The first few stops in Spain were a good introduction to hostel life, living out of a backpack, and being in a new city. It was especially helpful that I chose a place where I could at least manage to communicate when necessary to start out. I couldn’t imagine starting this trip in a place like Denmark or Prague.

Copenhagen and Palermo were tough for me. They were the first cities I did on my own and I didn’t particularly like them. At that point I was about a week into my trip and the combination of being on my own in strange places where I didn’t speak the language and being in two cities that I just really didn’t enjoy in hotels rather than hostels (they were the cheapest option) made me consider booking a flight home right then and there.

Thankfully I managed to convince myself that it would get better once I got back into the hostels and once I started on BusAbout. Definitely true. I’ve loved BusAbout so far and I’ve met so many great people along the way. Though we’re all traveling independently, it’s nice to have a group to go home to at the end of the day and to see some familiar faces.

On BusAbout, Venice and Rome were great. I absolutely loved Venice and Rome is a place I’d definitely visit again, not only because I didn’t get to see everything I wanted to (and really, how could you in just one trip?), but because it’s so rich in history and just plain interesting.

I’ve also really enjoyed staying in a campsite. I didn’t think I would, but they’re actually a lot of fun. The only downfall is that they’re often pretty far from the city. We generally had a 20-30 minute trip to get in. Not so bad, and considering the prices, I’m not complaining!

Now we’re in a proper hostel, so I’ll have to get used to being inside more. And, luckily, this place has free wi-fi. Yay!

The most important update, though, is about my trip as a whole. After my experiences in Palermo and Copenhagen and generally getting adjusted to life in Europe, I’ve realized 9 weeks is just way too long. At first I thought it would be great to just have 6 days between when I get home and when I move to San Francisco to pack up and move and such, but really, it’s kind of insane. Money also doesn’t go as far as I’d like it to here. I could skimp and eat once a week and not do things that I find cool in order to save a Euro here or there, but what kind of fun is that?

After looking at my itinerary and the BusAbout map, I’ve planned out a new itinerary that will take me a grand total of 6 weeks and only cuts out a few stops that I wasn’t too excited about anyway. I’ve also rearranged some of the stops. For example, I’m going from Nice to the Interlaken area of Switzerland, possibly to Zurich and then off to Munich and Berlin. I’ve cut out Amsterdam and Budapest and a few others.

Now the trip from here on out looks something more like:
Florence
Nice
Lauterbrunnen
Zurich
Munich
Berlin
Prague
Vienna
Salzburg (still have to go on the Sound of Music tour!)
Brussels
Bruges
London

or something to that effect. This way I get to be with BusAbout for some of the busier cities where I’d like to have company and I’ll be on my own for some of the other cities where I don’t mind just exploring or want to do super cheezy things like The Sound of Music tour or just hang out.

I’m thinking of changing my flight out to July 15th out of Heathrow instead of Edinburgh because I’ve also been putting together a quick trip (maybe a week or so) back here to do the UK area early next year.

I know photo uploading has been pretty much non-existent, but having very sporadic and slow internet combined with a teeny tiny screen and no photoshop or any real ability to properly handle RAW photos has made it really unpleasant to do anything but download and backup the photos onto my external HD. I promise to upload LOTS when I get back to the States and have my MacBook Pro back. Oh how I miss it.

So that’s the trip so far. I’m really enjoying Italy, but I’m ready to move on to a new country. I’m especially excited for Switzerland. Cooler weather and beautiful scenery? It’ll be like a taste of Ithaca without the school work. Win!

Like I’ve mentioned, I really enjoy getting long emails from you about what you’re up to and just general hi-there-and-hellos. I also promised to send post cards to those of you who’ve emailed me your address. I’ve written them but it’s strangely difficult to get stamps around here. I PROMISE to get this round mailed out before I leave Florence so if you want a post card now’s your chance.

Thanks for keeping up with my travels and here’s to another month of adventures!

Well that’s it – classes are over, finals are over, and all that’s left to do is graduate. These last few weeks have been absolutely crazy. but they’re over and now I have an entire week (a.k.a. Senior Week) to just hang out in Ithaca and do whatever my little heart desires. And then I realized: oh boy, I’m leaving in 16 days. I don’t even know where I’m going to stay or where I’m going to go! So much to do!

So my week of downtime has turned into a week of scouring the web for planes, trains, ferries and hostels to try to piece together at least the first few weeks of my trip. It’s been a very expensive past few days and I’ve only booked about two weeks worth of travel and lodging, but I think that’s more sticker shock than anything else.

Why the changes? Well, I’ve decided to put myself at the whim of cheap transportation and (hopefully) comfortable, but affordable hostels. Along the way I’ve found a few sites to be absolutely indispensable:

Skyscanner.net

Skyscanner.net is amazing. You must check it out. I’ve been using it something like this: 1) Enter current city (i.e. Barcelona) 2) Choose “Any Country” as destination and see what it spits out. I found a €20 trip to Copenhagen from Barcelona and it turned out to be the cheapest and most interesting next stop so I decided to ditch my original plan of flying to Rome or Naples and will get to see a place that I’ve had on my list for a while. Score! The trick is to be flexible with your dates, though. Always check +/- 1 day from your intended departure because the fares are extremely variable (€9.99 on one day and €32.59 the next!). Really, the site is fantastic.

Hostelworld.com

I mentioned Hostelworld.com when I was interviewed for a Wall Street Journal article on Deals on Travel Abroad. In addition to the cheap airfare, I’ve found that it’s also important to check the hostel listings before booking your ticket. What good is a €9.99 fare if you’re going to be stuck in some hole-in-the-wall at your destination? Or, maybe one plane ticket is slightly more expensive than the other, but perhaps at the more expensive destination you can stay in a posh B&B for the same price as the hole-in-the-wall in the cheaper one (Palermo won this battle. Private room in a B&B for cheaper than a mid-rate hostel anywhere else I could fly cheaply).
When checking reviews on HostelWorld, I always sort Lowest to Highest rated because people are generally very specific about what they don’t like and very vague about what they do. It lets you decide what you’re willing to put up with. If two hostels are rated equally and they’re around the same price, I’d take creaky floorboards over dirty showers.

The Others

Though I haven’t booked anything through these sites yet, they’ve been very valuable in helping me to decide what a better sequence of visits would be or whether I should fly vs. taking other modes of transportation.

Planes

I’ve found to avoid EasyJet as much as possible. That line nickels and dimes like you wouldn’t believe. TransAvia’s final price is quite close to the original quote on Skyscanner.

Trains

RailEurope.com is the best site I’ve found for searching all of the various rail lines at once. Though you don’t get to see the discounts that many of the rail sites would provide on their own sites (The same train from Madrid -> Barcelona was €56 on RailEurope and €33 with a Youth Card on Renfe) it does give you a general idea about prices and travel times.
Speaking of Renfe: Another little trick is to always use the national rail sites in their original language. You can sometimes save €20 by going through the Spanish or German version of the site instead of switching to the English translation. Trickier, but €20 can go a long way!

Ferries

Sorry, no automobiles. Not at the moment at least. The final site that’s been quite useful in gauging prices and opportunity costs (I know, nerdy, but I can’t help it) is aferry.to. It’s another multi-service aggregator that I’ve referenced mostly when I’m in or want to go to a coastal city (duh?). The site is pretty ugly and usability-wise it’s a pain, but it gets the job done. I’ll likely be using it to book a mini-excursion to Split, Croatia during my Italy tour on BusAbout.

But most importantly…

Give your credit card company a heads-up. Even though you’re still in the States (or in your respective home country), don’t forget that these places will likely be booking from an international location and if you’re using your credit card, the credit card company might get suspicious. I didn’t realize this until a hold was put on my card and I had to call up to tell them that I am, in fact, charging all sorts of random things to my account and I’ll be doing so for the next few months.

My itinerary has been through a few facelifts since I originally posted it here and it’s still changing with each stop, so there’s really no point in my posting a new one just yet, but as a brief glimpse: I’m no longer going to Greece, but I’ve added Copenhagen, and Sicily (Palermo) and will likely also add Budapest. For now the bookends of my trip are all sorted out. I have a place to stay in Madrid, Barcelona, Copenhagen, Palermo, and Edinburgh and transportation to/from almost all of them. Still a long way to go, but it’s a start!

Go on, leave a comment! If I end up going to that particular place, I’ll even take a photo in your honor (or send you a post card…snail mail is fun!)