9 Rules for Summer Travel: Europe with Kids
If you’ve been dreaming of going to Europe with your family but are overwhelmed by the logistics of planning a trip of that magnitude, I promise: you can do it
When I told people about our 18-day, June 2022 trip to Italy and Greece, the most common response was:
“I wouldn’t even know where to start.”
Which is exactly how I felt. I knew nothing about method of travel between destinations, how many stops were too many, how to find good restaurants, good anything.
And the idea of moving our family of five (kids aged 11, 13 and 16) across two countries put my brain in skip mode.
I just wanted someone to do it for me,
so I contacted a travel agent.
But then two things happened:
One, the travel agent was traveling, like everyone else as COVID restrictions lifted, so the days ticked by with no progress as hotels and Airbnbs filled up.
Two, when she finally sent an itinerary for Greece, it was twice our budget – not including airfare. And it didn’t hit any of the notes I had fantasized about for the past two years.
If you want an amazing trip,
define what that means to each member of your family.
And then find those experiences.
I wanted boutique hotels and Airbnbs in the quaint spots splashed all over Instagram.
I wanted the kids to see the Acropolis, Colosseum, Vatican and Pompeii.
The kids wanted to swim.
My oldest wanted to see those blue domes in Santorini, the mountain stacked with colorful houses rising straight up out of the sea in Positano, the whitewashed streets in Naxos and the idyllic Tuscan countryside.
My middle wanted to jump from high things into the water.
And my youngest was good with all of it – and at times none of it.
Our departure date got closer and we still had no firm plans.
It was more stressful waiting for the travel agent to send the itinerary than if I just did it myself.
So I cut her loose and dove in: I sat with friends who had just moved back from Italy – map in front of us – and calculated distances between places we wanted to go; ran ideas past a Greek woman who put itineraries together for her friends; and joined a Facebook group (Greece Travel Secrets) and followed IG accounts (like The Little Basket) to get inspired.
Over the next few weeks, I narrowed down the places we had to go, the parts of town we’d like to stay in the most and how we’d travel between destinations.
I made some mistakes (like not booking our high-speed train from Rome
to Florence soon enough) and some good choices (like booking a SUPER reasonable, no-frills, but perfect-anyway place in Tuscany with a beautiful pool surrounded by Cypress trees as our first stop).
After each leg of our trip, I took stock of how I could’ve improved on the logistics and those realizations became my new rules. The following are based on what I did well and what I would do differently to make the next trip even better.
THE TRAVEL RULES
1. You can’t see it all. Choose what makes sense and keep the rest for a future trip.
You want to see everything but trying to fit in too much means you’ll spend more time in transit than enjoying the experience. We didn’t go to Venice…and I don’t know if you’ve heard but, it might sink – so the pressure to see it was strong.
But the Amalfi coast was a must and travel time to go that far north and then that far south would’ve cut into our time in Rome. I was ok with skipping Venice when I thought in geographical terms: save Northern Italy (and maybe Southern France?) for 2024.
2. Start big and work your way to the details.
None of it matters if you’re not there so book tickets first (if you’re flexible on dates, you could save a few hundred dollars on airfare). Then move onto accommodations, how you’ll get between destinations – ferry, train, private transfer – then to restaurants and finally tours (or tours first, depending on what’s important to you).
Three nights at each stop was just right for us. Some people prefer a home base do day trips; we liked immersing ourselves in a region and then moving on. Figure out the best fit for your family’s collective temperament.
When going from region to region, consider travel time as well as check out and check in time. If you’re taking an early train, think about getting to the station – with luggage.
When planning our Rome to Positano leg with a stop at Pompeii, I found a train + second train + bus option that left at about 7 am. I even planned on taking a bus to the train station. Easy. Once in Rome I realized that was literally the worst plan I could’ve come up with.
But a private transfer was 10X the cost of the bus + train + train + bus option. In the end I decided the amount of hustle needed to make that work was not worth it. I booked the private transfer in the air conditioned Metris – and it was the second best decision on that trip.
3. Access to water is a must, especially in a city.
My experience of European cities in the summer is that they are hot. Every time I’ve visited, it’s been during a heat wave. “Record temperatures” they say, “highs like we’ve never seen before” (except the last time I was there I guess). The only way to keep my family happy in excessive heat is by getting in the water.
We hit Rome and it was stunning just how hot it was. My normally cheerful oldest daughter was just about to lose it before we retreated to the air-conditioned Airbnb (which spurred the next three rules). I thought about hiding from the heat in that little apartment for the next two days and decided I’d rather bail Rome. We needed to get into water.
We found two rooms on Hotel Tonight at a hotel with a pool – at what would become the best decision of the trip – Palazzo Dama. I questioned the wisdom of bailing on accommodations that were paid for and going to a place that exceeded my budget five times over but once I decided to spend the money, everything flowed easily for us.
4. Spend the money.
Pay now or pay later. Cheap is expensive. Either one of those adages fits here. I’m not extravagant. The Airbnbs and hotels I’d booked were very modest. But modest can be depressing.
This is the time to spend the money. You’ve already invested so much in getting there, don’t deprive yourself of experiences once you’re there. And a nice place to stay is one of the best experiences of all.
I canceled the questionable places – and lost the cash, which wasn’t much because they were so modest – and booked 4-star boutique hotels on the fly.
I’ve been carrying the key card folder from Palazzo Dama in my bag for the past year. That’s how much of a shift occurred with that one decision.
5. No Airbnbs – unless you need to do laundry. Then make sure you stay long enough for clothes to air dry because no one has dryers.
The Airbnb in Rome was shabby. But it had great reviews…about the nice host (he was so nice) and the great location (really close to Spanish Steps). And all I kept thinking was, but the reviews were so great!
Later the friend who had lived in Italy for two years explained that excessive praise for the host and the location usually meant the property itself was subpar. Can confirm.
And the whole “staying like a local” thing? Nothing will make you feel like more of an outsider than standing on a corner, surrounded by your luggage, as you check the address in your What’s App convo with your host against the address on the building.
On our first morning in Rome, the girls and I stopped at the cafe across the street from the apartment for a cappuccino and fresh squeezed orange juice. We saw a family exit the building we were staying in, huddled together, blinking against the sun, looking left and then looking at the phone for, what I assume was, directions to the Spanish Steps. My daughter said, “Is that what we look like?” Yes. It is.
Stay in a hotel where everyone is a tourist and enjoy the experience without feeling like you need to blend in. Plus you’ll get the beautiful European breakfast. That alone is worth it.
I kept one Airbnb on Capri because it was the halfway point of the trip and we needed the washing machine. It had 10 million-dollar view but about 3 million steps to get there – and was the only place we didn’t love.
6. Make your first stop a place where you won’t feel like you’re wasting time by resting.
I’ve traveled a decent amount. Never was I as destroyed by jet lag as when we landed in Italy. It didn’t help that all the high-speed trains to Florence were booked, which meant we had to drive 3.5 hours after an international flight. In a stick shift, which my husband hadn’t driven in a decade, because when I reserved the car, from the comfort of my couch a few weeks earlier, I thought it would be a fun surprise.
(Pro tip: those signs letting you know speed is checked by aircraft? It really is. We received nearly 1,000.00 in speeding violations a month or so after we got home.)
By the time we got to Tuscany, all I wanted to do was get in the pool. There’s a lot of pressure to make the most of the short time you have in these amazing places, but stretched out on the chaise under the umbrella, taking in the rolling hills, the quiet, the peace, the trees – it was so perfect being there it didn’t matter that we didn’t make it to Pisa or Lucca – my overly ambitious plans for our first day.
7. When planning a trip, make sure you don’t have tunnel vision.
We flew into Rome because that’s what the travel agent recommended. The logistics of landing in Rome, getting to Florence and then back to Rome kept me up at night. But Rome it was, because that’s what she said.
While I contemplated the time we’d need to clear passport control, all the high-speed trains to Florence filled up. So our only choice was to drive.
But what if we’d just flown into Florence? Once you have a plan in mind, scrap it. Flip it. Reverse it. Make sure coming from the north isn’t better than the south; see if a ferry is better than a plane; determine if maybe a day trip is better than two nights.
8. If it’s between an extra day or a nicer place to stay, choose the nicer place to stay.
There are two types of travelers: those who think where you stay is just a place to sleep, and those who know better.
I was firmly in the first camp when I booked our trip. We would have so much fun no one would care where we stayed!
After the Rome Airbnb, I took a long hard look at my beliefs about money, what experiences were worth, how I valued the memories I was creating with my children and the difference between spoiling them and honoring them.
Being in ugly surroundings is defeating. I didn’t realize how defeating until we walked into Palazzo Dama and they stood up straighter with a more energy and excitement.
9. Prepare your kids for what they’ll see and do.
Talk about the places you’ll visit, the architecture, the achievements of those civilizations. But also tell them about the heat, the walking, the tours and what you expect from them.
Even though you’re gifting them with an amazing experience that will broaden their horizons, climbing ancient ruins in 100+ degree weather is intense, so thank them for being troopers, let them know how much it means to you to be able to experience this with them. And, of course, build in breaks at cafes under misters for ice-cold Cokes.
