2 WEEKS IN AUGUST

I tried to get a ticket to Spain back in February (with my FF miles) and everything is booked already. I figured out that the thing is August in Europe is their holiday month, most people are down at the beach cities on the Mediterranean, Ibiza, Mallorca, Gran Canary Islands etc.. shops close early, Sundays everything is dead...I would postpone your trip to Southern Europe till September. OR go to Scandinavia, Denmark, Sweden, Finland and Norway! People are so friendly, beautiful buildings churches, castles, and it is the best month to visit! If you go way up north, it stays light almost all night long, very cool experience. A potential intinerary would be to Fly in and out of CPH, there is plenty to see there Roskilde, the Viking Museums, lots of great shopping, canal tours, easy 40 min train ride up the coast from Copenhagen to Helsingor where there is one of the coolest castles in Erurope, in my opinion. It is where Shakespeare wrote Hamlet, Kronberg Castle. Once you've done a few days in Denmark catch a cheap flight on SAS or Sterling to Stockholm, from Stockholm take the overnight ferry boat to Helsinki and you can either fly back to Copenhagen or take the boat back to Stockholm and fly back to CPH and then fly home. I took my girlfriends on this very same trip last summer and had a BLAST! There is a great travel company based out of Minnesota that books the Viking overnight Ferry, it's cheap too. Let me know if you want any info.

PS What is nice about going to Scandinavia is that it is not "trendy" (Paris, Rome, London) so you don't run into annoying American tourists every way you turn, so you can actually really feel the culture! Reply to this

dude, if you do the scandinavian trip you might also want to get the ferry to riga in latvia, its a awesome city and well worth it Reply to this

If you wish to travel to Europe in August and have an accommodation concern you can register yourself with www.couchsurfing.com and its easy to find someone who will host you, so that should be simple.

You can try some itineraries such as:

Arrive in Italy - Full Day Excursion To Rome - Onto Venice - Venice to Innsbruck - Switzerland - Onto Paris - Paris to Belgium - Brussels - Amsterdam - Germany

Or

Arrive Into Germany, Frankfurt - Innsbruck - Visit Venice - Onto Tuscany - Florence - Rome - Geneva - Chamonix - Lucerne

Or

Copenhagen - Oslo - Bergen - Sognefjord - Karlstad - Stockholm - Helsinki

Hope this helps! Reply to this

It is crowded (and mighty hot) in Mediterranean countries in August. The Nordic countries are much better, but unfortunately you can't see the midnight sun anymore in August... A roundtrip Copenhagen (Denmark), Lillehammer (Norway), Stockhoolm (Sweden), Helsinki (Finland) might be a good idea. It is not crowded and the weather could still be reasonably nice. Take a ferry from Stockholm to Helsinki and visit Tallinn (Estonia) from Helsinki (daytrip, it only takes a couple of hours).
Another possibility is to go to Spain for example and stay off the well beaten path. If you enjoy hiking, you could go to the mountain resorts (Picos de Europa or Pyrenees) where it is not too crowded. Thanks to the economical crises there should be rooms available ;-)
The northern coast of Spain is never as crowded as the southern and eastern coasts or the most popular cities like Barcelona, Seville etc. Oviedo (Asturias), Santander (Cantabria) are recommended bigger cities over there in August.


Reply to this