#HurnEuroVacay -- Day 6 - London to Rome

We woke up early to check-out of our hotel on time, and decided to check our bags at the hotel this time instead of the super expensive train station bag check. I had read about the Camden Market on another travel blog that I read, and we decided to check it out on our last morning in London. We took the underground over to Camden and wandered around until we found the market. Camden is a cool, eclectic part of London, and the market was full of weird shops all selling the same t-shirts and souvenirs. After walking through the market for a little while, we found a huge area full of food booths – Peruvian food, Middle Eastern food, mac & cheese, BBQ booths, Mexican food – everything you could think of. Jeff bought a polish dog and pierogi plate, while I opted for a chicken marsala wrap. Everything was delicious, and it was most definitely the best food that we had in London.

After lunch, we took the underground back over to our hotel to get our bags. Then, we hopped back on the underground to Liverpool Street in order to get on the Stansted Express out to our airport. Let me tell you a little something about European airports (or at least the ones that we used) – they work a little differently from American airports. Let’s say you are checking in for a flight in the Atlanta airport; you might be able to find out your gate information hours or even days ahead of time. Not in Europe. They wait until 45 minutes to an hour before your flight to announce gate information. So everyone ends up waiting in a general holding area around all of the shops and restaurants until your gate is announce right before your plane starts boarding. Also, some airports and airlines do not use boarding zones. So when the plane starts boarding, all 200 people on the plane get in one huge giant line waiting to board the plane. Not sure why…

Also in the London airport, I took my Apple Watch off to go through the security metal detector. I was in a hurry to grab all of my stuff out of the bins and get out of everyone’s way. [No one wants to be that person taking their sweet time in the security line holding everybody else up.] Well, in my hurry, I left my Apple Watch in the bin. This nice little security lady was holding my watch in the air yelling, “Whose Apple Watch is this, please?! Whose Apple Watch is this, please!?” I ran back over to her, grabbed my watch, and thanked her about a million times. I would have been so upset if I would have left my watch in London.

After the longest security check every, we finally got on our flight to Rome – along with three or four crying toddlers. There was a really funny, animated flight attendant on the flight who apologized on behalf of the child saying, “Sorry, We are auditioning a new baby for Game of Thrones. You know, one that needs to cry all the time.” Glad he had a sense of humor about the situation.

We landed and took a taxi into Rome to our VRBO apartment. Livio met us there and was so nice. He showed us around the flat and the neighborhood. He gave us a map and suggestions on lesser known attractions to visit. We ate a late dinner at the pizza place at the end of our street. My pizza had nasty mushrooms on it that made the whole pizza soggy. Gross. Of course, Jeff ordered pasta with mussels and clams – this will become the theme of all food Jeff orders for the rest of our time in Italy. We found some gelato, headed back to the apartment, did some much needed laundry, and went to bed.

This is me in the piazza at the end of our street with some gelato. Also, my husband is a terrible photographer.

#HurnEuroVacay -- Day 5 - London

On our second day in London, we started the day with a visit to Kensington Palace – the former residence of Queen Victoria, Princess Diana, and William & Kate. The Palace was interesting and the audio tour was very informative, but it was not my favorite attraction in London.

Jeff trying to look like Albert (Queen Victoria's husband)

Kensington Gardens

Jeff was so sleepy.

After our tour, we were walking through the huge public garden out to the street, when I noticed a mother undressing her young son (under two years old). The next thing I know, the mom pulls a small training potty out of the stroller and sits the kid down on it. The little boy was just going number two in the middle of the fancy gardens! Jeff and I could not believe what was happening and laughed so hard all the way through the gardens.

We then took the underground over to Westminster Abbey. The church was beautiful and the audio guide was great. It was amazing to see the site of such famous weddings, coronations, and other historical events. You can also see the Coronation Chair, which has been used in every coronation ceremony since Edward II in 1308. 

 

We took the underground over to Notting Hill for dinner. Apparently, Europeans do not like to use the word “sandwich,” so I had a “chicken burger” (not a chicken sandwich) for dinner. Jeff finally had some fish and chips, which looked (and tasted) a lot like Captain D’s according to Jeff. The restaurant we ate at marked the men’s and women’s restrooms with pictures of Julia Robert and Hugh Grant. So cute.

Because we were staying so close to Kings Cross station and passed through there 3-4 times a day, I couldn’t not get a picture at Platform 9 ¾. Jeff was too cool to take a picture, but he loves Harry Potter more than me.

Peace out. Going to Hogwarts.

Jeff found Snape's wand.

Remember how I mentioned that the London buses are impossible to figure out? Well, the underground is also pretty complicated. I am usually pretty good at navigating subways, but I must confess that we got the wrong train a few times in London. [Sometimes, multiple lines and directions use the same platform, so if you are not paying attention, it is easy to hop on the wrong line. Oops.] At some point in our day, the doors closed on the train, and I realized we were not on the right line. I looked at Jeff and said, “Well, we are on the wrong train.” The train started moving, and Jeff looked at me with the most optimistic and upbeat look on his face and said, “Wonder where we’re going?” It was just the best possible reaction to realizing that we had no idea where the train was taking us. We eventually figured it out, and got over to our intended destination.

#HurnEuroVacay -- Day 4 - London

We woke up super early to get to the train station for our train to London. I had been on European trains before, and you pretty much just jumped on the train and took off. Well not the Eurostar train from Paris to London. We had to go through airport style security and through customs. The British customs agent asked me the most questions I have ever been asked at a customs checkpoint. Where are you staying? When are you leaving London? What airport are you flying out of? Where is your next stop? When are you going back to the US? And on and on and on. He was not playing.

Backpack train station selfie

Train selfie

 After we got on the train, I fell right to sleep and woke up in London 2 hours later. I was aware that our hotel check-in was not until later that afternoon, so we decided to check our bags at the train station. [Later, we found out that we could have left our bags at the hotel for way, way cheaper. Oops.]

We hopped on the Underground and headed for Buckingham Palace just in time for the changing of the guards. I thought that we were getting there early, about 40 minutes beforehand, but there were thousands of people everywhere. There was nowhere to stand, and you could barely walk down the street. Once the ceremony started, people were pushing and shoving to get a good picture/video. One lady kept sticking her giant iPad in front of my face to snap a picture through the gates. It was mass chaos. I could not see over the people to watch the ceremony, so I stuck my selfie stick high in the air and watched through my phone screen.

Victoria Memorial

So. Many. People. Everywhere.

After grabbing a bite to eat, it was time for our tour of Buckingham Palace. Tours are only available during certain times of the year when the queen is not staying at the palace, and we happened to be visiting London at the right time. I had booked our tickets months in advance, and this was one of the things that I was most looking forward to. The tour did not disappoint. A special exhibit was going on where the palace was decorated and set up for a state visit. We saw the dining room, place settings, and all that it took to pull off such a huge event. The audio guide was also really good with great information about the palace and all of the rooms. We were not allowed to take pictures inside the palace, and were only able to take this picture once outside in the gardens.

We loved Buckingham Palace!

After the tour, we hopped on a red double decker bus toward the London Eye. Warning: the London bus system is almost impossible to use. Buses are numbered, stops are lettered, lines are colored – or something like that. It was way confusing, and we never figured out how to use the buses. We just stuck to the Underground.

The London Eye was actually kind of scary. The capsule rotates around the circle, different from a ferris wheel. There were also a group of ten teenage boys running and jumping around the capsule, which did not make it feel any safer. It was cool to see the city from up high, but I probably would not pay the money to do it again.

Big Ben and Parliament from the ground.

Big Ben and Parliament from the eye.

Thank goodness the streets were marked telling you which way to look before crossing the streets. Getting used to cars on the left side of the road is really hard.

We tried to take the bus to Leicester Square, but ended up taking the Underground instead. There is a TKTS booth in the square that sells discounted West End tickets (the London equivalent to Broadway). They had pretty good prices on Les Miserables tickets, so we decided to go. The show was fantastic, and Jeff sang the songs through the rest of our trip. [I have a video in Florence, of him singing “Who am I? Who am I? 24601!!!!!!!!” in the middle of a public square.]

After the play, we made our way back to the train station to get our bags. At this point, it was around 11pm. When we got to the baggage check counter, the guy told us that we barely made it, and he was 2 minutes from closing the place. For some reason it never crossed our minds that the baggage check place would close. Thank goodness we made it back when we did.

We walked a few blocks to our hotel – Tune Hotels. I was little worried about the hotel and had read some mixed reviews. It is a budget hotel, and we had booked the cheapest basement room with no windows. [London is super expensive, and this was our cheapest option.] I was expecting the equivalent of a cruise ship room – just a bed and no room to walk. I was actually pleasantly surprised with the room; it was bigger than our Paris studio apartment. The bed was comfortable, shower was great, and everything was clean.

We are going to Europe!

For the past 7 months, I have been diligently planning the Hurns’ DREAM VACATION! This fall, we will be traveling to Europe, and I cannot believe that our departure date is so soon! I have done all of the planning and booking myself, and I did a ton of research through travel blogs. So, I decided that I would share my Europe trip planning tips and steps.

1. Narrow down your options.

Planning a trip to “Europe” is super daunting because Europe is a huge place with so many wonderful cities! Our first step was to make a list of all of the places/cities that we were interested in. This list included: Paris, Rome, Florence, Venice, Madrid, Barcelona, Prague, Switzerland, Vienna, Ireland, Tuscany, London, and Athens. Visiting all of these places would be impossible in one short trip.

I read some travel blogs, articles, and travel sites to see some sample European itineraries. I marked the places on a map to see what paths made sense geographically. I researched train and plane schedules and prices to see which cities were easy to travel to.

Paris was a no-brainer. I have already been there. I knew that I wanted to go back, and I wanted to take Jeff to see my favorite city. Italy was a must, but I just didn’t know what specific cities we would go to. Ireland was far away from our other destinations, as was Greece and Spain.

After a ton of thought and research, I narrowed it down to Paris, London, Italy (Rome, Florence, Cinque Terre, Venice).

2. Pick your dates and book a flight!

Due to our work schedules, we knew that a typical summer vacation was not possible. (Jeff’s super busy time at work is June & July.) So, we first started looking at traveling in August. Due to some luck and Pinterest, I discovered Norwegian airlines. Norwegian airlines only flies out of a couple of airports in the U.S., but their prices are great! I once found a one-way flight to Paris for $169! [I’m still mad at myself for not booking that flight immediately.] After some procrastination, the prices for August flights rose too high, so we started looking at September. September actually seems like the best month because (hopefully) the weather will be nice, but it is not peak tourist travel season.  Plus, if you travel around Labor Day, you get an extra free day off work!

We made list after list of available flights overseas and return flights back to the U.S. We compared dates, prices, possible itineraries, and travel times. Finally, we decided to fly into Paris, and fly home from Barcelona. [The flights from Barcelona to U.S. were so much cheaper, that it made sense to make an extra stop in Europe to save money on the return flight home.]

We booked our overseas flights directly from the Norwegian Airlines site, and our trip was now official!

3. Make an itinerary.

Because geography, I knew that we would visit Paris and London, and then move over to Italy. However, I had no idea which order to visit the Italy stops, nor did I know how long to spend in each city.

We had narrowed our Italy stops down to Rome, Florence, Venice, and Cinque Terre. I created a calendar in Excel with the dates of our trips, and played around with different itineraries. I knew that I wanted to stay in Paris for at least 3 full days, but I thought that 2 days was sufficient for London. So, I went ahead and marked those on the calendar.

I made separate itineraries for different possibilities, comparing travel time, costs, and accessibility. For instance, flights from London to Rome were more frequent and way cheaper than flights from London to Venice. There is a direct fast train from Florence to Venice. So, I settled on this order: Rome, Cinque Terre, Florence, Venice.

4. Book hotels.

From booking our regular New Year’s Eve trips, I had some of favorite sites for hotels/apartments/houses. I checked Airbnb, VRBO, Wimdu and of course the regular Expedia, Hotels.com, Kayak, etc.

Paris: Apartment booked through VRBO in the Latin Quarter

London: London was by far the hardest stop to find a place to stay. London is exponentially more expensive than any of our other stops. I ended up booking a budget hotel with Tune Hotels. I am comparing our room to a cruise ship room – just a bed and a bathroom, no window. We only have two days in London, so I am sure that we will be busy running around the city. As long as it is clean, we should be good to go.

Rome: Apartment booked through VRBO

Cinque Terre: We will be staying in the town of Vernazza in a bed and breakfast booked through Airbnb.

Florence: Apartment booked through Airbnb close to the main squares

Venice: Bed and breakfast booked through Airbnb

Barcelona: We will only be in Barcelona for one afternoon, and our flight home leaves at 8AM the next morning. We decided to stay in an airport hotel, so that we can be sure to make it to the airport on time.

5. Start booking trains and flights.

One of my favorite things about Europe is the ease of travel. I absolutely love trains! We booked our train from Paris to London through Eurostar. I used the Trentalia website to book most of our trains through Italy. I have read great things about the Italo train line and wish that we could have used them more. Italo only stops in certain cities, and only in certain order. We are using Italo for our Florence-Venice train. We will be flying RyanAir from London-Rome and Venice-Barcelona.

6. Now for the fun stuff!

Now it is time to start looking at fun things to do! Read blogs. Read TripAdvisor. Look at Pinterest. Make sure that you look at hours/dates because some museums are closed one day of the week. For instance, the Louvre is closed every Tuesday. Wouldn’t it be a huge bummer if you showed up on your last day in Paris, and the museum was closed?? If museums/attractions allowed online ticket ordering, I booked things ahead of time. No sense in wasting my time abroad waiting in line after line. Some places pretty much require reservations months ahead of time – the Accademia Gallery in Florence (home of Michelangelo’s David). I tried to book our tickets to the Eiffel Tower the day that they became available, and they had already sold out. Guess we will be waiting in line for that one.

We are so excited for our trip. I hope to continue blogging throughout our trip to keep everyone updated on our travels!