r/SlowTravelEurope

Which one would you recommend first, and what made it worth the trip?

If you've been, what made it worth the trip... or what didn't?

Or is it better as a day trip? Curious how people experienced it. Please no short answers.

When did it start to feel like you'd settled in rather than just seeing the highlights?

Of all the 20 arrondissements, which one do you like spending time in the most?

If you've stayed on both sides, which felt more like your kind of Paris? I'd love to hear why.

I 27F have just finished a few nights in Amsterdam before returning home, and I can’t help but feel underwhelmed and just “meh” when it comes to visiting cities, especially capitals. I think I am growing and changing my priorities. A lot of cities have an atmosphere of indulgence, consumerism, hedonism, etc. Do your thing! But I think I have moved on.

I am thinking of pivoting to travel focused on small cities/towns, nature, non-strenuous hikes, swimming (quiet beaches, lakes, swimming holes), and maybe camping. I’m not an experienced outdoorsy person, so maybe I’d join groups for these activities vs doing solo. Please share any resources or reccs if you have them!

I have realized a lot of my favorite travel memories include leaving the city. For example, Howth cliff walk in Ireland, San Juan de Gaztelugatxe in País Basco, and a Scottish highlands tour.

Cities I’ve really loved: Edinburgh, Madrid, Prague, Bilbao, Munich

Cities I felt meh: Vienna, Amsterdam, Manchester.

Basically I’d just love some insight on how to switch up my travel style, any particular suggestions or fond memories you have. Trying to embrace the overly stimulated nature of myself. Thanks!

Hello, I am in germany and I want to visit 5 countries in Europe in 15 days, Belgium, France, Italy, Switzerland and Austria... I want to start in colonge and end in Munich... I know it sounds rush but I really want to go everywhere.

My mistake:

1. Tried to do my own schedule but I ended up visiting only the capitals so I want other beautiful, cheaper and safer cities in the same country (I will visit the capitals for an hour or 2 only just the big attractions)

2. Have a budget of 70-80€ daily, and that should includes the transportation and accommodation as well

3. Don't have a background about Europe

4. Alone

I keep hearing people compare these two. For those who've been, what made one stand out for you? And, did you have a favourite?

If you've visited both, what is one thing you liked and disliked about each?

My husband (both 30) and I will be living in Porto for a month followed by Florence for a month. Looking for any recommendations of cities we could take a day trip or night trip to outside of those main cities! We have a week in between places so if you have somewhere we should go for that time let me know. We both love to just chill and vibe, don’t need to see all the attractions. Thanks!!

Venice can't be done in a day. I know it's tempting to squeeze it into a quick stop on a longer Italy trip, or a few hours off a cruise ship, but that's genuinely the worst way to experience this city. Venice rewards slowness. It needs to be lived in, not just photographed. I've been back many times over the years and I still find new corners every visit. Here's what I've learned, for anyone who wants to go beyond the postcard version.

WHAT NOT TO DO

Avoid St. Mark's Square, Palazzo Ducale and Riva degli Schiavoni during the middle of the day. They're packed with tour groups moving in herds, restaurants built for people who'll never come back, and queues that eat hours of your day. They're worth seeing, but they are not Venice. They're Venice's front window, built for people who only have one day.

Pick three monuments and stop there. Trying to see everything turns Venice into a checklist, and a checklist is the fastest way to burn out and remember nothing. I'd suggest Teatro La Fenice, the Arsenale, and Palazzo Ducale. If you have any interest in contemporary art, the Biennale gardens are worth visiting on their own, regardless of what's on show that year. The bar there alone makes the detour worthwhile.

WHAT TO DO INSTEAD

Spend real time in Campo Santa Fosca. Sit, eat, drink, and read up on Paolo Sarpi while you're there. He was a Venetian friar, scientist and the Republic's chief theological and political advisor in the early 1600s, a friend of Galileo, and a fierce defender of Venetian independence during the papal Interdict of 1606 to 1607. In October 1607, assassins sent from Rome ambushed him on the bridge right by this square and stabbed him three times. He survived. There's a statue of him in the campo today, a few steps from where it happened. Knowing the story changes how the square feels.

Check if Harry's Bar is open before heading over, it's not always.

Eat at Al Tagier right by Zattere, hands down the best bacaro in the city.

Go to the Cannaregio market on a weekend morning. Get there by traghetto (the gondolon) from San Polo, a nice way to cross and cheaper than people expect.

Visit the Jewish Ghetto. It dates back to the early 1500s and carries centuries of Venetian Jewish history. If you can, talk to people from the current community, there's still an active presence there. Have lunch at Gam Gam (kosher), book ahead, it gets full. Coming out of the ghetto, turn right and keep walking into the residential quarter beyond it, away from the main tourist flow. There's a café with a lagoon view worth the detour.

Visit the Peggy Guggenheim Collection, mainly for the Magrittes if modern art isn't usually your thing, that room alone is worth the ticket.

Walk from the Accademia to Punta della Dogana. Short walk, and the view from the tip, where the Grand Canal meets the lagoon, is one of the best in the city and almost always quieter than you'd expect.

Also worth seeking out: San Giorgio Maggiore, the island of Giudecca, and two of the best bookshops in the city, Libreria Acqua Alta (yes, the one with the gondola full of books) and Libreria Marco Polo.

ON BACARI: VENICE'S REAL SOCIAL LIFE

If you only take one thing from this post, take this. A bacaro is a small, no-frills Venetian wine bar, the local answer to a tapas bar, but older and rougher around the edges. The name comes from "far bacara," old Venetian dialect for going out for a drink. There's no real translation that captures it.

The ritual: you stand at the counter (sitting is rare and often costs more), order an ombra (a small glass of wine, literally "shadow," from the old habit of vendors moving their wine cart to follow the shade of the campanile in St. Mark's Square), and pick a few cicchetti from the trays on the counter. You eat standing, you talk to whoever's next to you, you move to the next bacaro. It's not a meal, it's a crawl through the day, locals do it from late morning through the evening.

The cicchetti to actually order: baccalà mantecato (whipped salt cod, creamy, usually on bread or grilled polenta, the benchmark dish for judging any bacaro), sarde in saor (fried sardines marinated in sweet and sour onions with pine nuts and raisins, a centuries-old preservation dish and arguably Venice's most iconic cicchetto), polpette (small fried meatballs), and if you're up for something more local, moeche fritte when in season, tiny fried soft-shell lagoon crabs.

Doing a bacaro tour properly means picking a sestiere and hopping between three or four spots rather than trying to cover the whole city in one night. Worth trying: pubs like Santo Bevitore for a more casual night out, and bacari like Alla Torretta, Oxy, and Bacarando Corte dell'Orso, the last one especially good if you want to actually sit down and make a meal of it rather than just standing for a quick bite.

ON FOOD IN GENERAL

Venice eats better, and less touristy, than people assume. Once you're off the San Marco axis, it's genuinely hard to find a bad osteria. A simple test for whether a place is the real deal: check if bigoli in salsa is on the menu. If it is, you're probably eating where locals actually eat.

Hi everyone, I’m trying to plan a longer Europe trip and I’m looking for realistic budgeting advice. My last trip cost about $6,500 for ~20 days, where I visited 5 countries and 8 cities, and while it was amazing I did run into some stress like having to switch hotels a couple times and missing a few trains due to logistics. For my next trip I want to slow it down and do it better, but try to keep the total around $3,000–$4,000 for about 3–4 weeks (or longer). I don’t really travel like a vacation—I like moving through multiple countries and cities and doing more long-term travel—but I want less chaos this time. I’ve thought about hostels, but I’m honestly nervous about them, and I really prefer hotels because I value privacy, my own bathroom, and having a space to decompress (I do like comfort/luxury, but I’m trying to be more budget-conscious while still staying in hotels). Right now I’m also struggling with flights because even booking 6–8 months ahead I’m seeing prices that feel high, and I feel like flights may end up being one of the biggest costs. So I’m basically trying to figure out: how do people realistically keep a Europe trip in the $3K–$4K range while still staying in private hotel rooms, and what are the biggest things I should change—flights, number of cities, trains vs passes, hotel strategy, etc. Any advice would really help because I’m trying to plan smarter this time instead of just overspending.

They offer such different experiences. If you've spent time in both, what did you appreciate most about each?

Heading to Portugal for nine days in the near future and staying in Cascais.

Flying in and out of Lisbon - never been there but I am currently done with cities so just looking for a generally relaxing “holiday” vibe with a few day trips thrown in. Plan on some surfing, running, biking and drinking a lot of coffee!

Want to do a few day trips and hikes as well, so this is my question really. Any good options by bus/train (excluding the obvious such as Lisbon and Sintra)? Happy with day long hikes, or small interesting villages/towns I can just wander around in.

Curious how people experienced them differently. What did one city offer that the other didn't?

Hi everyone!

I've been traveling around Italy for the past week, and next week I'll be spending 3 days in Florence.

I'm looking for authentic local food, also high level restaurants. I'm afraid of turist traps or the same 10 restaurants that keep showing up on Tiktok

I don't know anyone from Florence to ask, but while I was in Naples I found some incredible places thanks to Reddit, so I thought I'd ask here as well

Are there any high level food tours that focus on authentic Florentine/Tuscan cuisine and are worth doing?

Any recommendations are really appreciated. Thanks!

Not necessarily which is "better" or your favourite, but what stood out about each city once you were actually there.