Please do the environment a favour and fly as little as possible. travelling through Europe by train is infinitely preferable and more enjoyable, in any case.
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Not in the case of Germany and Belgium, too unreliable. For Finland and France I can confirm that the train provides a good experience.
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I would suggest to move your travel to May 2024… come on…
SUPERBOOTH24
SuperBooth24 will happen in Mai 16th til 18th 2024 again, we’re very much looking forward!
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Just got off the phone with my buddy in Vilnius and funny enough was just saying the same thing. So I appreciate it. Excited to see Lituania. I hear nothing but good things about the people and geography, so looking forward to exploring that nations beauty.
Just waking up, so haven’t read the rest of the comments but thank you to everyone for the information. I do appreciate it immensely.
Holy shit! The plot has just thickened, and now I need to figure out how to get my wife to add it to her bucket list.
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What can you recommend in the US?
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What would you like to see, and what’s your usual enjoyment? How long you got and when?
You can PM me all that if you’d like.
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…paris…hmmmmm…not really that much the postcard romantic dream destination anymore…
at least not what it used to be…super expensive, super crowded, a bit smelly and heaps of tourist ripp offs at every second corner…and don’t dare to come across too american stereotypish…
if ur not fluent in french language, don’t even bother…local snobbery won’t even talk to u in many cases…
and if ur wife insists, than make it a tit for tat deal…she get’s the eiffel tower if u get the superbooth… 
no matter what…spring is best timing, no matter where u go…
do some decent travel planning early upfront …nice daydreaming mission for this winter…
AAAAAND overnight trains are ur best friend and can get u anywhere in europe…especially if u travel with kids/teenagers…
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Fall is also a nice time to travel. Harvest season.
I felt on the blunt end of some snobbery about French proficiency the first time I visited Paris, more than forty years ago (and I had many years of study in elementary and secondary school, being Canadian). It’s much better now. Retail staff switch into English without blinking, especially young people.
Ironically, I find myself speaking French from time to time here in Lisbon, because (1) the neighbourhood in which I live has a lot of French expats, so the businesses cater to that, and some of the food shops I visit are run by French people, and (2) older people often studied French as their second language, whereas younger people studied English. (I am working on my European Portuguese, but listening comprehension is difficult – my immigration lawyer is from São Paolo, speaking Brazilian Portuguese from birth, and even she had difficulty during her first year in Portugal!)
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The Lamped shooting from the hip tourism reviews scores are in from all the places I’ve been:
Paris: 6.5 (food: yes. Walking about and chilling in cafes n boozers: happily do it all day long. Went to cool game boy music museum thing once. Still no match for the other main euro cities I’ve been too)
South coast of France: 8.5 (beautiful but let’s be honest…a poor man’s Italy…)
Belgium: 4 (the Stella factory was good…goes up to 8 for the punk music festivals, they are the kings…I went Groezrock 4years in a row, coolest, all the bands, best organised thing ever)
Brussels: 3 (shit hole… thank god for its beer festival…)
Amsterdam: 8 (get up, walk around, eat, drink, cool streets, decent)
Luxembourg: 5 (cool to look at but once all the workers leave the place is empty and abit soulless)
Frankfurt: 8 (got cool different areas and easy to walk round them all - had some great nights out)
Berlin: 8 (a cool place for sure)
All of Spain: 9 (you can’t go wrong, just point at the map and go - Madrid over barca for me tho… although that particular trip to Madrid influencing it for other reasons….)
Lisbon: 9.5 (literally had one of the best weeks of my life there, if you are in to lots of random shit happening, this is the place, I don’t think I’d ever get bored of drinking in the streets and heading to the food hall…also the place is very rough around the edges, I kinda liked that about it)
Italy: 10 (the north: 10, west coast:10, Rome: 8.5, Milan: 8, Venice: 8.5, Bologna: 8.5, Siena: 9, Florence: 10 - basically just go to italy…)
Oslo: 7 (but only been for work so not done too much)
Athens: first time I went just after olympics and the place was buzzing (8), I then visited again after all the financial crisis stuff and was shocked to see how the place had gone, one of my best friends lives there so always a great time for me
Greece: south and went round 4/5 of the islands - like Spain, can’t go wrong 8
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Let’s say 2-3 weeks. Some pleasant cities or regions. That is beyond the must-see big huge ones that we Europeans hear from every day (NY, SF, LV, LA, Chicago, DC) 
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What you mean with “west coast?”, the italian tyrrhenian coast goes from Liguria to Sicily and it’s like 10 different countries between them. Also “North” is pretty generic, I would’t give a 10 to Bergamo or Udine.
As much as I love Firenze, Bologna, Milano… I don’t get the 8.5 to Rome… You need four lives to visit, discover and understand Rome… but I guess that given these are much more smaller cities it’s easier for a tourist to have genuine and memorables moments there, while in Rome there are a lot of tourist traps.
By the way, you can’t go wrong almost anywhere in Italy; even the smallest ‘borgo’ has something unique to offer from a cultural or naturalistic point of view… but if you wanna have some serious fun I’d always recommend Spain over Italy.
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well, I’m from Rome and I love Paris. Been there like 5 times, probably i’m biased because I grew up reading Baudelaire and Verlaine.
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Even if you aren’t very interested in the big famous stuff, it’s worth spending some time in Paris because it looms so large in European history and culture. I think I visited Washington DC with my grandparents when I was around 12, and am glad I did.
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How are you with roadtrips?
Rent an RV, hit up North AZ, fly through Utah (the border of Utah and Wyoming has some of the most beautiful landscapes ive ever seen), up to Wyoming (Yellowstone). Cut over across Idaho to Portland and the Pacific. Take the 101 down to the Redwoods National Forest. Get your Return of the Jedi vibes on. From there continue down the 101 head down to the 1 and ride along the Pacific. Take a stop in the bay area (Santa Rosa/Napa Valley/San Fran for a night if you want but its hit or miss). You can either cut in to Yosemite, which is absolutely beautiful, or continue a leisurely drive down the 1 staying at state camping sites along the coast and stopping off at those little coastal Beach towns to get a milkshake and bite to eat. This will eventually bring you to LA which is a whole other list. From LA to a little north of San Diego there is another state beach side camp spot (think it’s Carlsbad area) you can also stop off at one of my favorite spots in that area Solana Beach (Fletcher Cove Beach Park). It’s just North of San Diego and for the past dozen times I’ve been there it’s relatively empty. It’s crazy. Nice sandy Beach, with cliffs behind you, and it’s more or less wide open. Lovely spot to get some beach chairs out a good buck, and just soak in the warm breeze and majestic sound of the never ending Pacific oceans waves. From their down to San Diego, which again would take a whole new post as there is a lot to do there, most of it free or cheap. From San Diego, dig in for a 6-7 hour drive through a ever more desolate terrain (you also get to travel through the farm fields that produce a large percentage of this nation’s leafy greens). Once you leave San Diego County (it’s huge) you end up in a rocky series of mountain/hills and come down into a desert with farms scattered, a massive series of sand dunes that have been used to film Middle Eastern sand Dune scenes in several movies, Yuma (where you can fill up) and then onwards until the I-8 and I-10 merge. From there take the 10 to Tucson, say what’s up to your boy, and peace out.
That’s just off the top of my head. Midwest America is pretty boring, but Colorado is another amazing spot for views, and Denver is a fun town. Grab chili peppers and enjoy the natural beauty of the vast desert that New Mexico has. But really, I think if you get yourself a “National Forest Admission” card and hit up this nation’s natural splendors while rolling along the coast and hitting up all those quaint little towns along the way, would be a great little trip. East Coast has a lot of options as well, but that’s another post.
And when I say fly through Utah, I mean to blow through it. It does have some amazing National Parks, but the cities and their laws are really weird and…well weird. Like I said, North Utah where it borders Wyoming has some of the most picturesque scenes I’ve ever seen. Camping out in the middle of nowhere and starring up at the nights sky will simply take your breath away.
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It’s a “shooting from the hip” review , not in-depth!- In general I’ll always prefer places you can do long walks round the whole place, without having to use transport, eg the likes of Edinburgh trump London, same here.
By north I meant the lakes, I’ve twice hired a car and spent 3weeks going across them all then chilling in Ravenna before heading home, I would easily go do it again, best holidays I’ve ever had.
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Italy 10:10?
That place is the very definition of overtourism. Venice is pretty much destroyed, everywhere else that isn’t just concrete isn’t far behind.
For crying out loud, they even charge entry to each and every beach they have - and they have a lot!
Food is terrible - unless you want to eat pasta every day.
That said, I like the fact that you can have acceptable coffee at every street corner. Also, Rome has been doing mass tourism for more than 2000 years so in a way getting ripped off in a tourist trap is an authentic experience.
Not Trastevere, though. That is horrible.
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If this is a serious experience, you have missed many good places in Italy to get food. Italy is anything but pizza and pasta
- mediterran starters (anti-pasti)
- a variety of beef/pork/poultry dishes as main course
- great see-food near the coast lines, and Italy has a long coast line
- delicious deserts - not only Italien ice cream, which is superb
- great wines
Try an Italian Ristaurante and on the menu you will find pasta as first course only and many others to follow
If you find pizza on the menu, you are not in a good Trattoria or Ristaurante - you will be inside something, which is specialized to feed tourists
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Lol. It’s like saying food in Japan Is terribile unless you wanna eat sushi everyday. Every city has it’s own traditional kitchen.
Sad to see tourists in restaurants eating Frozen pizza and Fettuccine Alfredo, that is not even an italian recipe.
I live by the sea, Anzio and nobody charges you to go to the beach. It’s illegal and you should have called the Police. Oh and I eat pasta once a month.
What’s horrible in Trastevere… the Pantheon? 
Wine and cheese. And every city has its own type which is different even in the same region.
and this is only a charcuterie.
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Different countries, different traditions. I think wherever you are in the world you can find your way, food, etc. if you’re not too picky.
I just think it takes time and that is where the scams happen: you take a plane to spend 4 days on the other side of the ocean, of course it us way too fast to find the good spits to eat, etc, especially if you do researxh before on internet.
Thanks God, life is still more enjoyable when you get tips from real humans 
Even here, i would not advise you a good adress cause then you know it would not be a good adress anymore …
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Yes … I forgot this! And there is much more …
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