Which European city would you recommend for a long weekend by train or car from London? Easy to get to, culture, good food, interesting vibes as taking DD in 20s...

[loveyouradvice]

The obvious answer is Paris BUT Olympics.... so where would you go in the next couple of months? By train or car, not too far - interesting, fun, good food and good art... even better if funky alternative clothes or design shops....

Rotterdam
Lille
Strasbourg
Montpellier
Dusseldorf
Cologne
Frankfurt
Freiburg

I've heard that Paris is not that great. Going by car/ferry/train you may prefer Amsterdam, Hamburg or Bruges. Further afield, Berlin and Prague are beautiful cities with lots of culture, or you may prefer somewhere warmer like Lisbon, Rome or Seville. Europe is your oyster.

Lyon?

I'd second Bruges. Joint best holiday I ever had.

Not Paris! Way too expensive

Try Berlin 🩷

Amsterdam on Eurostar

Or Budapest 🩷

Ghent is lovely

Go by train to Antwerp, you will arrive at the architecturally stunning Centraal station to get your holiday off to a beautiful start.
Lots of different things to do, shopping and markets, historic buildings to visit, take a boat trip on the River Scheldt, visit the beautiful cathedral, lovely parks if you want a change from the city....Chocolates, diamonds, fashion......
A huge range of restaurants and bars in the city, with a great European cafe culture vibe going.

Olympics are 26 july to 12 aug or so… can you do paris just before?

Mmmm.... leaning towards Bruges, Antwerp or Amsterdam... Keen to keep travelling to a minimum and have more time there....

Love to hear other's experiences - Yes, Europe is our oyster, I feel so lucky being on its doorstep

Brussels on Eurostar

... though wondering about Paris pre Olympics... DH convinced it is getting too busy... Im not sure

Bruges

Seconding Ghent

Amsterdam
Bruges
Antwerp
Ghent

Bruges or Ghent

Brussels. Good for food,art and shopping. Stay near the Grande Place.

Based on your wishlist I'd go for Antwerp, the shopping is fab there. I wouldn't go to Bruges for what you want, it's beautiful but quite low key, not very buzzy. Amsterdam has everything too but can feel very touristy.

Take the ferry to Belfast! Great shopping, food, and culture. Plenty of museums, theatre, culture, history, etc. Big market on Friday and Saturday, live music, theatres. Some lovely architecture - it even has a fairytale castle. Well worth a visit.

Belfast is an interesting idea... I think we'll go Europe this time, but definitely putting Belfast up there for next trip....

Loving the contemplating... I think I'm going to come up with a short list of 3 and let DD choose... I think it's looking like Antwerp, Amsterdam, Ghent or Bruges... so going to drop one of those to make it 3...

Not sure why I don't feel very enamoured of Brussels, only been there once, perhaps we went to the wrong places...

Cologne

I vote Antwerp.

Paris is bloody amazing!!

The Olympics are only for a brief period- you could go outside of that OP? But of course there are other cool cities out there.

Eurostar goes to Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Lille and Brussels. Amsterdam is great, haven't been to the next 2, Brussels is a bit meh in my opinion. Cologne is 2 hours by train from there though.

I'd do Rotterdam over Amsterdam for quirky and buzzy. It's difficult to escape the tourist bits in Amsterdam, but obviously most of the big hitting galleries are in Amsterdam. Den Haag is an easy daytrip if you want Dutch postcard style. Everyone on that side of NL goes to Antwerp for shopping though!