Recently, a colleague of mine who is moving back to India said that she wants to take a 10 day trip in Europe before going home. Knowing that I have traveled a lot in Europe, she asked for my recommendations. Where should she go? Paris was definitely a place she wanted to visit, but didn’t know where to go from there.

“Well”, I told her, “if you are starting off in Paris I would definitely recommend that you stay at least 3 nights there. Paris offers so many cultural and historic places to see that it’s really worth walking around as much as you can. If you can, take a day (or half a day) and go to Versailles as well. There is a train from Paris that takes you there – it’s just an hour outside of the city.”

Whether you are taking a train, bus or renting a car (although if you can afford it, rent a car because you can cover more ground and see the charming small towns between the popular cities), here are a few travel options for the rest of the days:

1. If you want to go North, you could go to Brussels, Amsterdam and then perhaps go east into Germany to see Berlin (and Hamburg along the way if you want to stop for a day).
2. If you go East, you could go to Luxembourg,  Strasbourg (one of my favourites), Baden-Baden (the famous spa town), Stuttgart and Munich (one of the best cities in Germany).
3. If you go South, you could go to Nice, passing through Geneva or even Lyon. Nice is really awesome and the cool thing about it is that you can take day trips from there to go to Cannes ($1 bus ride), Monaco and Sanremo.
4. If you go South West (much longer way) you could go to Barcelona (and even Madrid) in Spain and stop through any major cities in France that the train would go through.

As I mentioned in some of my other posts, any trip you take should cater to your style of travel and what you really want to see. If you want to spend just 2 days in Paris and then travel as much as you can to other regions, then do so. If you want to spend a full week in one place, do so! I must say though, from experience, that some places are really worth spending the extra time while others you may just want to pass through. Keep your schedule and hotel bookings flexible!

Paris, France to Berlin, Germany

Paris, France to London, UK

Paris, France to Barcelona & Madrid, Spain

Paris, France to Munich, Germany

Paris, France to Nice, France & San Remo, Italy