If you have read this far then you know I spilled the beans and told my wife about my plans for our 30th wedding anniversary. From this point forward it actually became easier to narrow down, what is now, our plans. The first thing I did was research air fare since including Greece in the trip would obviously raise that price. Surprisingly, it did not raise it out of reach so we began to plan what we would do in each country.
Our first stop would be Athens. With the abundant Greek ruins we would be in heaven stopping by the Temple of Zeus, the Parthenon, a trip to the Oracle at Delphi just to mention a very few. Of course what would a trip to Greece be without visiting the picturesque village of Santorini?
We discovered early that renting an apartment in each country would be far cheaper than staying in hotels (there will be more on apartment rentals vs. hotels in a later post). Athens has numerous apartments available for short term rental, anywhere from 3 days to a month with prices which are very reasonable when compared to hotels. I narrowed my search down to 3 apartments and moved on to transportation.
Apparently, getting around Athens is best to do as a pedestrian. Traffic jams are constant and Greeks like to strike. Actually, most European countries strike quite a bit and if you watch the news you will see they can effectively shut down a city or a country. It probably isn't fair to say the best way is as a pedestrian but it did seem like less of a hassle. Taking a taxi means paying attention to the time of day and the meter. In Athens, there are two rates, one for daytime and one for evening/night. I came across several reports that stated taxi drivers will set the night rate (which is higher) during the day when they pick up tourists. To keep from being overcharged you had to constantly be aware of what the meter was set to.
As it turned out, during my research I happened across "George, the famous taxi driver of Athens". You can access is webpage here http://www.greecetravel.com/taxi/ George's story of becoming a taxi drive is interesting and very telling of the economy and a Greek's love of his country. With several testimonials, not only on his website but also in several travel forums, it looked like George was going to get hired for a few days while we were in Greece.
Our next stop would be Paris, we fly in and go to an apartment then enjoy the city and all it has to offer. I repeated the apartment and transportation research that I completed for Athens, this time I researched Paris.
Again, I was able to find affordable studio and one bedroom apartments located in the heart of Paris. I narrowed the choices to three and not finding a "George, the famous taxi driver of Paris", set about trying to make sense of the Metro system. Of course, we plan on walking a great deal but at the end of the day, when you are 2 miles from the apartment and tired, hopping on the Metro is just the way to go.
Moving on to our next stop, we planned to travel to London then Edinburgh. The same research narrowing of choices was done as we looked at what to do in London and Edinburgh.
Travel to London from Paris is relatively easy, you can fly, take a ferry across the English Channel or take a train. We didn't want to fly so we were left with one of the other two choices. The train through the channel tunnel (I am told some call it the chunnel but not to call it that while in Paris or London) would take 2.5 hours from the the center of Paris to the center of London. Nice and quick.
The ferry would take pretty much the whole day however, the advantage would be traveling to the coast and enjoying the countryside then crossing the English Channel and watching the white cliffs of Dover grow ever larger as you neared England. Then the travel through the English countryside to London. We were undecided for quite awhile until we had an "aha" moment.
If you remember, the original plan was four weeks. We looked closely at everywhere we would visit and everything we would see and do. We then realized, even with four weeks, we were trying to do too much. I say this because my wife travels the same way I do, at at leisurely pace. We don't want to rush through all the tourist sites and wolf down our meals. We want to immerse ourselves in the life and culture of where we are. Certainly we would visit the sites high on our personal "must see" list, the Parthenon in Athens, the Louvre in Paris, Stonehenge in England, Kilvarock Castle in the Highlands of Scotland and finally the Military Tattoo in the shadow of Edinburgh Castle. Those were just the sites at the top of the list for each country. Those were followed by other sites we definitely wanted to see. Then of course there would be shopping, eating, time spent waiting in lines, transportation would take time as well. Let's not forget the mundane tasks either, four weeks away from home means we would have to do laundry.
We sat back and reassessed what we really wanted to do. It amounts to this, it is our 30th wedding anniversary and we want to celebrate the achievement. We don't want to have memories of being rushed, hurried, exhausted and just plain run down. We want celebration memories. We decided four weeks would be too long and we would cut back to one destination. When all the pros and cons were weighed, the history and romanticism of Paris won.
We would spend three weeks in Paris, France, the City of Lights, the City of Love. We could relax, stroll the neighborhoods in the different arrondissements. Visit flea markets, shop the wine and cheese stores. Take a morning croissant or baguette for breakfast
And that brings us within a week of where we currently are.
Until next time, keep planning.
No comments:
Post a Comment