| Planning your Trip to Europe | |
| What to look for and what's available here and elsewhere about Europe on the About Network | |
I like to be surprised when I travel. On the other hand, when I arrive in an unfamiliar city late at night I'd rather know that there was a hotel waiting closeby with a reservation in my name. Planning isn't my strong suit, but at least some of it has to be done before I go or I fret.
Below is a list of all the current resources you might use on this site and on the about Network and instructions on how to use them.
European Countries covered on this site
Austria, Belgium, Luxembourg, Denmark and Faroes, England, France and Monaco, Iceland, Ireland, Italy and San Marino, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Scotland, Spain, Sweden, and Switzerland. For a listing of the destination articles on this site see European Destinations. If you're looking for Eastern European destinations, check out Eastern Europe for Visitors.
Subject Pages
Right over there to the left of this article you'll see a list of what we call subject pages (the link goes to the Subject Library). These are categorized lists of links to things you might want to use to plan your route. You click on lodging, for example, and further categories of lodging will appear to you. Drill down to a topic that interests you and you'll find a list of your favorite lodging types right there.
New To Traveling Europe? Need advice on traveling for the first time?
Try 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 outta my train pass for sure.
Another way to plan is to pick one of Europe's great 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. Of course, we have a festivals link page to help you out.
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 photo 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.
Features
These are articles I (or a guest) write on some subject of interest to European travelers. The complete list of current-year articles is available in a link under the Subjects called All Articles on this Topic. Articles specific to travel planning are: How I travel in Europe, an article about what I pack. what I like to do in Europe, and what I get out of my travels, and Footloose Travel: Tips on Flexible Travel Planning in Europe which covers how much planning is enough, and how much is too much.
OK, I've read just about everything and I've still got a question
You can, of course, email me. But a better way to tap into the wealth of information that visitors to this site possess is to post your question to our forum. And if you've got an interesting travel story yourself, why not post it there as well?
There are other sites here on the About network that are focussed on a single European country. If you have questions that aren't answered here about one of them, you might try these other sites:
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Italy
for Visitors And the meta-site for Eastern Europe: Eastern Europe for Visitors |
 Sienna, Italy. Photo © 2001 by James Martin, licensed to About. |
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