What I learned on our family’s 9-day 3-city trip to Europe

How about a “9-day 3-city trip to Europe”? My husband always jokes that when I plan our trips that I try to cram in as many cities and things to do as possible (after all, time is money, and we don’t have unlimited time or money for our trips!). So even though we are often hitting more than one city and filling our days with sightseeing during our all of vacations, I knew that I was going to be met with a bit of eye rolling when I suggested the itinerary with two boys under 10.  However, with a combination of planning, flexibility and an adventurous spirit, you, too, can have an awesome European adventure. Here are some key learnings from our whirlwind trip to Copenhagen, Paris and Amsterdam in early June.

9-day 3-city trip – Paris

1. PLANNING A VERY DETAILED ITINERARY SAVES YOU TIME AND ENSURES YOU HIT THE MUST-SEE ATTRACTIONS: This sounds obvious, but generally, I list out all the things we want to do and then determine when we see them and other details on the fly. However, this trip, I was very specific. I even planned what type of transportation we would use to get from place to place (Uber, subway, train or walk).  Research things to do by checking city visitor web sites and scan family travel blogs. This may be self-promotion, but family travel blogs truly are one of the best places to get tips and tricks and determine what works and what doesn’t with kids because they have already laid the groundwork for you. For example, through a couple of blogs I read, I learned that purchasing Eiffel Tower tickets months in advance is critical in order to guarantee a time to go up into the iconic landmark (and this was true as we by-passed long lines and waits by doing so). By pre-determining our day-to-day plans, it left less up in the air and avoided arguments about what to do and when to do it. And, it created some build up and excitement for the boys when they knew what the agenda for the day was going to be.
2. KEEP YOUR DESTINATIONS RELATIVELY CLOSE – In hindsight, I would have chosen three cities a little closer together. Paris to Amsterdam was a breeze because of the fabulous 3 hour 15 minute express train, but we flew between the other routes (Amsterdam to Copenhagen and Copenhagen to Paris). While the flights were less than two hours, we still needed to account for time to get to the airports from our apartments, time to check in and then we experienced some short delays (which ended up being six to seven hours per stop).  In the future, I would opt for a maximum of four hours between stops, particularly for a trip that’s less than 10 days.  We adored Copenhagen, but a Paris–Brussels-Amsterdam trip would have been easier, and we would have had more time to explore the cities.
   

   9-day 3-city trip train from Malmo, Sweden to Copenhagen

3. CARRY LOCAL CURRENCY ON YOUR PERSON – I should know better, but I didn’t do it for much of the trip. I had U.S. currency the whole time, but never got any Danish krone or Swedish krona (for our day trip to Malmo). Nick carried the cash, and at times, I was walking somewhere without him. I corrected it once we got to Paris and always had Euros with me after that. There are plenty of places were credit cards work, but cash is still king in Europe (and you avoid credit card fees).  Pick up some cash at at the money exchange at the airport or get some from an ATM in country, but do keep some local cash with you at all times.
4. GO WITH THE FLOW. One morning, Alex wasn’t feeling well. We were scheduled to go on a boat tour of Copenhagen (highly recommend). So, Nick and Nate went ahead to the boat, and I stayed at the apartment with Alex and nursed him back to his chipper little self by making some pasta and giving him apple juice (his two favorites). We were able to hook back up with Nick and Nate about an hour and a half later and continue on with our day of sightseeing. He still wanted to do the boat ride, so we just went on the tour after dinner. The benefit of Scandanavia in summer – it’s light outside until 10pm!  It’s easy to force a schedule, but more enjoyable and practical to roll with the punches.
   

   9-day 3-city trip Copenhagen

5. YOU CAN PACK HALF AS MUCH AS YOU THINK AND SURVIVE: We packed half as much as we normally do (each of us had a backpack, and we had one carry on), and did not run out of clothes.  The caveat is that I did hand-wash some items the first couple of days of the trip, but it didn’t take long and it was definitely worth it (and even easier if you stay somewhere with laundry facilities). I mistakenly thought that our first apartment had a washer and dryer, which would’ve been even easier, but honestly, soaking clothes in some Woolite and rinsing them in a sink and hanging to dry was easy. The other reason that we were able to pack half as much was because my new backpack holds an incredible amount of gear, but balances the weight so it never feels too heavy, and we used packing cubes which worked incredibly well for saving space and keeping everything organized.
   

   9-day 3-city trip – do some laundry

There’s no question that traveling with kids can be stressful, especially when you’re constantly on-the-go and taking planes, trains and automobiles from place to place — and journeying on a 9-day 3-city trip to Europe extravaganza.  It’s inevitable that not everything will go as planned, but take some of these notes into consideration, and you’ll have a family vacation that you’ll remember forever.