To be slightly done with Eurpopean city break type holidays?

[LindorDoubleChoc]

My one holiday this year involved 10 days split in a
much loved European city, equal time in a smaller town a few hours away, plus a day in a pretty much unknown town just over the border in another country. And of course the inevitable 2 days travelling.

All very pretty but all quite similar! Most of the 10 days of my holiday involved 12 to 15k steps because we had to see as much as we could while we were there. And, tbh, I just thought - this is all very nice but I could be in Rome/Barcelona/
Lisbon/Paris/Amsterdam/Bruges/Prague/Sienna/Montpellier/Munich/Faro/Seville/Cadiz/Cherbourg/Dinan/Porto ... anywhere I've already been really. We walk around and take photos for the sake of saying or feeling like we've been here. We will take in the major sights, read a bit about the city's history and not remember a thing about that after a few days! I won't be putting photos on IG or FB because that's not my thing. So why am I doing it?

Perhaps I need a different type of holiday.

Try smaller towns /cities with some excursions in to the country/the beach. sometimes "be" rather than "do" places are good.

We went to Narbonne this year, we saw some sights but mainly pottered and went to the cafes and restaurants. We also had some day trips around the salt lagoons and vineyards and then spent a long weekend at a nearby seaside town before travelling back.

ODFOD.

If anyone goes on holiday anywhere they are "following the herd" to some extent.

My entire post is about how, up until now, I have really enjoyed visiting the various cities in Europe I have been to, but this time I'm starting to think maybe I'm done with it for a while. And then I was just checking in to see if this is short sighted of me, or can anyone relate. But maybe it's because we spent 10 days charging around and not having time to relax much.

Then I get bored sitting on a sun lounger! Perhaps I'm difficult to cater for.

Next year it will probably be a villa with pool in Italy or France with one or two interesting cities in striking distance.

Come to think of it, I've got a really useful Mumsnet thread saved with a title something like "beach holidays with a nice town nearby" which I will revisit.

I couldn’t be doing with that travelling. Once I’m somewhere I like to stay in that town or city. Perhaps one week breaks in one place at a time would suit you.

I hear you. I’ve been to some “must see” busy European destinations and have thought ok, I’ve seen it now and taken the obligatory photo….and the whole experience has left me underwhelmed.

I’m more inclined these days to explore parts of the UK I’ve never seen. A long weekend walking parts of the North Devon or Welsh coast are more my choice these days. Not so far to travel and generally pretty quiet and relaxed.

Rather than squeezing in the tourist guided areas it will be better to arrange your own travel and create your own schedule.

I could have written this

I was just thinking exactly the same thing. Maybe it’s an age thing but I’ve realised I like being in peaceful coastal or countryside locations when I’m on holiday. I do love all the cultural attractions of cities but after 3 days I think I’ve had enough.

I know the feeling! Nowadays we only go on city breaks if we can tie it in with a gig or a concert. That works really well, and this year I’ve been to Rome, Dublin, Switzerland, and Germany to see some big names I could probably have seen in London, but it’s an extra treat doing the tourist thing. I remember being in Pula in Croatia many years ago and the amazing Pula Arena (coliseum vibes) was being set up for an Elton John gig. Tickets were long sold out, but I’d love to have seen him play (I’m not even a fan) in such a spectacular setting.

How about focusing on the coast and countryside more. Perhaps somewhere like Albania, Montenegro, Croatia, Slovenia, Poland, if it’s still safe from Russia, or Norway? Or the north west of Italy perhaps? You could do a mix of countryside hikes, days on the coast, kayaking, boat trips, island hopping perhaps, interspersed with bus , car or train trips to towns or other sites of interest?

I’m in Australia and I just can’t have those weekend trips or a few day trips like that all over Europe, so actually I’m quite jealous, lol . It’s not to say I haven’t travelled because I have but I think I really appreciate it more because nothing is on my doorstep .

Sol take a different type of holiday. Why do you have to stick with one style of trave

But the “ticking things off`’ approach is the fault of the traveller not the location?!

I love a city break but we do mix our holidays up. If it’s not working for you choose something else,
we change our preferred holiday type all the time. We’re currently in a road trip phase but when we fancy something else we’ll just change.

YANBU, I can’t remember much of my city breaks in Italy/Germany etc.

I’d rather have a week somewhere lovely.

Everything feels like hard work these days. It’s either that places are getting more busy and stressful or I’m getting old! Probably more the latter.
I often dream of how it must have been to travel back in the 19th century when places in Europe would have been so very different from each other. So much less crowded. A sense of discovery. We have all ruined it all!
Nowadays I say I won’t visit another city for a holiday as I already live in a city (London) and would rather explore that then come home again. Holidays will be for nature and sun.

Mix up your holidays a bit. Instead of just city breaks have some sunbathing / beach breaks or a cruise. I love a city break, but I do enjoy a few days by the coast too. Off on a cruise in 3wks too which involves a few days at sea before we start stopping at ports for the day. The good thing about holidays is there are lots of options. Or maybe stop going altogether for a while, or have a staycation.

Have you been somewhere like Crete? Beautiful island, beaches if you want them, lots of history and things to do, car hire is reasonable and the driving very easy. You can have a day walking to a local village and flopping by the pool or on the beach followed by a day at spinalonga, a trip to krissi Island (nature reserve great snorkeling), go up for lunch on the lasithi plateau, visit Knossos etc, mix it up. I do like a city break for shorter holidays but I can do a week or two somewhere like that and have the best of both worlds. We spent a few days in Marrakech , seeing mosques, galleries, museums etc then drove down to Essaouira, beaches, fresh fish, the women's argan collectives, art and music, again for the blend of busy city and relaxed coast both with history and different aspects of the culture. I think you might prefer a holiday that is more flexible and less all of one thing or another.

Perhaps take stock of what your hobbies are and pursue those in your holiday time.

Reimagine the concept of holiday from flying somewhere to doing what you enjoy.

Are you a foodie? Drinker? Architourist? Beach goer? Art lover? Theatre buff? Nature lover? Animal lover? Like busy? Like quiet? Explorer? Returner? Like grit? Like polish? Spender? Pennypincher?

In short, do you and that feeling of dissatisfaction will be replaced with satisfaction.

Not sure I recognise a lot of these experiences, we all do things differently

We nearly always exclusively go to cities when going abroad, spending a week in each one. Once or twice they are also cities on the coast where we have a beach day but thats only once or perhaps twice a push

The rest of the time we are meandering, we dont have a tick list, we get lost in the back streets and the rough areas, we wander round at night, we love eating so seek out the best places to eat local food and traditional food, we like things we've never had before

There will usually be cathedrals, palaces and churches in the mix, perhaps with museums and art galleries because we enjoy that but not if it involves queuing or booking, we wont do any of that, we tend to turn up at unpopular times and if its too busy we just wont go. Having said that we did queue for the Vatican for a long time.

We'll also go on day trips to nearby places getting the train or the bus.

In the Uk we're more inclined to do cycling and walking type holidays although still visiting the nearest cities and towns to wander round

10 days can be samey same if you just visit cities.

Things I would do. Research! Check out what you want to see in each city. For me it's things like cathedral, museums, galleries and quares for lunch, coffee & people watching. The key is not to do the same itinerary for each city. Be prepared and seek out specific items in a museum a specific artist in a gallery or foods to try. Interest and background knowledge make things so much more fun!
Plus get some rest days! Book yourself into a lovely spar hotel for a night or 2 and enjoy what is on offer!
Or spend a few days in a rural location for lovely countryside walks...

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If you don't enjoy it, don't do it?

If you holiday alone you must know what you'd enjoy - whether lying on a beach, walking in nature, specific hobby based holiday, all inclusive, spa type thing or indeed just staying at home during your annual leave - it's not compulsory to go away on holiday!

Do you have travel partners who you are trying to keep happy on holiday? Do they enjoy the city breaks and you just feel like a passenger? If it's your partner, then it's worth considering just doing a short break with them and not ten days, and something you actually like alone!

I would get bored of this too! We do SOME European city breaks because we enjoy history and culture but I don’t want to run out of interesting places to go in Europe before I get older and don’t want to travel so long haul!

So we do 1 longhaul holiday per year and 1 shorter break! The long haul holiday has some mixing it up between cities and different types of scenery.

Things we’ve done in the last 5 or so years:

1. Vancouver Island road trip followed by Alaskan cruise.
2. Scotland road trip and hiking- NC500, Cairngorms etc.
3. 1 week Maldives followed by 1 week Dubai.
4. Canadian roadtrip including Montreal and Quebec, the Eastern coast and Prince Edward Island and then through the fall foliage in the forests back to Montreal.
5. Cruise from Dubai, stopping in Mumbai, Cochin, Malaysia, Phuket and finishing in Singapore.
6. This years trip was to Bangkok, just finished 3 days in a jungle safari camp and on our way to Koh Samui for a week.

Generally we try and do multi stop holidays to make sure we have loads of variety. Sometimes just 1 week in 2 places, the Canadian road trip we did 8 stops over 18 days.

Next year we are doing Vancouver, Alaskan cruise and then roadtripping to Denali via some other Alaskan sights.

The short breaks we’ve done in between are Bruges, Seville, Paris (but it was to watch the Olympics) and Chicago (but it was to run the marathon).

Travel is important to us and we really enjoy variety- we prioritise it financially and I put a lot of effort into choosing destinations as I don’t like sitting around and my husband is hard to impress!

Our absolute favourite type of trips are US/Canadian national parks and road trips but we try to only do it once every 2/3 years because we wouldn’t want to get bored of it!!!

I love European city breaks, but I think we're done with them as the travel is such a pig.

For a 2 hour flight, it takes a day of travel, once we've dropped the dog at the sitter, driven to the airport parking, waited at the airport for 2 hours, the flight leaves late, 2 hours on the flight that's no more luxurious than a bus, and then getting to the accommodation at the other side.

We've both said we'd rather stick to less infrequent long haul as it makes it all seem worth it, is more exciting, and the flight is more of an experience (as we love watching films!)

We had years of having to use our holiday funds and time to visit grandparents in another country so have only been able to have city breaks etc in recent years and have not jaded yet!

Eg I went to mainland Spain for the first time last year. I still have a list of places I want to visit before I die!

I prefer a long weekend for those sort of trips. Unless you are in a big city you can run out of things to do.

Whereas I went to Paris recently for the umpteenth time and still had a great time.Went to nice restaurants and specific buildings/exhibitions that had current things we wanted to see rather than the big tourist sites. London is similar for me. I could never run out of things to do there.