Madrid, Gibraltar, & Tangier details

Here's the plan for my last week in Europe: three days in Madrid (one of which might be a side trip to Toledo), then 2 nights and 2-1/2 days at the tip of Spain (Gibraltar, Tarifa, Algeciras) and into Morocco, then back to Madrid for one final night before heading to the airport. Then home!

Barcelona details

I'm stuck on the train for 8 hours, from around 7am til 3pm, but unfortunately it's not the same train, I have three connections to make so I can't even sleep for very long. There seems to be enough to do that I can do and see most of what I want in the 2-1/2 days I have in Barcelona, assuming I don't stay out too late or sleep too late. Then I leave for Madrid on Friday.

South of France details

Here's what I had planned for the South of France. Originally I was going to spend one day each in Nice and Monte Carlo, but I took an extra day in Rome and ended up combining the two cities into one day. We get into Nice late on Friday night, then Saturday we start out in Nice and spend the afternoon and evening in Monte Carlo, coming back to Nice for the night. Then Sunday we get to Aix-en-Provence and rent a car to drive around the Provence area for 2 days, the first night in Avignon and the second in Aix. Because we have a car, we have the luxury of going wherever and whenever, not depending on the train or bus schedules for once, and so I've got a list of places that we'll pick and choose from over the two days.

Italy details

With the flooding in Cinque Terre, I had to switch up my itinerary. I was going to go from Milan to Venice to spend 5 days in Rome (with a day trip to Amalfi and Pompeii included), then a day in Florence, then a half day in Pisa followed by a day and a half in Cinque Terre before heading to 2 days in Nice/Monte Carlo.

The new plan had me going from Milan to Venice to Naples (via Rome) for 2 days, including a ride down the Amalfi Coast and a tour of Pompeii and a climb up Mt Vesuvius; then 5 days in Rome; then a day in Florence; then a half day in Pisa and a half day on the train going to Nice, followed by 1 day in Nice/Monte Carlo. Basically, I swapped Cinque Terre for Naples and took one day out of Nice to give to Rome.

Switzerland details

I've fallen behind in my daily writing - as I write this now, I'm going on day 3 in Switzerland, so I still have 1 day of Hallstatt, 4 days of Munich, 2 days of Bavaria, and 2 days in Switzerland to get caught up - but I still have to plan for where I'm going more than write about where I've been.  So here's the plan for Switzerland.

Munich & Bavaria details

Came up with this list of things to do in Munich and the two days in Bavaria a few days ago, but haven't had a chance to sit down and post it yet. I've got 4 days in Munich, one of which was originally supposed to be a day off but has of course morphed into a day with something to do. Then I'll go off to two towns in Bavaria: Garmisch, which is at the base of the Zugspitze, Germany's highest mountain, and has some pretty neat sounding ways to get up the mountain (all of which involve me not actually climbing much); and Schwangau, the home of King Ludwig's castles. The details in those areas are a little fuzzy right now.

Of note: Thursday is stocked with museums, but I can't see spending 8 hours in art museums. I'll probably just hit the highlights and then go have a beer or check out the English Garden or something.

Also of note: Friday is the halfway point in my journey.

Salzburg details

Two days seems to be enough to cover all that I want to see in Salzburg, though if I had a third day that would be ideal (same as Vienna). However, I still have Munich, Bavaria, and Switzerland to see before my hard deadline of Oct 30 in Zermatt, so I'll have to make do with two days. The two big tourist draws in Salzburg are the Sound of Music and Mozart, so I'll take whatever else I can get.

Wachau & Salzkammergut details

So apparently the Danube Valley is called the "Wachau" region. I discovered it while researching Austria, Rick Steves doesn't cover it but Frommer's does, as part of a driving tour that goes from Vienna to Salzburg to Innsbruck. I'm not going that far, but the book does mention some interesting-sounding things to see and do in the Austrian countryside. I decided to make it into three days, one day in the Wachau region of the Danube River not too far from Vienna, and two days further west towards Salzburg in the Lake District or Salzkammergut. Even though they're very different areas, I'm lumping them into one post here for convenience.

Vienna details

Now that I've rested and relaxed as much as I can for a couple days in Prague, I'm ready for another trip back on the road and rails. Next up: Vienna.

I've gone northeast-ish from London to Paris, Amsterdam, Cologne, and up to Copenhagen, then south to Berlin and Prague, and now I'm headed west for a while through Austria, Munich and Bavaria.

Budapest details

Before I left, I had figured out my daily plan up through Prague. Had I realized how little time I was going to have during my trip to figure out what to do after Prague, I would have started earlier and done more up-front work. So now while I'm in Prague, I'm fleshing out a plan for Budapest which is my next stop. This was much easier to do sitting at home at my kitchen table.

Update 10/9: After staying up til 4am putting this together, I decided that it was just too much and I needed some time off to relax (I haven't really had a day off since I left) and to plan ahead, plus get some writing done.  I didn't want to be figuring out what I'm doing in Vienna while on the train to Vienna. So regretfully, Budapest will have to wait for a future trip, but this is what I would have done.

Prague details

My initial plan was to spend 3 days touring Prague, and one of my weekly days off, making 4 days altogether. But both Frommer's and Rick Steves said I could to pretty much all I needed in just two days. I took a look at the guide books and split the difference - I'll do their 2-day trips in 3 days (really 2-1/2, since I get in early afternoon from Berlin on the first day), all of which include a lot of easy wandering and meandering, which I'm good at. And to me that's relaxing too, just checking things out without a tight schedule. So I'll leave a day earlier than planned, and use that in Budapest.

Berlin details

For some reason, the sights in Berlin seemed to me to not be as quantifiable in how long I should spend there, so I just grouped them in rough chronological order in geographic regions. First day after the bus tour is west to east along Unter den Linden, from the Reichstag to Alexanderplatz. Second day is the stuff south of Unter den Linden like Checkpoint Charlie and the Jewish Museum, then the Museum Island stuff north. Third day is the west and central stuff like the Ku'damm and Victory Column. I think I've arranged it so that I have good areas for lunch and dinner/evening.

Copenhagen details

At the moment, still working out when to go to Cologne (Koln) and whether I'll get to Copenhagen from there or from Amsterdam, but wherever I get here from, they both arrive right around 10:00am.

The other unplanned hitch is that I didn't read the rail guide carefully and I assumed that the overnight from Copenhagen/Malmo to Berlin runs every night. In fact, it only runs Wednesday, Friday, and Sunday night. So I had to choose between staying my 3 days in Copenhagen/Malmo (Saturday 10/1 thru Monday 10/3) and flying from Copenhagen to Berlin on the morning of Tuesday 10/4 (otherwise it's an all-day train ride, getting in mid-afternoon), or cutting a day out here and saving it for later. Right now I'll do the latter, and have a spare day in my itinerary.

Amsterdam details (plus a bonus day in Cologne)

So, originally I had 4 days planned for Amsterdam, 2-1/2 for sightseeing (I get in from Paris around noon) and one for a day off. I took one of those days and gave it to London. Now I have to take another day and plan for an unexpected side-trip to Cologne (Koln), Germany.

Paris details

Paris is the second stop on my trip. I was last there in 1988, and this is the last stop that I have already been to. Here's what I came up with back in March.

The first two full days in Paris are front-loaded with museums. I was pretty much forced into putting them on Saturday and Sunday since most are closed on Monday and/or Tuesday, and I arrive in Paris at lunchtime on Friday and leave Thursday morning. I'll get a Museum Pass, which is free admission to all the places on those two days with an asterisk in front of the name. I tried to lighten my days on Monday and Tuesday, since I will not have had a day off since I got to Europe - late starts, strolls, etc.

I've got a couple of cousins I've never met who live in Paris (our great-great-grandfathers were all brothers, making us 4th cousins), I'm hoping to be able to meet up with them at some point.

London details

Looking at my itinerary, I kept getting fooled that I had one extra day in London, but I was bookkeeping my first airplane travel day against London. So really I only had 4 days, not 5. And with one of them taken up by a full-day trip to Stonehenge, I needed another day. I was able to steal one from my time in Amsterdam; after reading the guidebook for that city, I found that I had given myself one too many days there. Overall, though, I did pretty well with my original rough cut back in March.

So, here's my detailed itinerary for London.