Palais Longchamp in Nice

Several years ago I decided three months in Europe was what I needed.  I had saved carefully for a year and had enough funds to leave my job and take off travelling overseas.   My trip began with a two day stop in at Amsterdam where I felt quite jetlagged but managed to see the sites.  Then we took a flight to England where I borrowed a friend’s car and toured around for two weeks seeing some relatives and the usual British monuments.  Next, we took a ferry over to Calais in France, picked up a brand new Renault Clio from Renault Eurodrive for a 13-week lease to drive through Belgium, Luxembourg, Italy, France, Spain and Portugal finishing up with a week in Paris.  The feeling of driving your own way around Europe is liberating, though sometimes stressful if you don’t know your way.  Back then you had to buy maps before you travelled, now there is google maps or google trips!

Once you have your maps sorted, you can drive off with confidence knowing that if you wish to take a detour to an area of interest, you can without feeling like you will never find the motorway again.  After Paris, we flew to New York, went to see Niagra Falls and crossed the bridge to Canada for a day.  Another flight to spend a couple of days in Los Angeles, then onto our final destination before home, Hawaii.

It was an amazing trip and well worth saving madly for a year. I didn’t go out and took home-made lunches to work.  I knew it would all be worth it and it truly was a memory that is still vivid today.   It took a fair amount of research and planning which wasn’t easy back then when there was no internet!  Yes, it was that long ago! It’s so easy to plan your travel today,  you can browse the internet and see great images and reviews on sites like TripAdvisor or Expedia.  Some hotels don’t even require a deposit.  Spontaneity is great for the thrill of travel, but I feel it’s important to have a rough timeline, especially if you are travelling in the peak period.   We made that mistake of not booking hotels in some areas and would still be driving around at 9pm feeling hungry, grumpy and tired.  Nowadays with apps like Airbnb or Hotel Tonight its a cinch to book ahead or even last minute.

I haven’t blogged much for a while so if you do happen to follow my posts,  I might churn out a few short posts and photos over the next month of my Trip to Europe for those that enjoy travel and old photos.  Maybe I will get you motivated to plan your next Trip!

Published by Seafarrwide

Passionate woman, enjoying life, learning new things, love traveling, writing thoughts and sharing memories. View all posts by Seafarrwide