Hey everybody what is up I just want to wish you guys a happy new year and I just want
to let you guys know I came back from Europe.
We were there for three weeks and I just want to do a travel tip video based on whatI learned
from my experience.
We visited Germany, Switzerland as well as Italy.
It was my real first time.
I'd been to Germany once before for a short period of time, but it was my first time experiencing
Europe for a real long period of time so I'm just going to run down some tips I learned.
So lets start with booking your hotels.
We used a website called Trivago which I highly recommend.
I've seen there commercials on TV and that's what's made me become aware of them.
Basically what they do is that they'll take one hotel room and they'll compare the price
of that hotel room across a number of different websites, so you basically get the best price
for that hotel room.
And what we found by booking out hotel rooms is that we saved anywhere from 30-70% booking
out hotels So i highly recommend Trivago.
The next thing is when you're booking you flight is that I really recommend Google Flights
Explorer.
Google Flights Explorer if you don't already know lets you set your destination and you
can pick you dates.
They'll actually give you a bar graph of how much the prices vary day to day.
You can look at the bar graph and see what the cheapest price is per day and if you're
flexible you can get the best value for your money The other thing to is that when it comes
to budgeting.
We didn't really know how much we would be spending per day, but what we found and we
journaled everyday we were there.
That typically, excluding hotels we would spend anywhere from 40 to 75 Euros a day on
food That includes breakfast, lunch and dinner.
Some hotels have complimentary breakfast.
As well as sight seeing as well as taking public transit as well.
Even shopping includes.
So typically we spent 40-75 euros per day.However in Switzerland it is so expensive.
Places like Zurich, St. Moritz and Zermatt which we visited.
I would probably budget a little more like 150 swiss francs per day because everything
else is just so much more expensive in that country.
The other thing I highly recommend is that if you're flying on an airline you should
really check if they have like a free members program or a free miles program because we
flew with Delta and we just signed up with their skymiles program, which is free.
Normally we bought economy class tickets, but because there were vacancies in first
class Delta will actually bump up Skymiles members.
and so we basically got to fly first class on the way back.
And the cool part too is that skymiles members get priority boarding as well as you earn
points from travel so why would you not sign up for that.
The next thing to is that when it came to actually checking our hotels we used tripadbisor
to you know see reviews of the hotel, see pictures of the hotel from the people who
had stayed there.
We also used TripAdvisor to find the best restaurants in the cities we were visiting
and the places.
As well as see the top sites as well.
Tripadvsior has the top things to do in each city.
And you can see one of the most popular tourist destinations.
What do people have to say about those places.
So i really recommend tripadvisor as well.
The other thing we learned especially in Italy is that when you are planning your trip you
should really see where everything is in the City you want to visit in relation to your
hotel.
How do you get their by public transit because the wifi in parts of Europe is a little spotty.
It's better to do it at home, print it out the maps.
Although we found in Italy that a lot of the street names on the actual google maps did
not match the street names out in the actual Cities.
So we'd be walking in Milan or Bologna and a lot of the street names didn't match even
though we were in the exact same spot in the map.
The street names would be completely different.
I don't know why that is but that was something we found.
SO I really recommend you guys really use street view when you're trying to figure out
how to navigate from your hotel to whichever place you want to visit.
The other thing we were really careful about was protecting our passports because if you
lose your passports you have to go through a bunch of hurdles and you have to talk to
the embassy or consulate.
So the first thing we did before we left is to see where the closest embassy and consulate
were for the Canadian government and then whenever we were out and about traveling and
sight seeing we would always carry our passports in these pouches.We just basically put them
around our necks, put them under our clothes.
We even put our money in here so there's a little slot for your passport as well as for
your Euros or Swiss Francs.
And you know that way especially when you're in Italy people you gotta be a little careful
especially in the bigger cities that people may pickpocket you or try to get your money
or steal something from.
And it's also good that you're carrying your passport at all times because that way you
don't leave it in the hotel room and the cleaning staff may not steal it.
So that's really important to.
The other thing is that its really important that you carry change whenever your going
to washrooms and stuff.
The one thing we take for granted in Canada and the US is that most public washrooms are
free.
In Europe I don't think I saw one free public washroom.
You either had to pay for a public washroom or if you're in a restaurant you had to buy
food there and then you'd have to pay for a washroom even after you'd pay for service
at a restaurant.
. So always carry change on you.
Another reason to carry change is that even stuff like condiments at a McDonalds they
actually charge you for ketchup as well as you know hot sauce.
So when we were in Switzerland as well us like 35 or 50 Euros for hot sauce and ketchup
so it's important to have that.The other thing too is that when you're using public transit
like in Germany it's important you don't carry large denominations of money because the actual
machines will only give you a maximum amount of change .So when we were in Frankfurt the
maximum of change they'll dispense is 19 or 20 euros.
So if you're paying with a 100 and you're train only costs 15 euros you're only going
to get a maximum of 19 or 20 euros back and you'll lose all that money.
So it's important you carry smaller denominations of bills.
The other thing too that is really important is that we carried bottled water wherever
we went.
All the cities we visited in Europe you could easily drink the water because it was clean
and you wouldn't get sick.
And you go to a restaurant a lot of restaurants charge you for water.
So when you're going and having three meals ir four meals you're paying for water each
and every time.
Why not just fill up the bottlled water at the hotel and why not just carry it with you
wherever you go.
And the last thing I want to say is that when it comes to traveling I am a pretty light
packer so we use these basically these travel cubes which you an buy at an outdoor store
or online I'm sure they're pretty cheap and you know there's two different sides.
You can fold your clothes and put them in each pouch.
And then what it allows you to do is that you can actually sort your dirty laundry from
your fresh laundry as the trip goes on It actually saves you a ton of space.
I was able to put a couple of pants in here as well as maybe three or four shirts as well
a couple of socks.
As well as my undergarments so I really recommend travelling with a packing cube.
The other cool thing is that you can save a lot of space by folding or rolling your
clothes You which is another cool thing too.
So that basically does it for my experience in Europe.
I'd love to hear your guys comments , questions.
I'm more than happy to answer them.
I just want to wish you guys a happy new year.and don't forget to hit the subscribe button