interesting histories. Also think cordoba / granada / seville too

Ms.Sunshine

I did a trip to Prague and then got the train from Prague to Berlin. It was one of the best holidays I have ever been on. The year before that I was in Krakow, which is also beautiful and FULL of history. The main square there is a-mazing. You could get the train between the three of those cities and then go to Vienna even.
When we visited Krakow,Berlin & Prague it was the last week in October. In my opinion this is the best time to visit European Cities as it is nice and brisk and mostly dry. ( It only rained for a few hours once we got to Berlin!)
If you are interested In visiting them I can let you know the hotels we stayed in.

clumsyklutz

I personally loved Biarritz in the South West of France, beautiful scenery, quite cheap and in September the weather would be just nice.

mel.b

Balmed Out wrote: »

Not that impressed with Florence??????

Aachen in Germany is nice as is Avignon in France neither very big and both with interesting histories. Also think cordoba / granada / seville too

Yeah, I know it won't be a popular opinion! We had 4 days in Florence which included a day trip to Pisa / Lucca and 1.5 days in Venice and we both wished we had done it the other way around.

Seville has been on my list for a long time

Thanks for the suggestions - I'm putting them on my list for future reference. Mum has actually surprised me, as I mentioned Poland to her and she went and googled it and came back with a list of places she would like to see, so it looks like we are going to do a Central Europe - Czech / Poland trip this time.

clumsyklutz

mel.b wrote: »

Yeah, I know it won't be a popular opinion! We had 4 days in Florence which included a day trip to Pisa / Lucca and 1.5 days in Venice and we both wished we had done it the other way around.

Seville has been on my list for a long time

Thanks for the suggestions - I'm putting them on my list for future reference. Mum has actually surprised me, as I mentioned Poland to her and she went and googled it and came back with a list of places she would like to see, so it looks like we are going to do a Central Europe - Czech / Poland trip this time.

Sounds like an amazing trip! Be sure to let us know how it goes