The Itinerary Europe
Longer flights, more paperwork, and worth the planning.
Western Europe
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Belgium in 6 days: Bruges, Ghent and Brussels
Four medieval cities inside an hour of each other by train: Bruges' canals at dawn before the coaches arrive, Ghent's castle and student energy, Brussels' grand square and comic-strip walls, and Antwerp's cathedral Rubens — with the day-trip trap, the beer that is genuinely worth the fuss, and why the trains make a car pointless.
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Benelux in 9 days: Amsterdam, Bruges, Ghent, Brussels and Luxembourg
The densest run of old cities in Europe: canals and Vermeer, a Flemish wool town the sea left behind, an altarpiece worth the trip on its own, and a fortress city built into a gorge — joined by trains that take an hour and cost very little.
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Provence and the Riviera in 7 days: Nice, the Luberon and Avignon
Three days on the coast by train, then a car west into Provence for the hill villages, Avignon and the Pont du Gard. When the lavender is actually out, why the car arrives on Day 3, and what the mistral does to a week here.
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Paris in 3 days: the Louvre, the Eiffel Tower and Versailles
The Louvre with a plan rather than a list, the tower booked, and Versailles given the whole day it needs. Plus the queue-skipping that actually works and the dinner hours that catch people out.
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France in 9 days: Paris and the Riviera
The classic first France — five Paris days done in the right order (closed-day traps avoided), then the TGV south to Nice, Èze and Monaco — with the 2026 border changes, ticket prices and visa realities most guides haven't caught up with.
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France and Italy in 12 days: Paris, the Riviera, Florence and Rome
Three days in Paris, two on the Riviera, three in Florence and three in Rome, joined entirely by train. Which museums actually need booking, why Nice is the right stop in the middle rather than a detour, and the ticket that is worth buying months ahead.
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Europe with parents in 10 days: Paris and Switzerland, slowly
Built for walking that is measured in hundreds of metres rather than miles: central step-free hotels, a seated boat or cogwheel train most days, taxis where the metro means stairs, and the vegetarian question answered in both countries.
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France and Switzerland in 11 days: Paris, the Jungfrau and the Matterhorn
A week of museums, boulevards and a glass pyramid, then a train into the Alps for cogwheel railways, a mountain that looks like the chocolate wrapper, and lakes the colour of antifreeze.
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Oktoberfest in 4 days: tent strategy, and Bavaria on the other days
Mostly September, not October, and the reservation system is the whole game. Which tents suit which kind of day, how to get a table without one, what a Maß does to you at that strength, and two day trips for the mornings after.
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Germany's Christmas markets: Nuremberg, Rothenburg and Munich in 7 days
Three weeks a year, Germany turns into the world's most organised fairy tale: the Christkind opening Nuremberg's 400-year-old market, a walled medieval town glowing under lanterns, Munich running five markets at once — with the glühwein-mug economics, the halal-and-veg stall strategy, and the one date mistake (arriving December 26) this guide exists to prevent.
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Germany in 10 days: Munich, the Alps and Berlin
Two Germanys on one fast train: beer-garden Bavaria with the fairy-tale castle and the top of the country at 2,962 m, then Berlin — the Wall, Nefertiti, a free glass dome over parliament — with the booking windows, the cash surprise and the Sunday-shutdown rule that guidebooks forget to mention.
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Italy and Switzerland in 10 days: Milan, Lake Como, Zermatt and Lucerne
Two days in Milan, two on Lake Como, then the Matterhorn and the Swiss lakes — no car, no internal flights, and one visa for both countries. What the Swiss Travel Pass is actually worth, the one ticket to book months ahead, and why Zermatt gets three nights.
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Luxembourg in 4 days: a capital on a gorge, castles and free transport
The first country in the world to make all public transport free, wrapped around a capital built on a gorge with a kilometre of tunnels cut inside its cliffs — plus a castle in the north, a sandstone forest in the east, and the hotel-rate quirk that decides what your trip costs.
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Monaco in 2 days: the Rock, the Casino and the Oceanographic Museum
The second-smallest country on earth — a medieval rock, a casino that saved the dynasty from bankruptcy, an aquarium Jacques Cousteau ran for thirty years, and a street circuit that is still the streets for fifty weeks a year.
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Keukenhof and the tulip fields in 4 days: Amsterdam and Giethoorn
Keukenhof opens for about eight weeks each spring and closes for the rest of the year. How to see it without queueing, why the commercial fields around it are free and often better, a canal village with no roads, and the bloom calendar that decides which flower you actually see.
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Amsterdam in 2 days: the canals, the Rijksmuseum and Anne Frank
The Anne Frank House releases tickets six weeks ahead and they go within hours — that single fact shapes the whole trip. Plus the Rijksmuseum with a plan, the Jordaan on foot, and the bike lanes that are traffic.
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Netherlands in 6 days: Amsterdam and beyond
A city built on water and run by bicycles: Rembrandt and Van Gogh a park apart, a canal ring that turns gold at dusk, windmills seventeen minutes away — and the Anne Frank ticket war, decoded to the minute. Plus the tulip-season playbook for the 19 March–10 May window.
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London and Paris in 7 days: two capitals, one train
Three days in London, three in Paris, and a two-hour train between them. The border checks that make Eurostar feel like a flight, the two separate permissions nobody realises are separate, and why the second city should be Paris rather than the other way round.
Southern Europe
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Albania in 9 days: the Riviera, Berat and the Accursed Mountains
The last cheap corner of the Mediterranean, and it will not stay that way: Ottoman towns of stacked white windows, a ferry up a fjord-like lake into the Accursed Mountains, and a coast of clear water and empty coves — with the honest version of the driving, the bunkers, and why going in June or September matters.
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Andorra in 4 days: the Pyrenees, Romanesque churches and Europe's highest capital
A country of 468 square kilometres with no airport, no railway, two heads of state who have never both lived there, a UNESCO glacial valley covering a tenth of the land, and the visa rule that catches people out — because the one you need is not Andorra's.
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The Balkans in 12 days: Croatia, Bosnia and Montenegro by road
Lakes in sixteen terraces, a Roman emperor's palace that became a city centre, a rebuilt bridge that still means everything, a capital where four religions share a street, and a bay so enclosed people call it a fjord — three countries, one car, and borders you cross before lunch.
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Bosnia and Herzegovina in 7 days: Sarajevo, Mostar and the waterfalls
A city where a mosque, a synagogue, a Catholic and an Orthodox church stand within a few hundred metres, a bridge rebuilt stone by stone after it was destroyed, and a dervish house under a cliff where a river comes out of the rock — with the honest version of the recent history and the one warning that genuinely matters.
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Istria and northern Croatia in 7 days: Rovinj, Plitvice and Pula
Plitvice's lakes, a Roman amphitheatre at Pula, Venetian Rovinj and the truffle hills of inland Istria. Why Plitvice needs a timed ticket, what Croatia joining the euro and Schengen changed, and the truffle season that decides when to come.
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Croatia in 8 days: Dubrovnik, Split and the islands
The Adriatic's greatest hits on one Schengen visa: a walled city you circle from the ramparts, a Roman emperor's palace that never stopped being lived in, a lavender island an hour's catamaran away and waterfalls in a canyon — with the cruise-crowd clock, ferry sell-outs and sea-urchin truths the postcards skip.
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Cyprus in 8 days: Paphos mosaics, the Troodos and a divided capital
Roman floor mosaics still in the houses they were laid in, painted Byzantine churches hidden in pine forest, and the last divided capital in Europe — where you walk through a UN checkpoint in the middle of the shopping street and come out somewhere that feels like a different country.
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Santorini honeymoon in 6 days: a caldera suite and one night in Athens
Six days built around a caldera-view suite: a night in Athens on either side, the Fira–Oia walk done at the right hour, a catamaran afternoon, and the honest answer on where to stay — Oia, Imerovigli or Firostefani — and what the sunset crowd is actually like.
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Athens in 2 days: the Acropolis, the Agora and the museum
The Acropolis caps its hourly slots and the rock has no shade — so the hour you go decides the day. Plus the combined ticket that pays for itself, and the museum most visitors skip.
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Santorini in 3 days: the caldera, Oia and Akrotiri
A caldera left by one of the largest eruptions in human history, a Bronze Age town buried under it, and the clifftop walk that beats the bus. Plus how to see the Oia sunset without standing in a crowd of four thousand.
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Greece in 14 days: Athens, Delphi, Meteora, Santorini and Crete
Two weeks is where Greece stops being Athens and two islands. Delphi was the centre of the ancient world, Meteora is six monasteries on rock pillars, and Crete is big enough to be its own country. A hire car for the mainland, ferries for the rest.
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Greece in 7 days: Athens and Santorini
A week is three nights in Athens and four on Santorini — and the case for stopping at one island. The Acropolis ticket that saves money, why the ferry beats the flight only sometimes, and where on Santorini you can actually swim.
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Greece in 10 days: Athens, Mykonos and Santorini
The Aegean classic with its eyes open: the Acropolis at the 8am slot (the combo ticket is gone — new rules inside), Mykonos decoded sunbed-by-sunbed, then four Santorini days built around the caldera hike, the wine, and the truth about the Oia sunset scrum — plus the Naxos swap that halves the bill for those who'd rather have Greece than the queue.
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Sicily in 8 days: Taormina, Etna, Syracuse and the temples
A one-way loop across the island: the Greek theatre at Taormina, Etna from the south, Ortigia, the baroque towns and the Valley of the Temples, finishing in Palermo. The ZTL cameras that catch every visitor, and why you fly into one airport and out of the other.
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Rome in 3 days: the Colosseum, the Vatican and Trastevere
Ancient Rome on day one, the Vatican on day two, Baroque Rome on day three — with the three tickets that must be booked and the four Roman pastas, none of which contains cream.
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Venice in 2 days: San Marco, the Doge's Palace and the lagoon
The crowds are in about ten percent of the city and the rest is empty even in August. The access fee that now applies on peak days, the vaporetto that beats every tour boat, and why the gondola is best taken as a traghetto.
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Italy in 14 days: Rome, Naples, the Amalfi coast, Florence, Venice and Milan
Two weeks reaches Naples, Pompeii and the Amalfi coast — the part of Italy the Rome–Florence–Venice week never touches. Six stops, all by train except the coast, and an honest account of how difficult Amalfi is to get around in August.
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Italy in 5 days: Rome and Florence
Five days is Rome and Florence, not Rome, Florence and Venice. Three nights and two, one 95-minute train, and the museum bookings that have to be made months rather than weeks ahead.
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Italy in 7 days: Rome, Florence and Venice
Three cities, two train journeys, seven days. Rome needs three nights, Florence two and Venice two — and this guide explains why that split rather than the other way round, which museums to book months ahead, and the tourist tax nobody mentions.
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Italy in 10 days: Rome, Florence and Venice
The classic triangle by high-speed rail: four Roman days from the Colosseum to the Sistine ceiling, Florence's Renaissance in walking distance, then the impossible city on the water — with 2026's booking windows, Venice's new access fee, and the coperto decoded.
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Italy and Greece in 14 days: Rome, Pompeii, Matera and the ferry to Meteora
The Greek temples in southern Italy are older than most of the ones in Greece — the Greeks got there first and called it Magna Graecia. Rome, a city buried by a volcano, a town of cave dwellings, then an overnight ferry across the Adriatic to monasteries on rock pillars.
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Kosovo in 5 days: Pristina, Prizren and the Rugova canyon
Europe's newest country: an Ottoman town under a hilltop fortress, four medieval monasteries on the UNESCO list, a canyon with via ferrata routes above it, and the least visited capital on the continent — plus the border rule that catches people out.
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Malta in 7 days: Valletta, the megalithic temples and Gozo
A country 27 km long holding temples a thousand years older than the pyramids, a baroque capital built by knights after the siege of 1565, Caravaggio's only signed painting, and an underground necropolis that admits eighty people a day — with Gozo across the water for the slow half.
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Montenegro in 7 days: Kotor Bay, Durmitor and the coast
A country the size of a large county that holds a Venetian bay, Europe's deepest canyon and a photogenic island hotel: walls climbing 1,350 steps above Kotor, a serpentine road with twenty-five hairpins, and a glacial lake in a national park — with the cruise-ship timing that decides your day and the honest driving brief.
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North Macedonia in 7 days: Skopje, Matka and Lake Ohrid
A capital rebuilt twice and then dressed in statues, a canyon with one of the world's deepest underwater caves half an hour from it, and a lake three million years old with a cliff-top church that is the most photographed building in the Balkans.
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Lisbon in 3 days: Alfama, Belém and a day in Sintra
Tram 28, the Jerónimos cloister and the original pastéis de Belém — plus the earthquake that explains the street plan, which hills to avoid walking up, and why Sintra needs a timed ticket.
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Portugal in 8 days: Lisbon, Sintra and Porto
Western Europe's best-value classic: a seven-hilled city of trams and tiled facades, a fairy-tale palace on a misty ridge, then three hours north to port-wine cellars and a golden riverfront — with the timed-ticket rules, tram-28 truths and €1.40 custard-tart economics that make it all run.
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San Marino in 2 days: the three towers, Monte Titano and the oldest republic
A country that has run itself continuously since, by its own account, 301 AD — perched on a single mountain above the Adriatic plain, with three towers along its ridge and two heads of state who serve six months each.
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Serbia in 7 days: Belgrade, Novi Sad and the western hills
A fortress where the Sava meets the Danube, floating nightclubs moored to the riverbank, a narrow-gauge railway that climbs a mountain in a figure of eight, a canyon of hairpin meanders patrolled by griffon vultures, and a 12th-century monastery in white marble.
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Andalusia in 8 days: Seville, Córdoba, Granada and Ronda
The three great Moorish monuments in the order that makes sense — the Alcázar, the Mezquita, the Alhambra — then the white towns and out through Málaga. Trains for the cities, a car for the last two days, and the booking windows that decide whether this trip works at all.
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Barcelona in 3 days: Sagrada Família, the Gothic Quarter and Montjuïc
Every Gaudí site needs a timed ticket bought ahead, the Gothic Quarter is best early, and Las Ramblas is a pickpocket's office. Plus the tower lift that only goes one way and the markets worth the detour.
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Madrid in 3 days: the Prado, the Royal Palace and a day in Toledo
Three world-class galleries inside a ten-minute walk, all free in the last two hours. Plus why Madrid eats at 22:00, which day trip to pick, and the Egyptian temple that is the best sunset in the city.
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Spain in 10 days: Barcelona, Madrid and Seville
The great Spanish triangle by high-speed rail — Gaudí's just-completed masterpiece, Madrid's golden art mile and a Toledo day, then Seville's Alcázar and flamenco — three Spains, two trains, one open-jaw ticket.
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Spain and Portugal in 12 days: Barcelona, Madrid, Seville, Lisbon and Porto
The Iberian peninsula end to end: Gaudí's unfinished basilica, the Prado's Velázquezes, a Moorish palace Christian kings kept building, a city of tiles and fado, and the port lodges across the Douro — joined by trains fast enough to make it one trip rather than two.
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Turkey and Greece in 14 days: Istanbul, Cappadocia, Ephesus and the Aegean islands
A city on two continents, balloons over carved rock valleys, a Roman library facade in Anatolia, and then a ninety-minute boat to the Greek islands — the Aegean crossing almost nobody realises is that easy.
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Vatican City in 2 days: St Peter's, the Sistine Chapel and the Scavi
Forty-nine hectares holding Michelangelo's ceiling, Bernini's colonnade and a necropolis under the high altar — reached from a Rome hotel, because there is nowhere to stay and no border to cross.
Central Europe
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Vienna in 2 days: the Hofburg, Schönbrunn and the coffee houses
The Imperial Treasury, Klimt's Kiss, and Schönbrunn's gardens — plus the coffee-house custom that expects you to stay two hours, and the Staatsoper standing tickets that cost less than lunch.
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Austria in 9 days: Vienna, Hallstatt and Salzburg
The empire, the lake village and the Sound of Music: four Viennese days of palaces, Klimt and €15 opera (the standing-ticket hack), a night in Hallstatt so you own it at dawn, then Salzburg's fortress and singing hills — with the café-culture rulebook and the ferry arrival that built a million posts.
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Eastern Europe on a budget in 14 days: Prague, Kraków and Budapest
Hostels, milk bars and intercity coaches across three countries that still cost a fraction of Western Europe. Three currencies and none of them the euro, the free walking tours that are not free, and the one day trip that should not be done on the cheap.
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Central Europe in 10 days: Prague, Vienna and Budapest
The classic European rail triangle, done at a pace that lets each city breathe: Prague's castle-and-bridge morning, Vienna's coffee houses and palace halls, Budapest's thermal baths and its river lit gold at night — three countries, three currencies, one Schengen visa and two four-hour trains.
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Prague in 3 days: the Old Town, the Castle and Vyšehrad
Charles Bridge at six in the morning is a different bridge, the Castle is a complex rather than a building, and Vyšehrad is the fortress almost nobody climbs. Plus the currency-exchange scam and the restaurants that still bring unasked-for bread.
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Czech Republic in 7 days: Prague and Český Krumlov
Europe's best-preserved fairy tale: a castle city the wars forgot to bomb, a bridge worth waking at dawn for, a church decorated with forty thousand people's bones — and an overnight in Český Krumlov after the tour buses leave, all on one Schengen visa and Emirates' Prague non-stop.
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Germany and Austria in 12 days: Munich, Neuschwanstein, the Tyrol, Salzburg and Vienna
A fairytale castle built by a king who drowned before it was finished, an Alpine valley with the best road in Europe running through it, a lake village that half of Asia has seen a photograph of, and Vienna at the end — where the coffee houses are UNESCO-listed and mean it.
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Budapest in 3 days: Buda Castle, the baths and the ruin bars
Buda is the hill and Pest is the flat, and the river between them is the point. The baths that are open at six in the morning, the Parliament tour that must be booked, and the shoes on the embankment.
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Hungary in 6 days: Budapest and the Danube Bend
The most dramatic riverfront in Europe, and you can swim in it — well, in its hot springs: Parliament by night cruise, a castle district with free-before-9am turret views, outdoor thermal pools steaming at 38°C, ruin bars in pre-war tenements — plus the artists' village up the Danube, all on low-cost flights from across Europe and the Gulf.
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Liechtenstein in 2 days: Vaduz, the Fürstensteig and a passport stamp you pay for
A hundred and sixty square kilometres between Switzerland and Austria, run by a prince who still has real constitutional power, with a vineyard above the capital and a mountain trail cut into a rock face.
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Poland in 7 days: Kraków and Warsaw
Europe's best-value great city and its phoenix capital: a medieval square with an hourly trumpet that stops mid-note, a salt cathedral 100 metres underground, history's heaviest day trip handled with respect — and a capital rebuilt brick-by-brick from photographs. On flydubai directs, at złoty prices.
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Slovakia in 7 days: Bratislava, the High Tatras and Spiš
The smallest high-mountain range in the world, a silver-mining town that funded an empire, one of the largest castle complexes in Europe, and the tallest wooden Gothic altar anywhere — in a country most people only see from a Danube cruise deck.
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Slovenia in 6 days: Ljubljana, Bled and the caves
Europe's pocket fairy tale: a church on an island in a glacier-green lake, a castle in a cliff's mouth, a capital guarded by dragons and a cave with its own railway — all inside a country you can cross in two hours, on one Schengen visa, for a round €1,000 a head.
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Switzerland honeymoon in 7 days: lake towns and the panoramic trains
The slower Swiss week: two nights each in Lucerne, the Lauterbrunnen valley and Montreux, joined by lake steamers and the GoldenPass line. Zermatt comes out — one fewer move buys you two unhurried evenings, and the Matterhorn is a long way from everything else.
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Switzerland in winter: Jungfraujoch, Zermatt and the snow trains
The winter version of the classic Swiss route: Lucerne and a Christmas market, two nights under the Eiger at Grindelwald with Jungfraujoch and a sledge run, and two in car-free Zermatt for Gornergrat and a ski day. Which mountain railways close in winter, which do not, and what the Travel Pass actually covers.
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Switzerland with kids in 8 days: trains, playgrounds and easy ridges
Three bases in eight days, joined by trains and lake boats that children treat as rides. The summit excursions cut to one, the hiking swapped for buggy-friendly ridge paths and toboggan runs, and an honest look at which mountain railway is worth the money with a four-year-old.
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Switzerland in 5 days: Zurich, Lucerne and Interlaken
Five days is Zurich, Lucerne and the Jungfrau valley — three stops on one rail line. Zermatt is left out deliberately, the Travel Pass arithmetic changes at this length, and the summit excursion is a weather gamble worth planning around rather than booking.
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Switzerland in 7 days: Zurich, Lucerne, Interlaken and Zermatt
A week of lakes and mountains, entirely by train. The Swiss Travel Pass arithmetic that decides the budget, which summit excursion is worth its very high price, and why Zermatt is car-free and what that means for arriving.
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Switzerland in 10 days: Lucerne, the Jungfrau and Zermatt
The rail-perfect classic: Lucerne's lake and a revolving cable car, four Jungfrau days from the Top of Europe to Lauterbrunnen's 72 waterfalls, then the Matterhorn filling a sunrise train window — with the Swiss Travel Pass maths that tames Europe's priciest country, the picnic strategy that halves the food bill, and the weather rule that saves the big-ticket days.
Northern Europe
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The Baltics in 8 days: Tallinn, Riga and Vilnius
Three capitals, three countries, one Schengen visa and Europe's friendliest prices: Tallinn's fairy-tale walls, Riga's art-nouveau streets and zeppelin-hangar market, Vilnius' baroque lanes and a castle on a lake island — stitched together by comfortable four-hour coaches.
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Britain and Ireland in 14 days: London, the Highlands, the Causeway and the Wild Atlantic Way
South to north and then west: a capital of museums, Georgian Bath, a castle on a rock, single-track roads through the Highlands, 40,000 basalt columns on a County Antrim shore, and cliffs with the Atlantic at the bottom of them.
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Denmark in 6 days: Copenhagen and the coast
The most liveable capital in Europe, seen the way it was built to be seen — from a bicycle: harbour baths you swim in mid-city, a palace-lined waterfront, Hamlet's castle up the coast and five Viking ships raised from a fjord, plus the honest version of what hygge and Danish prices actually mean.
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Estonia in 7 days: Tallinn, Lahemaa and Tartu
The most complete medieval old town in northern Europe, a national park of bogs and abandoned Soviet submarine bases an hour away, and a university town that reads like a smaller, cleverer Prague — in a country the size of Switzerland with the population of Birmingham.
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Finland in 6 days: Rovaniemi and the real Santa
The Arctic Circle trip that makes adults believe again: meeting Santa is genuinely free, huskies genuinely fly, the night train has bunk beds and reindeer traffic — and the northern lights need four nights and honest odds. Lapland in December, decoded, with the booking calendar that starts NOW.
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Iceland in winter in 6 days: northern lights and ice caves
The south coast between November and March, when the ice caves open and the aurora is visible. Four hours of daylight, the wind that rips car doors off, road.is before every drive, and why the itinerary has to be written in pencil.
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Iceland in 8 days: the Golden Circle and south coast
The planet showing off: erupting geysers, waterfalls you walk behind, a black beach with deadly manners, icebergs drifting to a diamond shore — one rental car, one road, eight days. With the visa quirk, the wind-vs-car-door economics and the grocery-store survival system that makes Earth's priciest island affordable.
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Iceland and Norway in 10 days: the south coast, and the lights from Tromsø
Five days driving Iceland's south coast, then four inside the Arctic Circle at Tromsø. Why two countries doubles your odds on the one thing nobody can book, what Icelandic car hire insurance actually needs to cover, and the months this works at all.
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Ireland in 7 days: Dublin, Galway and the wild west
The friendliest country in Europe and its wildest coastline: a 1,200-year-old book in a Harry Potter library, cliffs that drop 214 metres into the Atlantic, fiddle sessions in painted pubs — and the visa trick nobody tells Indians: a UK visit visa can cover Ireland too.
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Lapland in 10 days: Rovaniemi, the aurora, Tromsø and the Icehotel
Finland for the glass igloos and the huskies, Norway for the fjord under the aurora oval, Sweden for a hotel rebuilt out of river ice every December — three countries that share one Arctic and sell it quite differently.
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Latvia in 7 days: Riga, Sigulda and Kuldīga
The world's densest art-nouveau district, a food market built inside four WWI zeppelin hangars, a castle-strewn river valley an hour inland, and Europe's widest waterfall in a brick-and-timber town almost nobody has heard of.
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Lithuania in 7 days: Vilnius, Kaunas and the Curonian Spit
A baroque capital with a breakaway artists' republic inside it, an island castle on a lake, an interwar city that is now a UNESCO modernist listing, a hill carrying two hundred thousand crosses, and sand dunes you can climb on a spit between a lagoon and the sea.
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Lofoten in 8 days: Arctic beaches and the midnight sun
The archipelago where granite peaks drop straight into turquoise water, done in summer when the sun never sets. The car ferry that needs booking, the Reinebringen steps, why a rorbu is worth it, and what Norwegian prices actually do to a budget.
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Norway in 7 days: Oslo, the fjords and Bergen
The world's most beautiful commute: a mountain-crossing railway, a branch line that falls off a cliff into a fjord village, an electric boat gliding through a UNESCO waterway one kilometre deep in cliffs — Oslo to Bergen the famous way, with the 90-day minipris trick and the packed-lunch economics that tame Norwegian prices.
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Scandinavia in 12 days: Copenhagen, Stockholm, Oslo and the Norway fjords by train
Design, archipelagos and a fjord: Copenhagen's harbour baths and smørrebrød, Stockholm spread over fourteen islands, Oslo's new waterfront, and then the Bergen railway over the roof of Norway and down to a village at the end of an arm of the sea.
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Sweden in 7 days: Stockholm and the archipelago
A capital built across fourteen islands with thirty thousand more on its doorstep: a warship raised whole from the harbour, an old town of ochre lanes, a ferry out to red cottages and swimming rocks — plus the cashless reality, the fika habit and why the long summer evenings are the whole argument for going.
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Scotland in 7 days: Edinburgh, Glencoe and the Isle of Skye
Edinburgh first, then a car north through Glencoe to Skye and back by Loch Ness. The single-track road etiquette, the midge season, why Skye beds book out six months ahead, and what the weather actually does to a plan.
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London in 3 days: Westminster, the Tower and the museums
The ETA that now applies to almost everyone, the Tower at opening, and the national museums that cost nothing. Plus the Oyster cap that makes a travelcard pointless and which markets run on which days.
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United Kingdom in 10 days: London and Edinburgh
England and Scotland by one fast train: six London days from the Crown Jewels to the Harry Potter studios (with the free-museum trick that halves the budget), then up the coast to Edinburgh's castle crag, a Highlands day among lochs and hairy coos — plus the £127 visa maths and the service-charge decoder.
Eastern Europe
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Belarus in 6 days: Mir, Nesvizh and the last primeval forest in Europe
Renaissance castles, a fortress that held out in 1941, and the last fragment of the forest that once covered the European plain — in a country most governments now advise against visiting, for reasons this guide sets out before anything else.
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Bulgaria in 8 days: Sofia, Plovdiv and the Rila mountains
One of Europe's oldest continuously inhabited cities, a monastery of painted arcades under 2,900-metre peaks, and a medieval capital stacked on a river gorge — with the Cyrillic that was invented here, the head-shake that means the opposite of what you think, and prices that are the lowest in the EU.
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Moldova in 5 days: wine cellars, a cave monastery and Europe's least visited country
Two hundred kilometres of limestone tunnels holding the largest wine collection on earth, a monastery dug into a cliff above a river bend, a breakaway republic with its own non-convertible currency, and the cheapest week in Europe — in the country fewer people visit than any other on the continent.
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Romania in 8 days: Transylvania, Bucharest and the mountains
Saxon towns with watchtowers and pastel squares, fortified churches in villages that have not changed in centuries, a mountain road engineered by a dictator's vanity, and the castle everyone calls Dracula's — with the honest version of that story, the driving, and why Romania is the best-value country in the EU.
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Russia in 10 days: Moscow, St Petersburg and the Arctic
Two imperial capitals and the Arctic Circle in one trip — Red Square, the Hermitage, and hunting the northern lights in Murmansk, with the payment, SIM and e-visa rules that make or break a Russia trip in 2026.
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Russia beyond the capitals: Golden Ring to Kazan in 9 days
The Russia most visitors never see — monastery towns of the Golden Ring, the Volga at Nizhny Novgorod, and Tatar Kazan — strung along one eastward rail line with no backtracking.
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Siberian winter: Baikal ice, the Trans-Siberian and the coldest village on Earth
A February expedition across Russia's deep winter — a night on the Trans-Siberian through the taiga, the blue ice of frozen Lake Baikal, and the road to Oymyakon, the coldest inhabited place on Earth.
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Ukraine in 7 days: Kyiv, Lviv and the Carpathians — and why not yet
A country at war. This is not an invitation to go: most governments advise against all travel, the airspace is closed and there is no safe region. It is a record of what Ukraine holds, written for whenever travel becomes advisable again.
