Europe: A Backpacking Paradise!

This page talks about Frequently Asked Questions and is continuously updated…Here are some questions i have been always asked..If you have any specific question do email me or leave a comment on this page. I will definitely get back.
Thanks.

• How easy or difficult is it for married couples to Backpack?

It really is pretty simple for married couple to do this. Infact i have arranged for few couples recently and helped them with all their logistics.

But the whole point would be to decide whether you and your spouse want such a trip. Backpacking is a whole new experience but in order to have that experience and in order to make it cost effective one might have to do things differently.
For example one might have to stay in youth hostels. If you are ready to pay extra, than hotels or B&Bs (Bed and Breakfasts) should be fine. But individually booking hotels in Europe can become costly especially in places like London and Paris. This problem of accommodation would not be faced if you go via conducted tour approach. But then the fun is lost as you will be following their schedule without any flexibility and at the end of the trip you may not even remember much of what you saw or did. So each approach has its own pros and cons.

Anyway coming back to the question – the question one should ask oneself is whether one is ok with such an adventure, what is the time-line and what kind of budget one is looking at. Everything else can be taken care of. As far as couples staying in youth hostels (say staying in mixed dormitories) and moving around in Europe goes – it’s very common there. As long as we are comfortable and fine with it, everything else is seamless. It’s common and doable.

• The approximate cost of travel

It would depend on how many days you want to travel, what you want to do during those days and which places you want to visit. For ex: If you are traveling to London or Paris the cost would be much more than say to places like Berlin, Munich etc..
Also places like Interlaken in Switzerland you would want to hike/ski/Para-glide or Para-sail etc..Obviously that would cost extra.

So without knowing what is it that you would want to do and where you want to go, giving a cost would mislead you. I would still say on an average you would need approximately 100 Euros for most things (accommodation, food, entry tickets and other extra-curricular activities). But this is without travel expenditure and is just an approximate. One can easily reduce it or increase it.

• How about safety for girls who want to backpack?

If you want to feel safe, than Europe is the place. I am not saying it’s a haven where a girl can be carefree. But what I am saying is there are places where you have to be cautious (I can list them for you) and there are places within cities where you need to be careful not to venture alone in the night (again there are few places like these) but otherwise they are pretty safe. Also one has to be careful while traveling so that one doesn’t land at a new place bang in the middle of the night. So some amount of planning has to go into it in this direction. This holds good for both boys and girls and that’s what even I followed when I traveled. It made my entire trip incident free.
The point is – Europe is pretty safe as long as you know where the limits are and believe me the limits for these places is beyond the limits that we impose on ourselves in India.

• Best time to travel

That would be June, July, Aug…September winter starts…March onwards would be when Summer begins. But again it also depends on where you want to go and what you want to do as the best time to visit vary depends on the country you are visiting….Like if you are keen on winter sports then winter is the season to be there..:)

• What is the approximate preparation time for backpacking?

The time required would be few weeks to get the itinerary in place, get the bookings done for travel (to-fro and within Europe), accommodation (youth hostels etc), and to decide what to do in those places etc..

• Visa

The visa office requests you to send an application at-least 1 month in advance with all the bookings, itinerary etc…But i have seen people get their visa in 7-10 days. But when you are spending and putting in so much efforts you don’t want the visa process to get too close for comfort.

• My cost for services?

It totally depends on several factors and it’s too early to comment. All I can say is I will not be costly/exorbitant considering that backpackers are people who want to experience everything with the least amount of money (I am one of them..:))

• Places of interest or country specific information:

I can actually talk about this for hours..:) But to just give you a brief idea of what to expect – I would say it will definitely well beyond your imagination. At-least that was my personal experience.

For you to make your travel cost effective and to make the trip worthwhile I would suggest you to spend at least 2-4 weeks backpacking. 3 or more would be ideal.

Each country is unique in its own way and its very difficult to express in words or even compare. Once you get away from the standard tourist destinations or ticked away those museums you will actually see/feel the town/city.
London is beautiful. Paris is metropolitan and trendy. Berlin is amazing. Amsterdam will be far beyond your imagination. Freiburg (Black Forests in Germany) is heavenly. And what do I say about Switzerland that you haven’t heard of? Venice, Rome etc are all too good. Each one has its own characteristic and the opinions you make of it will totally depend on what you have experienced there.

I am sure once you are done backpacking you will be able to feel/convey/write much more than what I have written here…Makes you want to go again and again..:)