Liz Picurro, Author at Shared Adventures

Top 6 Multi-Destination Travel Tips

July 16, 2024 by Liz Picurro Leave a Comment

If it’s your first or second time traveling to Europe, it’s understandable to want to see it all. The flights are long and it’s difficult to choose just one destination. We always recommend creating balance in your trip and ensuring you have some days in the middle to slow down, relax, and enjoy the local experience. When you’re trying to craft the perfect multi-destination adventure, here are a few more tips to keep in mind to ensure you have the best time.

Choose Locations Which Are Close Together

If you’re going to be moving from place to place – look for destinations that are close together and easy to travel between. Take into account travel time, and find well-connected cities/towns. This will give you more time to enjoy new destinations without spending too much time in transit. Don’t forget to include travel time in your plans. If it takes 4 hours to get from one destination to the next, then that is only a half day you get to spend in the new destination.

Balance Overnight Stays with Day Trips

Moving from place to place isn’t the only way to maximize an adventure. You can stay in the same home base each night and enjoy that city in the evening while taking day trips to nearby locales — giving you the best of both worlds. Look for home bases that offer lots of fun daytrips in the surrounding area.

[Photo Credit: Kendra & Shad via Shared Adventures. Read about their adventure to Portugal here!]

Spend At Least 3 Nights in a Destination

At least 3 days/ nights is what we recommend for almost every city, with very few exceptions. The first night you arrive is always disorienting. You’re getting used to the new destination and learning about your surroundings.

A family visiting the Acropolis in Greece

The second night is when you start to settle in. The first culture shock has worn off a little and you can enjoy the sites you’re seeing, maybe find a favorite gelato place or café. You’ll spend the day seeing the major sites and attractions – what the city is known best for.

[Photo Credit: Alicia & Jay via Shared Adventures. Read about their family trip to Greece here!]

Then comes the third day. You have a better sense of where you are and how to navigate the city. You can start to relax and enjoy where you are. Make note of the little things and find a few hidden gems. More time is always better but without three full days, you won’t get a proper taste of a city.

Pack Smart and Travel Light

Nothing’s worse than dragging a heavy suitcase from hotel to hotel through Europe. Make sure you pack light. If you have multiple destinations on your itinerary, especially with trains where you’ll need to lift your luggage up a few steps, doing your best to pack lightly will make your trip that much more enjoyable.

[Photo Credit: Liz via Shared Adventures]

Prebook The Key Attractions

To make the most of your time, make sure you pre-book skip-the-line tickets for the major sites and attractions in your destination. This way you avoid waiting in long lines and can make the most effective use of your day. If you want a good overview of the major sites of a city, booking a walking or golf-cart tour is a great way to start your stay.

Traveling Off the Beaten Path Takes Time

Finding local experiences and hidden gems of a city takes time. The longer you spend in one city the more time you have to truly understand the city and explore the unexplored. You’ll enjoy the local culture and local experiences. Although it may not seem like it, sometimes maximizing your travel means visiting a few places more profoundly.

[Photo Credit: Ann via Shared Adventures. Read about her week in Rome here!]

If you’re ready to strike the perfect balance in your multi-destination adventure – let us know! We’ll give you expert advice and help you to plan a customized itinerary that maximizes your experience!

The Best Day Trips from 4 Top Destinations

July 10, 2024 by Liz Picurro Leave a Comment

How much of your precious vacation time do you want to spend traveling from place to place, versus actually exploring (and enjoying) the destination that you’re visiting?

It can be really hard to balance a long wish list and a limited number of vacation days. And a big part of our job as professional travel advisors is helping you to do that by making smart choices.

To that end, one of the “travel hacks” we recommend is to choose one place that’s a good home base (great hotel option, lots of good restaurants, easy transport connections) and then add some easy day trips from that base. You check in and unpack once, stay longer, and see other destinations from there as day trips.

Where does that work well? So glad you asked! Here are a few of our faves:

Florence

This pedestrian-friendly, walkable city is the perfect home base to explore all of Tuscany. You can spend a day or two enjoying Florence’s charms. And then hop on a train/bus to nearby Bologna, Lucca, Pisa, or Siena. (all are within 1 to 1 ½ hours).

[Photo Credit: Liz via Shared Adventures. Read about her adventure in Florence here! ]

Rome is a 90-minute train ride away, and even Venice is do-able as a daytrip (two hours on the train). If you rent a car for a day (or hire a driver) you can explore Chianti villages like Greve and Radda. Or, Tuscan hill towns like San Gimignano and Volterra. And you could also do a daytrip to the coast, for hiking in the Cinque Terre.

Athens

Lots of travelers blow through Athens in a night or two because they’re focused on the Greek Islands, but there’s an argument to be made for staying put for a little while longer and using Athens as a home base. When you’ve had your fill of the Acropolis, the Parthenon, the ancient Agora, and the Plaka, you can hit the beach at Cape Sounion (about 2 hours away) and check out the Temple of Poseidon while you’re there.

[Photo Credit: Alicia & Jay via Shared Adventures. Read about their family trip to Greece Here! ]

Or visit the original capital (Nafplio). Which is one of the prettiest towns in the country (about an hour and 45 minutes away). The closest island is Aegina, where lots of Athenians have weekend homes. And you can get there on a 40-minute hydrofoil from Athens’ port of Piraeus. Or you could do an organized group day trip to Corinth, Delphi, or Meteora.

Lucerne

The Swiss rail system is easy, efficient, and scenic. Why not take advantage of that by using Lucerne as a home base and exploring the surrounding country from there! Spend a day in Zurich (45 minutes by train), Bern (one hour), or Interlaken (two hours). Or connect from there to a mountain town like Grindelwald.

[Photo Credit: Ann via Shared Adventures]

London

With so many fabulous cities/towns so accessible by train, this one is a no-brainer. Spend a few days in London itself, and then hop on a train to Windsor (50 minutes), Oxford (one hour), or Bath (90 minutes). Spend a day in the Cotswolds (about two hours), or head to the coast (Dover and Portsmouth are both about two hours away). If you get an early start, you can even do Paris as a day trip (about 2 ¼ hours each way on the train through the Chunnel)

[Photo Credit: Ann via Shared Adventures. Read about her trip to England here!]

I think you probably get the idea by now! You can get more out of your vacation time/money by moving less and seeing more with a smart home base and fun day trips. Let us know if you want to try this strategy for your next trip!

How Many Days Should You Spend in Rome?

June 12, 2024 by Liz Picurro Leave a Comment

“How long should we spend in Rome?” This is something we get asked practically every day, and the answer is “it depends”.

If you’re short on time and your wish list is long, it’s okay to do a quick two-night spin through Rome to see a few highlights and move on. But if you really want to experience Rome, and have the time to do more than just scratch the surface, you could easily spend a week in this fascinating city

Realistically, most of our clients choose “option A”– the quick hit – in order to spend more time in Florence, Venice, Tuscany, the Amalfi Coast, etc. And our first few visits to Rome looked like that too. But we just spent six nights there. And it opened our eyes to new neighborhoods, hidden gems, fabulous restaurants, and cool daytrip possibilities. So we thought it might be interesting to compare what you can see/do in two nights versus a longer stay.

A Weekend in Rome

With just two days in Rome, you’ll need to be ruthless about cutting back your wish list. Most importantly, the two marquee attractions, the Vatican Museums and the Colosseum. Each merit a half-day (3-4 hours minimum). And you’ll want to pre-arrange skip-the-line visits for both, so that you don’t waste time waiting in long lines. There are some early-morning and early-evening time slots. These help free up more of your day. But you should still anticipate that you’ll have just two half-days to explore the rest of the city.

One of those mornings or afternoons could be spent walking around the central historical district to see the Spanish Steps, Trevi Fountain, Pantheon, Piazza Navona, etc. (If you want to go inside the Pantheon, be sure to pre-book those tickets as well).

With the remaining half-day, you could choose another neighborhood to explore (Testaccio, Trastevere, Ostiense, etc). Or dive deeper into a specific interest (churches, shopping, food/wine, etc)

In conclusion, in two days you can get a great introduction to Rome. Try a couple of restaurants, and knock the Vatican and Colosseum off your bucket list. And hopefully, that will leave you wanting more!

A Week in Rome

It’s interesting that people will happily spend a week in Paris or London but resist spending that much time in Rome. If you’ve already done a quick visit and are ready for a deeper dive – or if you’re embracing the idea that Italy is meant to be lingered over, region by region, and not “done” all at once in one trip – then there is MORE than enough to fill a full week in Rome and its surroundings.

Consider devoting a full day to Vatican City. Linger longer in the Vatican Museums to see the lesser-known galleries. And spend a few extra Euros to climb to the top of St Peter’s and explore the crypts underneath. While you are on that side of the river, check out Castel Sant’Angelo and the views from its rooftop.

Take a food tour. Rome has some great foodie neighborhoods with outdoor markets and fabulous local restaurants. It makes all the difference to have an expert guide you through them and show you the best spots. For example, we ate in Trastevere one night and were underwhelmed. But when we came back later in the week on a guided food tour of the same neighborhood, it was a highlight of our trip.

Find some smaller lesser-known museums to explore. Whatever you are into (history, art, fashion, architecture, photography, and more) we can guarantee there’s a museum you’d find fascinating. Spend an hour or two in one that looks interesting. We absolutely loved the Doria Pamphilj Gallery and the Museo Boncompagni Ludovisi.

Seek out green space. Stroll through the Borghese Gardens, or the Appian Way.

Act like a local. Visit a less-touristy neighborhood like Prati or Testaccio and linger over aperitivos at a neighborhood cafe. Similarly, pop into a grocery store to see how Romans live (and grab some snacks to picnic on.)

Take a daytrip. From Rome, you can easily spend a day in Naples (one hour by train) or Florence (90 minutes) and be back in time for dinner. In the summer, you could even hit the beach (Ostia is just 30 minutes outside the city).

If you’re ready to really appreciate Rome’s charms, let us know. We’d love to help you plan a fabulous itinerary!

A Family Adventure in Iceland

June 10, 2024 by Liz Picurro Leave a Comment

Jill and Kevin (and their girls, ages 9 and 12) came to us for some help with a spring break trip to Iceland. They wanted outdoorsy adventure, family-friendly accommodations, and some unique local experiences. We helped them find the right balance between pre-planned activities and free time to explore and find hidden gems on their own. Here’s how their Iceland adventure went:

We had a wonderful time in Iceland!

Activities

The highlight for the kids was the Icelandic horses. They were gentle and easy to ride. The woman who led us was great with the kids.

We all loved a 2-mile hike that we did which led us to some natural hot springs to bathe in on the side of the mountain. Cold getting out but worth the pain!

Hrunamannahrepp was an unexpectedly lovely spot to park and explore.

Kevin and I both enjoyed the snorkeling. (at Thingvellir) The process of getting ready takes a very long time but the company we went with was great. Such a unique experience.

The kids in particular like The Secret Lagoon. I vote for the Blue Lagoon but loved both experiences.

Room & Board

Our favorite place that we stayed was Seljalandsfoss Horizons. It was the perfect tiny house! They thought of everything and the house was so thoughtfully designed.

The domes were a mixed bag. The domes themselves were fabulous. A unique experience and beautiful on the inside. But they are next door to a mini golf place. Not a huge deal off-season but might not be what someone is wanting if mini-golf was open. Also, they are far closer to the main road than one might imagine. For us, they worked but depending on the client proceed with caution.

A few fun food finds were Friðheimar in Selfoss. A beautiful tomato greenhouse where they served tomato soup and fabulous bread. Gorgeous setting to eat lunch. We all enjoyed Flúðasveppir Farmers Bistro which was a mushroom restaurant. I was shocked when my son decided to enjoy the mushroom buffet and went back for a second bowl of mushroom soup.

Overall we loved the trip! Thank you for helping with the planning!

-Jill & Kevin