<p>I recommend a trip up to the Basilica of St Denis in Paris. You have to ride on the train for a while to get there. It’s in a kind of sketchy suburb, near a university. Interesting on many fronts:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>The Basilica itself is the burial place of much of French Royalty - including Marie Antoinette et al.</p></li>
<li><p>It’s very cool in there, which is great in the summer.</p></li>
<li><p>There is a “Joan of Arc was here” sign on the wall.</p></li>
<li><p>You’re out in the suburbs, so you see a different crowd of people than in the city.</p></li>
<li><p>Right next to the train stop is the equivalent of a Super-Walmart. If you go in, you see what the residents (as opposed to the tourists) buy.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Also - dare I say it - Disneyland Paris. It’s like a vacation from vacation. If you are cathedralled and museumed-out, go there. It’s great fun to be among the French, Spanish, German and British families visiting the park. It also has the best castle ever. I know, to some people it’s pure sacrelege to be in Paris and spend time in a Disney Park. But few Americans go there and it may be your best chance to be around actual European families, as opposed to all the other American tourists.</p>
<p>In Paris, you can see (or even stay at) the hotel in which Oscar Wilde died. AND, it’s pretty easy to find Nicolas Flamel’s house, said to be the oldest building in Paris. (Yes, there really was a Nicholas Flamel.)</p>
<p>Loved the museum in Paris, and not crowded at all. We’ll be in Barcelona this September, and I’ll skip the Picasso.</p>
<p>One tip I got for the Louve, was to take the Introductory Tour. It’s 1-1/2 hours, hits all the highlights without trying to search for them, and gets you into the moats beneath the Louve that you can’t get to on your own. Sounds corny to tour a museum, but it was a great way to leave the lines and hit the major pieces.</p>
<p>As we’re planning it through, I think we’re going to do London, Normandy (Omaha Beach etc) and then into Paris and then Barcelona. Dover to Calais doesn’t seem like the right way to go if the goal is Normandy. I see various ferries from Portsmouth to Caen or Cherbourg. Any suggestions of either of those, or other approaches / ports?</p>
<p>If you do make it to Oxford (which is not at all our version of Princeton - cf post No. 7), take a punt out on the river. Oh and if it’s a nice day, stop first at the covered market and pick up supplies for a picnic. Punting on the Cam is even more beautiful but Cambridge is harder to get to - and your teens might enjoy all the literary associations in Oxford - from Alice to those Philip Pullman books.</p>
<p>I think you’re smart to have one non-city spot. We’ve taken our children to Europe for the past several summers and we try to have one city and one or two beach or vacation spots. For example, we’ve started out in Paris and then headed down to the Riviera; on another trip we went to Rome and then to the Amalfi Coast. </p>
<p>My kids are much younger - we started when the youngest was six, but even now, while they enjoy the city destinations, all of their favorite memories are of the beach, swimming, hiking and touring the countryside.</p>
<p>My D was in London and Paris on a high school trip and London again while in college. She especially liked:
London: St. Paul’s (had a wonderful tour), theater, Hampton Court, Victoria and Albert Museum (saw a special exhibit of crowns, just did that exhibit)
Paris: Versailles, Sainte-Chapelle</p>
<p>there are “free tours” in various European cities. I tried a quick google but couldn’t find anything. Look for the literature at your hotel. You meet at a location in the morning, and then go on a 2-3 hour walking tour of whatever part of the city the tour covers. I know London has at least 2 different options. You get a tour guide and mine was very knowledgeable. At the end of the tour, they ask for tips, so you can give as much or as little as you want. I suppose you could also run away without tipping.</p>
<p>I didn’t know what to expect since it was a “just show up at X time and meet the guide” and because it was free, so who knows what quality you get… but I was very impressed.</p>
<p>Post 51’s walking tour suggestion is very good. Here’s a link for London: [London</a> Walks “first and best of the walking tour firms” Fodors](<a href=“http://www.walks.com/]London”>http://www.walks.com/). There are all sort of themes: ghosts, theatre, Jack the Ripper, Shakespeare, etc. Guides are VERY enthusiastic, some are jobbing actors - it is easy to peel off and do your own thing if for some reason it’s not a success. My teenage son enjoyed the ‘London in the Blitz’ tour a few years ago.</p>
<p>Don’t underestimate your kids and museums. When we were in London we told the kids we would do a museum in morning, and then something fun in the afternoon. We ended up doing 2 FULL days at the British Museum, a full day at the British Library, a full day at the V&A, a day and half at the National Gallery, and a full day at the Tate. My kids were 12 and 15 at the time, and one of the biggest arguments they had was about spending our last half day at the National Gallery or at the British Library. </p>
<p>We adults pushed for a couple of other things, so we also took a boat trip down the Thames to the Greenwich Observatory and a day trip out to Portsmouth where we saw the HMS Victory and a full fleet review with the Queen in attendance. We also saw as a play, Kew Gardens and did a lot of just wandering around the city, but both boys still talk about the museums.</p>
<p>^^^Ran out of time (and money!!!) but that just gives us an excuse to go back again. </p>
<p>In my experience the best way to do a museum with kids (or anyone else actually) is to grab a map of the museum when you first come in, have everyone take a look and see what they most want to see, then set a meeting time (like an hour and a half) and then everybody split up and go see what they want. When you come back together see if people want more time or are ready to go.</p>
<p>When my kids were little we would each pick one thing that we most wanted to see and head for those. Anything else we saw along the way was gravy.</p>
<p>I hear you … I just know my kids! Ironically, both of them work (volunteer) in museums … one a science museum and one a children’s museum. So there may be a bit of museum overkill already!</p>