My D19 is spending a semester in Rome. We want to visit her (if Covid rules allow it) but are having a hard time coming up with a good time due to scheduling conflicts. We are flying from Miami so it would be about an 11 hour trip, the red eye not he way there and a day flight on the way home.
What is the shortest trip you have made to Europe and did you think it was worth it? We have been to Rome once so don’t need to do the top tourist things, just want to spend time with D and maybe make one day trip.
I feel like I would have done a long weekend back when I was younger for sure!
@coralbrook We visited Orvieto last time and loved it, this time I really want to get south. I am hoping to get to Pompeii - studied it in 8th grade and have wanted to get there ever since!
I’m not a great traveler and not a wealthy person so 10 days would probably be my minimum. Our river cruise was 17 days and our upcoming France trip is 15 days. And also, that is about my limit as well. I think 3 weeks would be my definite limit just because I’m a homebody.
When I was in my 30-40s (with a lot less personal time) I have done quite a few Thu-Mon trips to Europe, but they were only for one city. I usually like 2 weeks. I was in the east coast, so it wasn’t any worse than going to CA.
I am in LA and I’ve done numerous 4 day trips to Europe- had to do this because of needing to be back at work. It’s doable, but it’s a long flight. I would say 5 days. And if it’s just one city- that’s more than enough time.
I’d be fine with flying out Friday night returning Monday (or Thursday night to Sunday). I’ve done plenty of shorter business trips to more distant places and got a lot done.
But it would be hugely more enjoyable if the overnight was in business class with a flat bed so you could arrive rested and get on with your first day. Ideally you want to power through it until the evening, otherwise your sleep patterns will be completely messed up.
You guys are making me feel better. I wanted to do an 8-10 day trip but with 2 other kids and lots of schedules to plan around it just wasn’t going to work. I am thinking we may be able to fit in a 5-6 day trip. Not the best scenario and I hate spending so much for such a short trip but I hate to miss the opportunity to visit D19 while she is living in Italy. Hopefully we will figure it out!
If you can’t manage to fit a trip to Pompeii in during your short trip, try to get to Ostia Antica instead. It’s only about a 20 minute train ride from Rome and is a fantastic place to visit for archeological ruins.
I once flew Tulsa-Pittsburgh-Paris-Lyon, skied two days at Val d’Isere, and made the return, because my wife was in Lyon on business. I do not recommend such a short trip.
I suppose if you lived a few miles from JFK and flew direct to London, three or four days might not be bad.
Minimum 5 days. In recent years it’s always been 2 weeks, but 5 days is doable for one location, especially if you have done all the main tourist sites in Rome. Highly recommend Pompeii if you can fit it in.
I went to Japan for six days and that was a LONG flight both ways. Totally worth it. As long as you have two full days somewhere, not including flight time, I say go for it. You can do a lot in two days.
5 days would be my minimum and as someone else said upthread, if you can swing the money/miles for business class, it will make a ton of difference in your experience on the ground.
If you have time before the trip, you could look into playing around with credit card bonuses to get enough miles…right now there are several cards offering between 80-100K bonus miles with a minimum spend in the first 3-6 months.
Thank you everyone! If we can figure the trip out we are probably going to get the first class seats. I don’t feel so bad about it because we were originally planning on bringing the kids but now we only have to get two seats instead of four.
I am going to really sit down with our calendar this weekend to see if I can find a way to make it work.
