Europe Travel: The Basics
Europe Travel is designed to help you plan an independent vacation in Europe. If you're not planning a coach tour, we've got lots of travel planning information for you.
Realize, of course, that different folks have different feelings about travel planning. There's no "best" way to plan your travels and no "best" destination. It all depends upon your needs and desires.
I have traveled to Europe at least once a year since 1976. I consider myself a footloose traveler; I only plan what is absolutely necessary. In my world, leaving things to chance is a way to get closer to a culture. Sure, you can get burned and have nothing to do for a while. But you can also have time to visit festivals you hadn't planned on, or time to sit at a cafe and meet the locals. If you'd like to see how I do it, see How I Travel.
You also might want to think about how long you might want to stay in a place. Might two weeks in Tuscany be better than 7 countries in the same two weeks? See: Deep Travel.
European Countries covered on Europe Travel
Europe Travel only covers western Europe, specifically: Austria, Belgium, Luxembourg, Denmark, England, France and Monaco, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Scotland, Spain, Sweden, and Switzerland. If you're looking for Eastern European destinations, check out Eastern Europe Travel.
New To Traveling Europe? Need advice on traveling for the first time?
If this is your first or second time planning a European vacation and you don't know exactly what you need and how far in advance of your trip you might need it, see our Europe 101 article - Europe Travel 101 - Before you take that first trip to Europe. You'll find a timeline for what you need to plan and when.
Four Suggestions for People unsure of a Destination
Starting your vacation planning with a clean sheet of paper can be fun, but if you've no idea where you'd like to go maybe it's best to try a whirlwind tour through as much of Europe as you can. Sure, people will laugh at you, "Geez, 12 countries in three weeks, you wanna kill yourself on vacation or something?" but you'll get an overview of your favorite areas. My first trip to Europe lasted almost seven weeks. I spent a week in London, a week in Paris, and then started to really travel (via Eurail pass), going to Tours, Nantes. Bordeaux, Barcelona, Madrid, Lisbon, Marseilles, Milan, Florence, Basel, Amsterdam and back to London. It gave me quite a few ideas for further travel and I got my money's worth out of my train pass for sure. You might want to plan a modern version of the European Grand Tour.
Another way to plan is to pick one of Europe's great Summer festivals and plan around it. If it's big and well known, like Sienna's palio, you'll have to make arrangements far in advance, but you'll be rewarded by being part of a fading tradition of life-affirming (and often quite spiritual) ritual with ancient roots.
Another way to see a part of Europe is to volunteer. You won't have to just stand there and look at an ancient cathedral, you can help rebuild it! And just about everyone I know wishes they could work on an archaeological dig. Well, why not do it in Europe? It's a great way to learn about local customs, ancient and modern. Yeah, we've got a volunteer page too.
And if you happen to be a visual learner like I am, perhaps you'll want to plan your vacation by looking at pictures in our Europe Pictures Gallery.
Off Season Europe
If you're unsure of the weather when you travel outside the summer tourist season, you might want to consult our Europe - Climate - When to Go links.
Articles on Europe Travel
Each week I write an article or two about different European destinations or things to do on your European vacation. You can check out our Europe Travel Blog frequently, or sign up for our free newsletter and/or rss feeds.
OK, I've read just about everything and I've still got a question on Europe Travel
You can, of course, email me: goeurope.guide@about.com. Make sure you make the subject specific so your email doesn't get caught in the spam filters. Here's some tips on asking a travel question.
A better way to tap into the wealth of information that visitors to this site possess is to post your question to our Europe Travel Forum (yes, it's true, I don't know everything about travel in Europe). If you've got an interesting travel story yourself, why not post it there as well?
There are other travel sites here on the About network that are focused on a single European country. If you have questions that aren't answered here about one of them, you might try these sites:
Italy TravelGermany Travel
Greece Travel
France Travel
Scandinavia Travel
Spain Travel
United Kingdom Travel
There are also sites that go into detail about popular Europe travel destinations:
AmsterdamLondon
Paris
And don't forget the meta-site for Eastern Europe: Eastern Europe Travel
Have fun planning your Europe Travel.
