My recent 6-week road trip through Europe.

[redduck]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Moemg Real men don't use hairdryers

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nemo2 But, but....I hate having wet underwear.

Real men don't hate having wet underwear.

[explanade]

They also might be called Despar or Euro Spar. Definitely see it in Northern Italian cities like Verona and Venice. Also Down to Rome.

[Bamaman]

To those interested in AirBnB:
As soon as you check out of a property, AirBnB is online asking your ratings on the property.
At the same time, AirBnB is asking your property owner to rate you as a renter. This follows you when you rent in the future.
When we last used AirBnB, it was in Halifax,and the owners said they couldn't even tell we were ever there.

[FUEGO]

Quote:

Originally Posted by NW-Bound Most of these are investment properties, and the owners just want to put low-cost functional furnitures in there. Perhaps Ikea had a sale on these tables. I could identify Ikea-branded stuff in a few apartments that I rented, but many also had odd or some other old or antique furniture.

Now that I think about it, we probably tended to book the more modern, clean looking apartments that had the Ikea aesthetic. Which explains why we're seeing Ikea in all the apartments. Duh.

I think all of your apartments are pure rentals. One might be a very part time home for the owners who live in S. America but they own five different properties in Portugal and Brazil, so who knows. Our current apartment in Milan looks like it might be the hosts' former home (they have 4 kids and it's a 2 BR, so it might have been 5-6 years ago before the youngest couple of kids were born). They have toys in the apartment and some more personal effects compared to the typical Airbnb.

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I never ran across a Spar, but shopped at many Carrefour, Lidl, Coop, and an Aldi or two.

I searched here in Milan and the nearest one came up in Switzerland (which is 22 miles from here). I shopped at a discount grocer here in Milan yesterday. They had a lot of the same products as the fancy grocery store around the corner, just a lot cheaper. I got some certified Asiago cheese for $3/lb and I didn't pay attention to the certification of the other stuff. The discount grocer didn't have the fresh meat, cheese, and olive counter, so I may go back to visit the fancy store later (if we're not out eating pizza or tracking down a trattoria ).

[NW-Bound]

We finally sat down and did an accounting of the trip. The cost came out to be around $300/day for 2 couples, everything inclusive except for airfare.

When divided by 2, it became very cheap as I expected. Sharing a larger Airbnb with 2 bedrooms and a larger car does not double up the cost compared to smaller lodgings and a smaller rental car, so a lot of savings was realized that way.

The above said, we will not be traveling with other people again, even with relatives. People's tastes and preferences differ, and when they are stuck together because of the common transportation it will cause some conflicts.

Some more details on the cost will follow.

[Bamaman]

I often read online about families of 5 or 7 people traveling together. I cannot imagine the pressure one of them will have herding them together to get to the next destination.

I would like to travel with friends. But it'd be nice to meet them in another city at a specific place a day or two later. Too much togetherness is not always best as so many of us oldsters are a little set in our ways.

[Sunset]

Quote:

Originally Posted by NW-Bound We finally sat down and did an accounting of the trip. The cost came out to be around $300/day for 2 couples, everything inclusive except for airfare. When divided by 2, it became very cheap as I expected. Sharing a larger Airbnb with 2 bedrooms and a larger car does not double up the cost compared to smaller lodgings and a smaller rental car, so a lot of savings was realized that way. The above said, we will not be traveling with other people again, even with relatives. People's tastes and preferences differ, and when they are stuck together because of the common transportation it will cause some conflicts. Some more details on the cost will follow.

Great, but it's not a Juicy as the details on the conflicts....

[NW-Bound]

No, it was not that big a deal. Basically, we did not always agree on how, when, and where to eat out. I liked to spend more money but they did not, being more frugal. Every morning, we were set to go and they were still dragging their feet, being very slow in the preparation. We simply did not know how they could cope with the guided tours that required them to be prompt and to keep up with the group.

Other than the above, it went OK. They did not know about places to go, so let me set the itinerary and do all the planning. So, I acted like a tour guide, and they were used to that, having taken so many guided tours before.

[NW-Bound]

People may be most curious about the cost of driving a rental car. We had 41 days of lodging on this trip, but kept the car for 36 days. At the end of the trip, we had 5 nights in Paris, and returned the car before that. I drove in Europe before, but never for an entire trip this long.

The costs associated with driving were: $1600 for the lease, $623 for gas, $400 for toll, and $140 for parking. The total of $2763 works out to be $77/day.

I think the above is fairly cheap for 4 persons. If we were by ourselves, we would save a bit on the lease, just a little bit on the gas, and nothing on the toll and parking fees. Depending on what one wants to go and see, it may be less expensive to travel by train. Again, we had traveled by train before, and a car allowed us to change the modus operandi significantly.

For example, if you want to visit Civita (described in earlier posts) from Rome, there is a company that will take 8 people on a van for $1000 ($125/pp). They will also take you to see nearby Orvieto, and a vineyard. In this trip, we spent 2 nights near Civita, and had more time to linger and got to spend more time at each hill town. And then, on the way to Siena, we got another entire day to visit Montepulciano and Pienza as these towns were on the way. These were almost freebies.

[NW-Bound]

I drove nearly 5,800 km in this trip, which was a lot compared to other drivers when I asked the guy at the agency when I returned the car. Divided by 36 days, that works out to 160 km/day, or 100 mi/day.

Actually, the driving was bundled in a few transit days when I drove 300-400 km or more. Then, there were many days when I parked the car and we took the tram. There were also many days when the Airbnb was right inside town, and all we had to do was walking down to the street to see all the activity. Of course in the countryside, I had to drive from town to town for sightseeing.

While it is no big deal to drive more than 400 mi/day (640 km) in the US, it would be too tough for me to drive this much in Europe. At least in the parts I traveled through, the highways often led into towns, and going through town slowed me down significantly, and I often got lost even with GPS and digital map software. I don't think I ever drove more than 400 km (250 mi) in a day, and man that was tiring.

[NW-Bound]

My wife did not keep records of the liters of gas that we burned, but using an average price of 1.5 euro/liter, I computed an mpg of 35 over the entire trip. That is quite reasonable, considering that when on the highways, I had to maintain speed above 80 mph to keep up with traffic, and the car was a decent-sized one to haul 4 people with luggage.

One thing I have to say about European highways, toll and public, is that they are good and mostly smooth as silk. The best freeways in the US will match that, but many quite often fall short. I remember once a European poster complained about the roads here in the US, and I now understand.

[Nemo2]

Quote:

Originally Posted by NW-Bound We finally sat down and did an accounting of the trip. The cost came out to be around $300/day for 2 couples, everything inclusive except for airfare.

Apples & Avocados I know, but we ran up the costs for our just completed 47 day trip, (Stupefyingly boring travel slideshow(s) Part II), which includes all air fares, medical insurance, and transportation to Toronto Airport and back from our town.

Rounds out to $10,200 Canadian total for two, approx $7,890 US...(no cars, no restaurant meals.

[Fedup]

Good thing I don't keep track of any of my trip expense or I might not go again. Ignorance is bliss in my case.

[Lsbcal]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nemo2 Apples & Avocados I know, but we ran up the costs for our just completed 47 day trip, (Stupefyingly boring travel slideshow(s) Part II), which includes all air fares, medical insurance, and transportation to Toronto Airport and back from our town. Rounds out to $10,200 Canadian total for two, approx $7,890 US...(no cars, no restaurant meals.

That is very low, $170 US per day. The secret? I would be happy at 2x that amount (with restaurant meals, flight from SFO).

[NW-Bound]

Restaurant meals and hotel rates will drive up the cost, for sure. Just do Airbnb, buy some provisions to make egg/ham breakfasts before you head out each day, and your trip cost will go down. I like it because it's more convenient too.

I never have a budget for any trip, although in my mind I certainly have an expected value that I do not think I will exceed. In this case, I did not have a good handle on what the trip might cost, and was thinking perhaps it might be $250/day. It turned out to be much lower than that, due to the cost sharing of the Airbnb and the car. I was ready to go even if the other couple did not join us. I chose the 6-week duration mainly because I thought that was about the limit of a trip before we would miss home, and it turned out to be about right.

Planning for the trip was fun. I had 6 months from the time I bought the air tickets late last year when I happened to see an airfare sale. I had a lot of time to plan the itinerary, to research where to stay and what towns to which I could drive for day trips.

It was not that I had a rigid plan. Other than where to stay, and all those Airbnb's and hotel rooms were pre-booked, there was a lot that was left to decisions made on the field. For example, I did not know about Pienza until someone mentioned it on this forum and Pienza was more convenient on the way. I initially wanted to go to Assissi which is a better known hill town, but was tired of driving. I had planned to go to Dusseldorf for a day trip while in Cologne, but abandoned that for the same reason.

On the other hand, while in front of Cologne Cathedral we talked with a very nice and friendly German who drove from Aachen to shop. Hearing that we were headed to Brussels, he told us we had to stop by Aachen to see the beautiful church there. We looked that up on the Web, and the church in Aachen has quite a history, being built by Charlemagne in the 800's, and the coronation site of many German kings and queens. It was a worthwhile stop on our drive the next day, and indeed the church interior was beautiful for something that was built in the Dark Ages. Perhaps it was not originally like that.





And continuing west to Brussels, we crossed the southern tip of the Netherlands, and looking at the map my travel companion said that Maastricht rang a bell. Surely, Wikipedia said that

Maastricht has 1677 national heritage sites (Rijksmonumenten), which is the second highest number in a Dutch town, after Amsterdam. It has become known, by way of the Maastricht Treaty, as the birthplace of the European Union, European citizenship, and the single European currency, the euro.

So, we had to make a stop. See photo of the town center. We did not have a whole lot of time, but spending a few hours in this town was a freebie anyway.

[NW-Bound]

I forgot an obvious thing when one calculates the travel cost per day. Airfare amortized over a long stay like Nemo did (47 days) would be much less than it would be for someone who does the usual 2-week trip.

A cheap airfare of $1000 for 2 persons adds $77/day to a 13-night stay, while it is only $22 for a 46-night stay. Hence, I excluded airfare in order to see the difference between driving and taking trains, and Airbnb (and eating out less) vs. hotel rooms.

[Moemg]

I am really enjoying your posts on this trip .Great Pictures !

[Nemo2]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Moemg I am really enjoying your posts on this trip .Great Pictures !

+1 I enjoy the insights too.

[NW-Bound]

I am glad that at least 2 readers liked the photos.

However, be careful as I just counted the number of photos taken on this trip. We had 3 cameras among us (the female traveler other than my wife used her iPhone, and I have not seen any photo taken by her), and together we took 11,000 photos.

That works out to 11,000 / 3 persons / 41 days = 89 photos per person per day. We were out and about 10 hours /day, so that's roughly 1 photo every 7 minutes. Of course the average number is misleading, because when we saw something that we liked, we took several shots in a quick succession, and there were a lot of duplicates.

Before posting more, I need to look through them to find good ones to go with tall-tale stories I am going to tell.

[explanade]

Well if you have a full-frame DSLR and take RAW files, each RAW file is about 25 MB.

I have a lot of drives ...