ohhh where to go... - TravelPUNK Backpacker College Student Budget Travel Message Boards!

**epicballa** · 06-22-2008, 02:58 PM

hey guys...

i'm leaving on july 4th for a 50 day trip. i have a pretty good plan of what i'm doing and where i'm going up until august 10th. that's when my travel buddy is flying back home and i have 10 days left to occupy myself with. i'll be in amsterdam when he leaves. i'm flying home out of london so i don't want to stray too far from that area.

there's a few different things i've been thinking of doing and wanted to see if anyone has any good experiences in the regions i'm thinking of going to. i'll be going to mostly major cities for the first 40 days of the trip so i kind of want to get a taste for some of the smaller towns and off the beaten path places.

option a - train to brussels and fly to madrid(like $50 on ryanair) -> spend 2-3 nights in madrid -> hop around to a few different cities in spain/portugal (bilbao, porto, lisbon, sevilla, valencia) i've been to barcelona already but i really want to see more of portugal and spain.

option b - get the benelux-france railpass and spend the 10 days hitting up brussels, luxembourg, and some of the smaller towns in france with only a night or 2 in paris since i've been there. outside of the major cities in france, how easy would it be to find cheap accomodation in some of the smaller coastal cities in normandy and other areas?

option c - train to brussels, fly to dublin. my friend lives 30 min outside of dublin so i'd stay with her and then get the ireland railpass to take day trips and maybe a couple overnight trips throughout ireland.

so which of these looks good? and if anyone has any better ideas i'd love to hear them. i was thinking of doing the switzerland too but i know it's expensive and i don't want to be burning money at the end of my trip.

**marc873** · 06-22-2008, 05:20 PM

If you are going to be in Brussels, and want to get out of the big city theme, ABSOLUTELY go to Brugges. About 30 min by train, and one of the most well preserved 16th century med-evil cities in Europe. Totally worth 2 nites. And from there, you could head to the North sea and stay in Oostende or Brackenburg (sp).
Have you also thought about getting out of A-Dam and into the Dutch countryside? Its a whole different vibe outside of the Dam. Much more relaxed without as many tourist.... Maybe Maastricht or Utrecht? I have a decent amount of info on the areas mentioned if you want any adivice.....
Cheers

**epicballa** · 06-22-2008, 05:51 PM

Thanks for the response. To be honest, the Netherlands don't really interest me too much, never really considered going to the countryside. Brugges sounds interesting, I'll look into it.

A friend just put the idea in my head of flying down to Marrakesh, spending a few nights there and then going to Rabat and maybe Fez. I think I'm leaning towards doing that or the Spain/Portugal thing. I forget to mention I'm sort of a gastronome so I prefer going to locales that have amazing food history, which Morocco and Spain definitely have.

**epicballa** · 06-24-2008, 05:32 PM

I've been looking into it and it seems the hostel scene outside of Marrakesh is non-existant. Can anyone who's traveled in Morocco comment on the cost and quality of accomodations in other places, i.e. Fez, Casablanca, Essaouira, Rabat, and Tangier. And how hard would it be to find a room in August? I want to book my flight from Frankfurt in the next day or two because it's only $70 right now and I don't want that to disappear, so quick responses would be greatly appreciated.

I really want to go there but as I'll have been already traveling 40 days I might go the safer route of Spain/Portugal if I have to worry about sleeping on the streets in Morocco

Oh, and one more question. What can I expect to spend daily in Morocco vs. the $75/day I'm expecting in Spain/Portugal?

**MeTurk** · 06-25-2008, 08:23 AM

There's no point getting an Irish rail pass if you do come here, Our rail network isn't even worth laughing at. Buses are the way to go and can be a quarter of the price.

Citylink.ie are the only buses that have an overnight service as they go from airport to airport via the cities. I don't think it's necessary to overnight anyway, if your up early it's enough. Dublin to Galway is only 2 and a half hours. Dublin to Cork would be around 3 and a half. You'd be very unlucky to spend more than 4 hours on a bus going anywhere.

It would be worth a trip up north to see the place, it's come on leaps and bounds since the peace agreement and you can get any taxi driver to give you the grand tour of all the trouble spots.

Spend a day or two in Dublin day or two up north, then a day or two anywhere in the west for your picture postcard view of Ireland. a few days in Galway city with a trip out to the arann islands would not disappoint.

A holiday show here just did a special on Marrakesh, looks like an amasing place. It's supposed to be great for food, they even do cookery courses throughout the city.

http://www.rte.ie/travel/nofrontiers/index.html you can watch the show here but it looks like they're a bit slow putting up the new episodes so the Marrakesh episode isn't up yet. There's one on Morroco though.

**ajb3000** · 06-25-2008, 09:04 AM

You can find really cheap hotels in Morocco, just look for locally run places (and obviously not international chains). I can't remember how much I paid while there, but it was less than a lot of hostels in western europe.

**Esterina** · 06-25-2008, 09:12 AM

I have read that the daily budget starts around $25 a day.

**Canadian Bacon** · 06-27-2008, 06:47 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by epicballa

hey guys...

option a - train to brussels and fly to madrid(like $50 on ryanair) -> spend 2-3 nights in madrid -> hop around to a few different cities in spain/portugal (bilbao, porto, lisbon, sevilla, valencia) i've been to barcelona already but i really want to see more of portugal and spain.

You cannot go wrong with Spain. Sorry France, but I would take Spain any day or night.