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Bollock Monkey posted:Any tips for Ljubljana? Bars, restaurants, hidden gems? I love Ljubljana, it's one of my favourite cities in Europe. Go up to the castle, it's basically reconstructed but it's still cool and worth it. I like just wandering through the old town and stopping wherever takes my fancy. It's a great city to just get kind of lost in.
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Apr 30, 2022 17:16
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Seconding that it's just a great place. I don't remember any specific bars/restaurants but do pass through Metelkova, an autonomous squatter neighborhood with a lot of art to see there, including the good museum of contemporary art. There are some good clubs there too, if you are into that. I had a good time at some synthwave night back when that was a thing. I do still have some things starred although I don't remember them, so probably those were good or somehow recommended to me: Sir William's pub, Union Pub, Pop's place, restaurant Julija, Okrepčevalnica Čompa, Restaurant Šestica, Nebotičnik roof terrace. Do note that I was there like 5 years ago at this point so this might be outdated. Also various other art places (Modern Art museum, City Gallery). Seconding the castle, and for relatively easy day trips you can go to lake Bled and walk around it + see the castle, or the caves of Postojna. There are buses to these places.
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May 1, 2022 00:46
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I may find myself in West-Vlaanderen, Belgium on Ascension Day. Does anyone know if shops, cafes, and the like are open on that day? I mostly want to know if I can get lunch somewhere without booking a month in advance, otherwise I'll just buy some sandwiches the previous day or something.
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May 1, 2022 07:11
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Carbon dioxide posted:I may find myself in West-Vlaanderen, Belgium on Ascension Day. Restaurants will all be open in Belgium on Ascension. Shops will only be open if you’re in some super touristy town where the shops are anyway open on Sunday. So if you’re in like.. Knokke then basically everything will be open, from little mom and pop shops to big chains like H&M, but if you’re in like.. Turnhout, then not so much. Restaurants will be open everywhere regardless, just like in the Netherlands. For shops, Belgium seems to have like the most liberal rules in all of Western Europe regarding Sunday shopping. also thirding/four thing that Ljubljana is great. Haven’t been in 10 years though so doubt my recommendations are worth more than you can find on Wikivoyage.
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May 1, 2022 08:27
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Longshot, but: any Aarhus tips? Specifically dining but also whatever else?
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May 1, 2022 10:10
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Entropist posted:for relatively easy day trips you can go to lake Bled and walk around it + see the castle, or the caves of Postojna. There are buses to these places. HookShot + Saladman posted:It's a great city to just get kind of lost in.
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May 1, 2022 16:33
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I would like to go to Slovenia too! I had never even heard of the country before. What might be a good itinerary? I am solo and could stay in Europe for at least a month, or a month and a half. I am very open minded but wouldn’t particularly want to spend a fortune.
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May 1, 2022 16:48
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Bollock Monkey posted:We have 2 days (Sun+Mon) at Lake Bled actually. Planning on a daytrip of caves + Piran from our Ljubljana base though! Hah, I did several days in Piran instead. Hard to get bored when you are by the Mediterranean. It might be a bit much to do that +caves as a day trip but I don't really remember how far it was. Cheese Thief posted:I would like to go to Slovenia too! I had never even heard of the country before. What might be a good itinerary? I am solo and could stay in Europe for at least a month, or a month and a half. I am very open minded but wouldn’t particularly want to spend a fortune. The country is quite small, you could probably explore the whole place with Ljubljana as a base. But if you have more time you can certainly make it a trip along with some of the nice area nearby such as Istria, the Croatian coast, Austrian Alps, places in the East of Italy that aren't Venice, or some Hungarian wine region. Entropist fucked around with this message at 16:54 on May 1, 2022 |
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May 1, 2022 16:49
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We're looking at this tour. Used to be snobby about organised tours but actually the last couple of places we've been it's been a great way of seeing a few things in a day with less hassle than if you had to rely on public transport.Cheese Thief posted:I would like to go to Slovenia too! I had never even heard of the country before. What might be a good itinerary? I am solo and could stay in Europe for at least a month, or a month and a half. I am very open minded but wouldn’t particularly want to spend a fortune. We're doing: Day 1 - Arrive Ljubljana AM - Around Ljubljana, sightseeing, museums etc Day 2 - Full day trip - Skocjan Caves, Piran Day 3 - Around Ljubljana, sightseeing, museums etc Day 4 - Predjama Castle, Postojna Cave, secret rooms - Relaxing afternoon/evening of some sort ahead of trip to Bled Day 5 - Leave early for Bled - Bled Castle, etc Day 6 - Vintgar Gorge - Other national park type thing in the area? Day 7 - Leave early for airport If we had longer we'd go over to Zagreb because I really want to go to the Museum of Broken Relationships. We've ended up choosing Slovenia after our 2020 trip to Croatia ended up, well, being a plan made for 2020, and finding that Slovenia is small enough that you can see a bit more in the amount of time we want to be away. You could totally go Italy - Slovenia - Croatia over a month without it being too insane, depending on where in those countries you choose to be.
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May 1, 2022 18:35
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Bollock Monkey posted:If we had longer we'd go over to Zagreb because I really want to go to the Museum of Broken Relationships. Yes, nothing wrong with organized tours for certain purposes! Especially in places with not so good public transport, and I think Slovenia counts. The buses from Piran to Ljubljana were not very frequent, anyway, and going from Italy to Piran also sucked. Maybe you even meet some people on the tour (you can easily bond with the few other non-boomers there). I also took some bus tours on the Irish west coast when I was there where there was basically no way to get to the (natural) tourist attractions except by renting a car otherwise.
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May 1, 2022 20:09
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Pookah posted:Just did a quick Google, and this what I got for a tiny car for 7 days - at least 700 euros I didn't believe that price but checked myself and you're right. For reasons unknown Northern Ireland doesn't seem to have spiked as much. You could fly to Dublin, get a €10 train ticket to Belfast, rent a small car for €380 and drive it back to Dublin.
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May 3, 2022 20:07
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Clyde Radcliffe posted:I didn't believe that price but checked myself and you're right. Yeah I also did a double-take. €100 for a car is what you pay for an SUV in high season in Iceland, not like ... a deuxcheveaux, in shoulder-season, in Ireland. Well, not normally anyway. I know the US has gone crazy with car rental prices but I really haven't encountered that in Europe within the past 2 years of COVID, and I've rented a fair number of cars (Italy, Spain, Tunisia, France, Turkey, Portugal).
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May 3, 2022 22:12
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I'll have two substantial layovers in Dublin so I'll be free to walk around for most of the day. Any pro tips? Is there such a thing as Irish fast/street food?
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May 4, 2022 13:16
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mobby_6kl posted:I'll have two substantial layovers in Dublin so I'll be free to walk around for most of the day. Any pro tips? Is there such a thing as Irish fast/street food? They are mad on doughnuts! If you want far too much food for not much money (in Dublin terms) then hit up McGuinness Traditional Take Away. Or you can get fish and chips from Leo Burdock's. Pop into The Brazen Head, oldest pub in Dublin, for a beer. If you have time, I'd recommend a trip to The Little Museum of Dublin - it's super interesting! You can visit The National Museum of Ireland for free and there's heaps of cool Viking/Bronze Age stuff to look at.
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May 4, 2022 14:07
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Bollock Monkey posted:They are mad on doughnuts! Awesome suggestions, thanks!  This is six loving twenty so you aren't kidding about Dublin terms but yolo right  It was very nice outside today so I just walked around mostly but kntbr way back there should be plenty of time for the museums as well.
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May 4, 2022 21:46
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mobby_6kl posted:This is six loving twenty so you aren't kidding about Dublin terms but yolo right Good deal, in Amsterdam you pay 9-10 euros for that depending on the place. Well, that was 6 years ago, it's probably more now.
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May 5, 2022 16:01
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I'll be in Palermo for a few days next week - I'm not fluent in Italian but have picked a bit up the last couple years on Duolingo. Any similar suggestions like the one for Dublin? I'll be in Dublin the week after so that post was timely too.
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May 5, 2022 16:11
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Sicily in October with a 3 year old and a 6 month old; terrible idea? We are looking for somewhere reasonably warm (compared to the UK) but not too hot, where we can rent an Airbnb, explore at our own pace and get some great food. I am not sure what there is to interest the 3 year old in Sicily though. We’d perhaps spend one day at the beach. We’re trying to find alternatives to the standard holiday with children that tends to involve going to an all inclusive beach resort.
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May 5, 2022 16:13
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mobby_6kl posted:Awesome suggestions, thanks! I'm not sure if beer prices have changed with all the... stuff going on in the world but when I visited Dublin, locals told me that if a pint of Guiness was under 6, then it isn't a tourist trap.
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May 5, 2022 17:25
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Clyde Radcliffe posted:I didn't believe that price but checked myself and you're right. Oh I'm not looking to rent a car in Ireland, I live here I just wanted to warn people coming here to absolutely not assume a car rental will cost anything like what they might expect from previous visits.Your advice is very good though - tourists to Ireland- rent up north, it's way cheaper!
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May 5, 2022 18:05
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Duodecimal posted:I'll be in Palermo for a few days next week - I'm not fluent in Italian but have picked a bit up the last couple years on Duolingo. Any similar suggestions like the one for Dublin? I spent 5 days there last month. Palermo itself is kind of interesting in that the central downtown area feels far more like Tunis or middle class parts of Cairo than it does anywhere in Italy. In that questions like "what is a sidewalk?" (ref: https://www.google.com/maps/@38.118...!7i16384!8i8192 ) and "should we do weekly street cleaning, or you think the current once per year is fine?" (ref: https://www.google.com/maps/@38.1121832,13.3603555,3a,75y,308.67h,72.54t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sRrccCj8Gy_Vl349x293jyg!2e0!7i13312!8i6656 ) are typical pressing issues for the town council. I actually liked Palermo a lot, but I like that kind of thing and dislike the sterile Dubai or Canary Wharf kind of modernism, at least as a tourist. The bar on top of the Rinascente shopping center ("Sulla Terrazza") is nice and has a decent view, but I particularly like outdoors bars and better yet outdoors rooftop bars. They serve decent food too. In general it's pretty loving hard to find a place that serves bad food in Italy, except in Venice, but I thought the food in Palermo was great. A particular shout-out for the pizzas at Sud Antica Forneria, and I would do unspeakable things if I knew it would lead to someone opening a shop near me that sold cannolis as good as the ones in Palermo, particularly "Cannolissimo" next to Chiesa della Madonna della Mazza. The general touristy stuff you find on Wikivoyage is alright too. I don't really care about churches, but found the Norman Cathedral to be rather distinctive, and I actually really enjoyed the Palatine Chapel inside the Royal Palace, pretty mind-blowing on the scale of the Sistine Chapel and Saint Chapelle. Different from those two, but equally "wow, goddamn they spent a lot of money on gold for Jesus." I also thought it was kind of interesting for all the older churches in the area how they had a very distinctive mix of both Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic imagery, including lots of inscriptions in both Latin and Greek, side by side but not translations of one another - but like you were expected to know both. We did a daytrip to Cefalu, it was okay. The walk up to the top was nice, but very short. We rented a car and drove to Erice and Segesta, which made up a nice daytrip but if I were by myself I wouldn't've cared. We did the hike up to Monte Pellegrino, which has wonderful views of Palermo and the valley north of it. The Santa Rosalia sanctuary, which is directly on the way, is bizarre and worth checking out since you're passing by it anyway. Feels kind of like a Catholic church that survivors in the Mad Max world would have built (it's in a cave, and has weird sheet metal all over the walls in haphazard fashion to collect water dripping from the rocks). Takes maybe an hour each way to walk there from the "Scala Vecchia (inizio salita)" bus stop (actually King - Scala Vecchia) on Google Maps. I thought the botanical gardens were pretty lame. Not very well maintained. Maybe beautiful once, a long time ago. Not terrible but not worth the like €8 or whatever. I'm not sure I'd go back, but I would definitely recommend people who were going to the area and like big cities to spend like 3 or so days there. The Palatine Chapel is definitely a "unique / don't miss" and the Norman Cathedral is unique if you care about Viking history, as a bunch of their kings are buried there. Lady Gaza posted:Sicily in October with a 3 year old and a 6 month old; terrible idea? We are looking for somewhere reasonably warm (compared to the UK) but not too hot, where we can rent an Airbnb, explore at our own pace and get some great food. I am not sure what there is to interest the 3 year old in Sicily though. We’d perhaps spend one day at the beach. We’re trying to find alternatives to the standard holiday with children that tends to involve going to an all inclusive beach resort. Probably fine? The food is amazing, and not sure you really need to find anything in particular to amuse a 3 year old, since a grassy field contains hours of entertainment.
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May 5, 2022 18:23
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Entropist posted:Hah, I did several days in Piran instead. Hard to get bored when you are by the Mediterranean. It might be a bit much to do that +caves as a day trip but I don't really remember how far it was. This is exactly what I’m going to do! Might I take a boat from Italy, across the sea to the coast of Croatia? How is the English, my experience with Southern Europeans is the English is less fluent than up North. I told some friends at the gym about “I’m moving to Slovenia this summer!” And the response was fear of Russian attack. I figure as long as I stay out of Ukraine I’d be safe and ok. Edit: I’m seeing flights from my USA departure town to Rome for <$1000 while the Slovenia destination is >$3000. I could go to Rome then take a ferry. Cheese Thief fucked around with this message at 19:54 on May 5, 2022 |
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May 5, 2022 18:36
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I want to jog around lake bled one day
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May 5, 2022 19:32
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Cheese Thief posted:This is exactly what I’m going to do! Might I take a boat from Italy, across the sea to the coast of Croatia? How is the English, my experience with Southern Europeans is the English is less fluent than up North. I told some friends at the gym about “I’m moving to Slovenia this summer!” And the response was fear of Russian attack. I figure as long as I stay out of Ukraine I’d be safe and ok. English is pretty widely spoken among people under ~40 throughout Europe, although it varies widely from like ~95%+ in Norway to probably more like 30% (statistic from: my butt) in Italy or Spain. Although apparently all primary schools in Italy and Spain teach English in school now? https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/10/08/more-than-any-other-foreign-language-european-youths-learn-english/ so maybe it's even higher than 30% for zoomers. If you speak other languages, sometimes they are useful in certain places, e.g. a lot of Spanish will speak French, probably a lot of Slovenes will speak Italian, etc. I hope your friends from the gym aren't worried about getting murdered on their way home due to the violence in El Salvador? $1000 sounds like a decent price for a roundtrip summer flight from US to Europe. I'm surprised you can't get a reasonably priced flight into Ljubljana but it'll definitely be cheaper to fly into Rome/Munich/Frankfurt/Oslo/whatever, and anyway since you have a lot of time and no particular first destination in mind it seems like you can just fly to wherever is cheapest and interesting to you.
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May 5, 2022 20:46
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Is 7 weeks long enough? I am about to buy a ticket Edit: I heard I need a visa to visit the Baltic countries? Anyone know about that Cheese Thief fucked around with this message at 01:26 on May 6, 2022 |
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May 5, 2022 22:44
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Cheese Thief posted:This is exactly what I’m going to do! Might I take a boat from Italy, across the sea to the coast of Croatia? How is the English, my experience with Southern Europeans is the English is less fluent than up North. I told some friends at the gym about “I’m moving to Slovenia this summer!” And the response was fear of Russian attack. I figure as long as I stay out of Ukraine I’d be safe and ok. Ljubljana is not a big airport. I think I flew into Venice to get there, but it was hard to get across the border by public transport. It should be possible to go from any decent airport in Europe to any other airport in Europe for like less than €150 (though keep luggage restrictions in mind) so you can usually just choose the cheapest destination if you don't mind a transfer. In Slovenia and Zagreb I was quite fine with English, as far as I remember. English is generally not a big concern in Europe, there is always some teenager around who can translate if needed even in Spain or Italy. I do believe there are boats across the Adriatic but I have no experience with them. I think some go from Piran too. Lmao, don't ask Americans anything that involves knowledge of European geography. Cheese Thief posted:Is 7 weeks long enough? I am about to buy a ticket Some Americans try to see Europe in a week so 7 weeks should do! With such longer trips it's more up to your personal circumstances how long you can/want to make it. Though I guess there might be a 90 day visa-free limit. Entropist fucked around with this message at 01:37 on May 6, 2022 |
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May 6, 2022 01:34
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Schengen limits you to 90 days in a 180-day period visa-free, and it's not like other countries where you can leave for 24 hours and the clock "resets" - it's a 180-day rolling period. But for a 7 week trip that's not really a concern. And no you don't need a visa for any Baltic country, they're all in Schengen. As others have said, English is fairly widely understood across Europe, but varies mostly with age and proximity to tourist venues. Slovenia and the Croatian coast you'll be mostly fine, unless you end up staying in a small rural Airbnb run by old folks or something. But even then, a mixture of charades, smiles, and (at worst) Google Translate will get you through. There are ferries across the Adriatic, most of them leave from Ancona or from Bari, though I haven't caught one so can't comment on reliability/affordability etc. Sicily is a great spot, and Palermo was one of the few places I've been in Europe that felt distinctly un-European. The vibe was much more like Marrakesh/Tunis/Cairo etc than to anywhere else in Europe. And yeah I strongly agree with Saladman's recommendations of the Cathedral in Palermo, along with the Norman Palace and the Palatine Chapel. If you're up for more religious architecture, the village of Monreale nearby has another fantastic decorated chapel which is well worth a look, though if you're someone who gets bored with churches and architecture easily I'd probably skip.
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May 6, 2022 02:29
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Oh and seven weeks is plenty long enough. Just pick what you're interested in and focus on that. You're not going to see an entire continent in seven weeks and it's a fool's errand to even try. I spent nearly two years travelling Europe full time; from North Cape to Gibraltar, Istanbul to Ireland and everywhere in between, and I've still got a huge list of places to see and things to do. So yeah - decide what's important and do that, don't try and do everything because you won't do it justice and may well regret it later!
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May 6, 2022 03:40
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Cheese Thief posted:Is 7 weeks long enough? I am about to buy a ticket Thé visa thing sounds like someone either had no idea what they were talking about, OR it got mangled in a game of téléphone that all non-Schengen citizens will need a visa to visit Europe from Jan 2023. It’s just one of those online visas you pay $20 though like Turkey or the US, not a "have to go to the embassy and give a DNA sample and leave your passport with some dude for four weeks" like going to China or Congo or whatever. E: May 2023 apparently. The ETIAS visa. And €7. Saladman fucked around with this message at 04:56 on May 6, 2022 |
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May 6, 2022 04:53
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Saladman posted:"have to go to the embassy and give a DNA sample and leave your passport with some dude for four weeks" like going to China or Congo or whatever. Eh, similar process for getting the B1/B2 visa to the US a few years ago (not sure how it works now +no longer need it), minus the DNA part.
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May 6, 2022 07:25
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mmkay posted:Eh, similar process for getting the B1/B2 visa to the US a few years ago (not sure how it works now +no longer need it), minus the DNA part. Yeah that’s for the real visa required countries; ETIAS will be the ESTA-équivalent. I’m not sure if things will become easier for non-Europeans who don’t currently get a visa waiver to enter Europe. Probably not if I had to guess.
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May 6, 2022 08:00
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Hello again thread! I'm flying to Scotland next Friday for 7 nights for work. I'm the pilot so once I get there I have the entire time off on company dime. Originally we were going to land and stay in Kirkwall, so my plan was to ferry around, go walking and just chill out. NOW it looks like I'm going to be in Edinburgh, which changes the scene a bit. I would really appreciate any ideas for must-do's shotgunned at me. I love hiking, drinking, eating, history and history related drinking. My family is Scottish and I've never been so maybe I could connect with that a little. I imagine I'll have a car if I want it but while I do have LH driving experience, I don't want to do it in a city if at all avoidable. Not a good idea. Also, a quick one for Saladman: I'm still planning that Switzerland backpacking trip you've been helping me with (you're so awesome for all the advice) but with me going to 3 European cities between May and June, I was thinking of pushing it from July to August. Is there anything you would consider when pushing it back 2-3 weeks? No spots or flights have been booked in stone.
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May 6, 2022 16:23
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Rolo posted:Hello again thread! I'm flying to Scotland next Friday for 7 nights for work. I'm the pilot so once I get there I have the entire time off on company dime. Originally we were going to land and stay in Kirkwall, so my plan was to ferry around, go walking and just chill out. NOW it looks like I'm going to be in Edinburgh, which changes the scene a bit. I would really appreciate any ideas for must-do's shotgunned at me. I love hiking, drinking, eating, history and history related drinking. My family is Scottish and I've never been so maybe I could connect with that a little. I imagine I'll have a car if I want it but while I do have LH driving experience, I don't want to do it in a city if at all avoidable. Not a good idea. Nope, all considerations identical in July and August except that the days are a little shorter, but not enough to really matter - you'll almost certainly get tired long before sundown, unless you're an absolute endurance beast. Swiss cities gets quieter in August, but not the "Christmas holiday period" type quiet like you get in some places, e.g. Milan. Just have to stay a bit flexible with the weather, but you're way more likely to get "30 min downpour" than "8 hours of drizzle" even if it does rain, so don't put too much stock in weather predictions more than a day in advance.
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May 6, 2022 16:35
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I’ll bring a coat! I’d say my endurance is average for a thin person that hikes 10-ish miles 2-4 times a month and walks about every day. I’ve done 16 mile days in Rocky Mountain Nat’l Park with a smaller bag but it felt like I could have carried more with the same pace. I mean as long as I don’t have to run anywhere because that’s different, I will die.
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May 6, 2022 16:54
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Rolo posted:I love hiking, drinking, eating, history and history related drinking.
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May 6, 2022 19:04
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Bought my ticket, main cabin to Rome for 7 weeks but I expect some flexibility if I’d like to leave sooner. This thread sold me on the idea of Italy, Croatia, Slovenia, but I would also like to spend time in Hungary. I’ll leave mid July! All by myself may I add.
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May 8, 2022 23:36
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Hell yeah! I've always wanted to do some loose-itinerary solo travel for a week or two but it's never happened. Kind of a hard sell when you're married 
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May 9, 2022 08:01
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Any recommendations for sightseeing in Tavira or Southern Portugal in general? Going on a family trip and I'm kind of of a history/architecture nerd, so anything Moorish/Roman is interesting. Also any lesser known sights in Lisbon or restaurants to recommend in Lisbon? I've already spent some time there and seen most of the major landmarks. Definitely going back to MAAT, but don't have any other plans.
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May 9, 2022 08:33
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Fruits of the sea posted:Any recommendations for sightseeing in Tavira or Southern Portugal in general? Going on a family trip and I'm kind of of a history/architecture nerd, so anything Moorish/Roman is interesting. definitely do a day trip to Sintra (a few hours by train from Lisbon) if you haven't been yet
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May 9, 2022 11:20
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Already done! It was amazing, very much my poo poo.
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May 9, 2022 11:28
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