Tips for getting tickets in Europe:

[Lepardi]

On the other hand, because everyone tries to fit everything into a max-size cabin bag, there is often not enough room in the cabin for everyone's bags, so they end up putting them under the plane for free anyhow

Before takeoff flight attendants are walking back and forth on the aisles desperately trying to find space for all the carry-on bags. This causes delays. Airlines will have to start charging passengers for carry-on luggage too:

Ryanair: cabin baggage rule change means small suitcases no longer free

 

[Havre]

Ain't many paying roads in Spain. Mostly in Cataluna.

You are right. I guess I just have basically hit them all (Bilbao, Barcelona, Malaga and Madrid) without really checking that the rest of the country is free. Even better then.

 

[Chimaera]

Drivings not hard, but just make sure you have the right license, insurance and an international data plan.

I wouldn’t want to mess with parking though. You could make sure places you’re staying have parking, but that’s a limiting factor

 

[Evilo]

You are right. I guess I just have basically hit them all (Bilbao, Barcelona, Malaga and Madrid) without really checking that the rest of the country is free. Even better then.

I go to Valencia from France and usually I only pay a small fee near Pampelona.
I once made the trip Barcelona-Valencia-Alicante, it's MUCH more expensive.
I also drive a lot in Andalousia from Malaga to Sevilla, from Sevilla to Cordoba to Granada and from Sevilla to Huelva. I only paid a toll once, it was between Sevilla and Jerez de la Frontera but it's been closed this year I think.

 

[Duchene2MacKinnon]

Athens is not a good looking city. Save the amazing temples of course.
Dublin is a nice town, but not much to do outside pubs
Prague and Budapest are nto getting underrated. I already said they were amazing cities.

OOk so, Dublin is out. Those cities would be great just too far east. Im thinking Valencia or another city in Spain. Close to Barcelona since you guys made me aware of not pissing my trip on just travel time.

 

[Evilo]

Cities not far from Barcelona with first league football : Valencia (some nice games in August in Mestalla, including some very very late games, I once went to a game starting at 11PM), Toulouse, Montpellier.

 

[East Coast Bias]

OOk so, Dublin is out. Those cities would be great just too far east. Im thinking Valencia or another city in Spain. Close to Barcelona since you guys made me aware of not pissing my trip on just travel time.

Yeah the best cities to see in Ireland are not Dublin. Dublin is your run of the mill metropolitan city. Getting out of Dublin is where Ireland is great.

 

[Chimaera]

I mean, I enjoyed myself in the pubs in Dublin, but yeah, get out to the countryside.

 

[S E P H]

Yeah, Athens is a ghetto town filled with a ton of graffiti. Never been to Greece, but all my Polish families go there for vacation and they love it. There are better places to go in the country that isn't Athens.

Has anyone done roadtrips?

Our new idea is to roadtrip around spain and portugal for ten days.

Yes, I did roadtrips in Italia, Austria, Germany, and Poland. What you have to watch for is that some countries have a lot of tolls while others do not. And some countries have strange laws, we got pulled over by the polizia in Italy for driving on a Sunday (true story). Roads in all the big countries are very good such as Spain, metro parts of Italy, Germany, France, England, Denmark, Netherlands, and Belgium. The worst roads are around Poland-ish and go east such as Slovakia, Ukraine, Romania, Czechia, and others around there. Poland has Germany type of highways, but the roads get brutal once you get off the main road. If you plan on going to Prague, take a train from Krakow/Berlin/Frankfurt than drive IMHO.

Road infrastructure in general is very very good in Spain, but if you are not driving on the toll roads it can be quite slow in certain places (depending on your budget).

Worst part of driving in Spain is the parking. Not that it would be any worse than in many North American cities.

Parking is a premium probably everywhere in Europe not named Germany. Italia for example is notorious for having absolutely zero parking (better to take the underground than drive in the cities even though the roads are good).

 

[Havre]

Yeah. Generally speaking I don´t like travelling to big cities with a car. To me that goes for NA as well, but I guess it depends on the city in NA. I got most experience from Vancouver, New York and LA. Also San Francisco I have spent a lot of time looking for parking. Such a hassle with the one way streets (in that case worth it though).

Defeats the purpose a bit if you got to spend a lot of time finding good parking - for then having to walk a long distance to get to where you want to go.

Also worth noting people do bump into you when parking in South Europe because everyone park so tight. Can be a bit of an issue with rental cars.

 

[Evilo]

That's extremely true. In Spain and Italy, parkings can be extremely tight. It's quite incredible.

 

[Stray Wasp]

If there is one museum every single person on Earth should go to, it's Auschwitz. It's outside Krakow which is one of the best cities you can visit in Europe, it's touristy, but like Paris it's for a good reason. Another city that is awesome to just chill is Gdansk, it has Malabork right outside which is one of the best castles in Europe, and since Nazi's used the city as a harbour it wasn't heavily bombed or damaged compared to Warsaw. Plus Poland is insanely cheap compared to majority of Europe.

Yes to all of this, at least based on visits in 2005 and 2006. I count myself fortunate to have seen Krakow before it gained popularity as an English stag-do venue. (Whether or not that popularity has now waned I can't say, but I hope so.)

(SEPH will forgive me, I hope, if I point out a typo for the sake of ensuring no one is confused - it's Malbork that has the fabulous castle near Gdansk. When I went, there was a medieval toilet you could sit on and the shop sold a book about old torture devices that introduced me to a marvellous implement best described as an arse pyramid. What more can you ask for?)

 

[Stray Wasp]

I'm not sure many cathedrals surpass Notre Dame, but I'm certainly not arguing Italy can't offer plenty of cultural marvels. Roma, Naples, Venice, Firenze are amazing cities. Even Milan. Torino sucks though.
Been to St Petersburg and while it's an amazing city (which I said earlier), it's not Versailles.
British Museum is nice, but is not comparable to Orsay or Louvre (in terms of what's in there).
Basically, le Louvre is British Museum and the National Gallery into one.

I love Paris, and agree with your remarks about the Louvre.

Notre Dame I wasn't struck with the first time I visited as a teenager, but on returning in 2015 I gave it a second chance and loved it.

Versailles, however, I cannot love. Teenage me was bored there (school trip, but since I hadn't studied the days of Louis Quatorze at that juncture I might as well have been touring a village in Gabon for all I understood of the context), and when I gave it a second chance I found myself thinking, 'It's beautiful, but overdone. In places you could almost think it was designed by a footballer's wife. No wonder the peasants revolted.' Mind, I think it's a streak of County Durham puritanism inherited from my parents - much as I loved Krakow, in the cathedral I thought 'too much gold. Looks like a bunch of chavs ran amok in here'.

 

[Evilo]

Haha, I actually agree. Too much is too much.

 

[Evilo]

There are some castles in la Loire area who are much less "goldy", but so much more beautiful. Azay-le-Rideau, Chenonceau, etc...

 

[S E P H]

There are some castles in la Loire area who are much less "goldy", but so much more beautiful. Azay-le-Rideau, Chenonceau, etc...

Mont Saint-Michel.

Wanted to revitalize this thread.

 

[Evilo]

I actually like in the Mont St Michel and my daughter is a guide there in the summer.
Wonderful site obviously.

 

[Evilo]

live* not like.

 

[S E P H]

I actually like in the Mont St Michel and my daughter is a guide there in the summer.
Wonderful site obviously.

live* not like.

You're a 21st Century Monk then?

 

[Evilo]

Near*

FFS, I can't write.
I'm like 25 minutes away.

 

[S E P H]

Near*

FFS, I can't write.
I'm like 25 minutes away.

Oh, I thought you lot lived in Montpellier? How touristy does the region get, especially considering with all the Americans there for Normandy Beach and Solider Cemetery?

 

[Evilo]

A lot.
Landing beaches + Mont St Michel bring a lot of tourists.

 

[Duchene2MacKinnon]

Poor old Evilo doesn't know how to edit.

 

[Evilo]

Haha, phone posts are pain in the ass.

 

[Duchene2MacKinnon]

Haha, phone posts are pain in the ass.