2017 Holiday Thread

[Yaayuh!]

I was just about to post a thread asking advice/suggestions on my holiday this year and thought that it might be useful to have an open holiday thread for others to dive into for ideas, suggestions or just to show off where you're swanning off too.

I digress.

The better half and I were planning on doing a few weekend Europe breaks due to having over 100K Avios points, I was thinking Krakow, Prague and Vienna. Then one thing led to another and I thought it would be great to do a 10 day holiday and do all 3 at once.

Fly to Krakow, spend 3 days inc Auschwitz
Train to Prague, spend 3 days
Train to Vienna, spend 3 days
Fly back from Vienna.

All 3 of these cities and the surrounding areas interest us nicely and the scenery via train should be great, but if anyone can throw in some "must do/see/drink/eat" suggestions (especially Vienna) that'd be great. Also, is 10 days enough, given the links would take a bit of a chunk out of the time?

What's annoying is that this doesn't really use many Avios, but the trains are relatively cheap. I suppose we'll have to bank the Avios and use on another trip (1-way to Mexico so far.... sounds good to me ).

TIA

 

[Yaayuh!]

All wonderful places.

Krakow = one of the biggest (if not biggest) town square in Europe. It has a great atmosphere, especially at night and there's a pretty cool water feature. It's probably most inexpensive European city I've been to so make the most of it as. Be aware that you will be propositioned during the day, I mean morning and afternoon, by attractive ladies to come with them to a 'great club', the men are more upfront and simply say *the crude word for nipple* club? It goes without saying, avoid these people

Vienna = amazing city. It reminded me of London in a lot of respects, busy cosmopolitan city but with an abundance of beautiful and grand palaces. The scale of these places is ludicrous, I needed a wide angled lense to fit most of these palaces in. As you're only there for 3 days, pick and choose which museums / palaces you'd like to go in to, there's no way you can do all or even half. I personally enjoyed the photography aspect of the architecture so didn't go inside most of them. Take time out to go to Belvedere, it's a bit out there if I recall correctly, but there's train which goes directly to it. It is amazing with beautiful grounds.

There's also a theme park called Prater which has one of the oldest functioning ferris wheels in the world (1897 I believe). It's pretty cool to take some photographs of Vienna's skyline. I wouldn't go out of my way for it but if you're nearby I would definitely recommend. Link

If you like nice cafes and cake definitely visit:



Prague = just walked lots and lots and lots, you can't get bored or run out of things to do. There's the old town across the bridge which has the Castle. It's a trek getting there if you walk but it's well worth it once you get to the top. The doughnutty cup things with ice cream called trdlnks are awesome (they are everywhere) definitely give them a go

Thanks! all very helpful, much appreciated. I can't wait!

I'm flabbergasted by the amount of holidays some of you are having, I'm quite jelly.

There's so many places I want to go, starting to build up a list now. Hopefully next year I can do a nice long bike tour to cover Scandinavia and more of Europe.

 

[Yaayuh!]

No big holiday for me this year, but long weekends

Feb - Madrid
March - Lisbon
April - Kiev + Trip to Chernobyl
May - London (I know but the TATE is quite good)
June - Macedonia

You going to take the Mrs up The Shard?

 

[Yaayuh!]

I'm now also going to Ireland for a long weekend in May

 

[Yaayuh!]

Looking to spend two weeks in June in the US, dont know if to do the West coast Fly into San Fran and fly to LA then Vegas or East Coast and fly into Boston and use the train to Washington and on Philly then New York and fly back to Manchester.

Choices Choices.

Personally I'd start in San Fran and go east then get a shorter flight home.

Edit: Ah, your choice is West or East not both. Hmm... I see the predicament.

 

[Yaayuh!]

We're going to take rucksacks to Krakow and Prague and looking to get something lockable and anti-slash. Most covers look over the top obvious (steel mesh) so we were thinking about getting new rucksacks with protection built in.
Any suggestions?

 

[Yaayuh!]

Looking for the best card to take when we go to Poland and Prague next month.

Not sure whether to go with a pre-paid card like Monzo or a CC like Barclaycard Platinum Travel. Both have positives an negatives. Little to no protection on pre-paid but potential charges on CC.

Opinions?

 

[Yaayuh!]

Starling Bank.

Like Monzo it seems. Great idea but not a fan of the way these app banks deal with identification. They required a photo of your drivers license or passport in which they will keep and store potentially outside of the European Economic Area. I've never once had someone take a copy of my passport or drivers license.

 

[Yaayuh!]

Looking for the best card to take when we go to Poland and Prague next month.

Not sure whether to go with a pre-paid card like Monzo or a CC like Barclaycard Platinum Travel. Both have positives an negatives. Little to no protection on pre-paid but potential charges on CC.

Opinions?

Went with the Barclaycard Platinum Travel in the end. No charges and no interest so long as we pay it off when we get back
Limit is waaayy higher than required and leadtime is 5 working days.