European vacation...daydream with me!

[Wabi Sabi]

Indulge me here, world travelers.

 

Let's say you were planning a 2-3 week trip to Europe for a family of four and are giving yourself two years to save up the money. How much money could you do it on if you were frugal but realistic? What time of year would you travel? Would you stay in one city/area the entire time? Stay within one country but visit several cities? Visit multiple countries? Daydream with me...

[TammyinTN]

I'm actually thinking of going back to Germany in a couple of years to travel again.   Gamisch will be our home base because it's so close to Italy and Austria.   We will also visit our favorite cities in Germany and stay in those places which is about 5 hours from Garmisch.    I would travel in the fall and we would save at least 10,000 for the trip.  We love to travel, eat out, explore and buy lots of cool loot to boot.  This will just be dh, ds and myself. 

 

[Laura Corin]

I can't help you on finance, but I'd travel in spring or autumn if it's southern Europe (less touristy and hot) or summer if it's UK/Ireland/Scandinavia.  Check the school holidays for the country you are planning on visiting and avoid those times - it will be cheaper (flights and accommodation) and less crowded.  For example, school in the UK doesn't get out until some time in July, so June is a good time to come.

 

Personally, I prefer choosing a base and making day trips/weekend trips from there.  I have twice done weeks in Rome with side trips to Pompeii - very successful and much less stressful than too much travel.

 

L

[PrincessMommy]

Visiting several countries in 2-3weeks with kids would be hard.  Perhaps 1 or  2 countries - depending on how large/small they were would be doable, but otherwise I would stay fairly geographically located.  You can do Europe on a budget.  We took 6 kids to Italy and it was quite an adventure.   We only did Northern Italy down to Rome (Lake district, Venice, Cinque Terre, Vinci, Florence, Rome).  We were there for 2 weeks and that was enough.  After about 10-12 days we loved it but were ready to be back home.

 

One big saver is to stay in Hostels rather than hotels.  Some of them will break you up by sex (men's rooms and women's rooms) but many now have family rooms.  Since we were such a large group we often took a whole dorm room to ourselves anyway.  The sleeping won't be plush (bunk beds, twin beds) and you may have to use a common bathroom (we never did because we went during off-season).  But who cares, if you are in Rome or Prague or wherever!!

 

The other thing is attitude - you have to look at it not as a relaxing vacation but an adventure.  Traveling with kids (mine were 3-17) can be a challenge but it's worth it.   After that trip our kids wanted us to take them to Greece.  Alas, college, marriage, grandkid, and expense have gotten in the way of that.

 

 

[Mrs Mungo]

I think you could do a decent (if not exhaustive) trip of London/France/S Germany/Italy in 3 weeks. I would agree that you would probably need around 10k to do it comfortably and leave room for snags. I agree with Laura that I would do spring or fall. Do NOT go to Germany in August, that is when Germans go on vacation and a lot of stuff is closed.

 

You could do 4 days in London (take the train to Paris), 4 days in Paris (rent a car upon leaving Paris for the rest), 2 days outside of Paris in southern France, 4 days to do the Romantic Road in Germany and the remaining week driving down through Italy. You could do 3 days each in Florence and Rome or Venice and Rome.

[Swimtaxi234]

Unless you hit a deal, you will probably spend $1,500+ a person on round trip plane tickets.  Once you have that, I would look at a minimum of $300-$500 a day for hotel and food.  If you travel from location to location, you need to budget for that (trains/flights/rental car/taxi/bus).  

 

Fees for attractions can be $100 for a family of 4 - if not more (look for discount tickets like a English Heritage Pass or Paris Pass - multiple venues for one price).  We more than got our money's worth because of pre-planning our routes/transporation.

 

[regentrude]

The big expense is the airfare; you can get around Europe rather inexpensively.

Travel in off season, not summer and not Christmas. If you can travel from major hub to major hub, you can plan for $1,000 per person.

be flexible with travel dates, sometimes changing by one day saves hundreds of $ in air fare

But in more expensive season, or if you need multiple legs, $1,500 is more realistic.

 

To make it cheaper there:

stay in youth hostels. They are now often catering to families and are nice and inexpensive; I can not imagine paying for 3 weeks of hotels  for a family, especially since there are no big rooms that sleep 4 and you will always have to book two rooms.

eat at a restaurant once a day max and have breakfast and other meal through bakery/supermarket. Restaurants are more expensive than in the US.

[Um_2_4]

Check the national airlines of where you are headed. We found some great rates for next spring. Helps if you live near a airline hub.

Also check into local transport options. I found cheap airfare between some major cities. And train passes might be another option.

[Annie G]

Seekinghim45, do you recall what food cost you for the trip? We spent a week in Rome in June and food costs ranged from cheap to what I considered really expensive- and I really preferred the more inexpensive food.  I'd like to know whether food costs in other parts of Europe are comparable to Rome- in other words, you can find a wide range of options. 

[Laura Corin]

Seekinghim45, do you recall what food cost you for the trip? We spent a week in Rome in June and food costs ranged from cheap to what I considered really expensive- and I really preferred the more inexpensive food.  I'd like to know whether food costs in other parts of Europe are comparable to Rome- in other words, you can find a wide range of options. 

 

Here's one cafe chain menu in London.  And here's a chain Italian restaurant.  Most supermarkets have a meal deal for lunch where you can buy a sandwich, a drink and fruit/crisps for £3.

 

L

[Um_2_4]

I forgot to add, with kids, I would definitely limit how many countries you stopped in. Maybe rome/florence/venice. I did that once via trains in 1 week (with only a day stop in florence). Or you could go south to capri/pompeii.

Or Paris and day trips from there. (carcassone is maybe more than a day trip, but worth it http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carcassonne)

Or London and day trips to bath/Stonehenge, etc.

I would go early spring to Italy or Paris (like April/May) and June to England. Or go in the fall (sept/oct).

[FaithManor]

We just booked a trip to Iceland with middle D's for the first week of July 2014. Around trip from JFK

plus six nights in a studio apartment with a fully furnished kitchen was $3500.00 and change. We will be

right around the corner from a very nice grocery store so we can cook dinners in the apartment and

have scoped out inexpensive restaurants in Reykjavik where we can eat and I will not have trouble finding

food I can eat. An indian restaurant near the apartment will be a good choice-rice and veggies. When

we hike in the national park and go whale watching on Videy Island, we'll pack snacks and water.

 

Our budget is about $125.00 a day in country for food and public transportation though walking will be

a major component. I want to bring back some Icelandic wool, a ski sweater each, some quilt fabric, and

the menfolk want some things as well along with children's books and literature in Icelandic since ds is

studying the language. So my guess is another $500-600 barring difficulties. We'll have two different

credit cards with us with decent size credit lines and dh's company allows us to buy medical insurance

coverage for foreign travel for $150.00 total for the three of us for the week We also purchased

trip insurance in case something happens and we need to cancel. That was another $200-300. However,

given my parents health, we felt that was prudent.

 

Total - so just over $5000.00 depending on how well we do on souvenir shopping and food. One country,

six nights, seven days.

[mumto2]

The B&B hotel chain is great value. We have recently found it. A pp mentioned it. The ones we have stayed at in France have been near a Auchean Hypermarket which has saved us alot of money on food. This chain is in several countries and has non smoking rooms €55 a night pre booked for 4!

 

In the UK we do well at Premier Inn. Sleeps 4 with separate beds for dc's our main requirment. Between £39 and £99 prebooked normally. A great breakfast for all at about £16 (2 children who eat free). No need for lunch when we stay there because all you want. Afternoon snack is plenty.

 

Passes are great. If doing London the Royal Palace annual Pass will get you into some of the must sees on our list. Great £80 for 4. Kensington, Hampton, War Rooms, Tower, Kew Palace(not gardens which have to be paid for to use).

 

I have a suspicion the pp that said Paris was not a favorite was right, at least for our family. We just returned from a rather imperfect(to be polite) trip to Versailles. We have a much much better time away from Paris to be honest. Long lines, huge crowds. Really not fun. The staff was nice just not worth the time. We have a great time in smaller towns.

[Bootsie]

We have spent a month in Austria several times with our kids, staying in small villages right out of Innsbruck.  We have been able to rent a two-bedroom apartment for about $1000 for a month (has varied depending on the exchange rate).  The area is full of family-friendly activities--hiking trails, lakes, swimming pools, castles, etc., and Innsbruck has museums and other cultural activities.  Salzburg is two hours away; Munich is two hours a way, Zurich is about three hours away.  Bolzano, Italy is only an hour and half away.  It is easy to take the public transportation locally and the train for longer trips.  Once we spent a month, never went more than 1 1/2 hours away from our home base and still did not have time to do everything we wanted to do in the area.

 

 "Holiday apartments" throughout Austria provide nice alternatives to hotels for families, and we haven't found a part of Austria we don't like.  The biggest cost is airfare--we went this past December and paid about $825 a ticket (flying in and out of Zurich); this July tickets ran closer to $1600.  

[lmrich]

Look at rental homes or apartments. It saves money because you can cook. We also looked into staying in a convent in Rome. It was very reasonable and in an excellent location. Save at least $1000 more than you think you need.

[Mrs Mungo]

I agree that airline tickets would be the biggest expense. That why my figure was so high. If you were using miles, then of course you could do the trip for much less.

 

Personally, we never had trouble finding hotels in Europe that had a private bath and held 4 people. You only get in trouble when you have more than 4 people in my experience.

 

Anyone with a military affiliation should check on the guest houses. For example, we stayed at the military campground in Livorno, scored a deal on a local hotel in Vicenza when the guest house there was full (and took the train into Venice), stayed at the Navy lodge in Naples, stayed at the military hotel in Garmisch, etc.

[lailasmum]

Try airbnb for accommodation. There are some really nice, very central flats in London which cost around the same as a lot of family hotel rooms we've stayed in but you obviously get a lot more space and better location. I assume this is probably true for other cities. Also a lot of the youth hostels do nice family rooms now, they're not as super cheap as being a single backpacker but still good value.

 

Also for food in the UK try pubs like Wetherspoons that offer 2 meals for a around £7 usually including a drink.

[Laura Corin]

In the UK we do well at Premier Inn. Sleeps 4 with separate beds for dc's our main requirment. Between £39 and £99 prebooked normally. A great breakfast for all at about £16 (2 children who eat free). No need for lunch when we stay there because all you want. Afternoon snack is plenty.

 

 

We've used Premier Inn too and it's been good - the rooms aren't enormous but they are well kept.  There's often more than one Premier Inn in a city, so make sure you get the one that is most convenient for you.

 

L