Booked!

As part of his forced vacation, Todd took Friday off... and while he had to work for a bit in the morning (as did I), one of the activities I proposed for the afternoon was finalizing our Europe trip... and as you can probably guess from it's... well, umm...  booked!

While I should wait to see how it all works out in the end, again I have to say we were very, very happy to find the European Destinations website and be able to book all of our transportation and hotels in one place and at the same time... and best yet, without having to talk to anyone!

So, in exactly three months from this very moment, we'll be on our way... or, now that I think about it, given the time difference... already there!  Yikes!  We start off in London for 3 nights... catch the Eurostar for 2.5 hour train ride through the Chunnel to Paris for 3 nights... followed by another high-speed rail trip on the Thalys to Amsterdam for 3 nights. 

Very, very excited... it's my first trip to Europe and will be only the second time and three years since the last time I used my passport... it definitely needs more stamps!   

Though I have to admit my blue-collar roots did make me do a big 'ole gulp when we hit the "book" button and put it on the credit card... now it's not like we can't afford it and the balance won't linger on the statements for months to come... but it's certainly not everyday that that kind of $$$ is spent in one swoop!

While Todd has made very brief trips to London and Paris (and has been to the Amsterdam airport), the toughest part was figuring out where to stay.  Ultimately, the major selling points were easy access to public transportation and proximity to restaurants, bars, some sites... so it's the Kensington area in London and near the Arch de Triomphe in Paris (Location wasn't much an issue in Amsterdam... seems pretty darn manageable... though our first choice had vanished since we had first began researching hotels). 

In "what the heck"/"what's another hundred bucks or so" mode, we upgraded to 1st class on both trains trips... though we only wish it was much to upgrade the plane tickets!   I was a little concerned about the length of the flights... but as it ends up the Houston to Heathrow flight clocks in at about the same 9 hours of my first/only international flight to Tahiti.  On the way home (from Amsterdam), conveniently enough we have a 4-hour layover in New Jersey... so my parents will likely come to the airport for a quick visit.

We've been taking full advantage of TiVo wishlists and catching a lot of programming about the three destinations... always exciting to see a new show pop up on the list. 

It looks like I'm in the market for a new digital camera.  While I have no complaints about my current camera, out of curiosity we popped into a Best Buy over the weekend and apparently they don't even sell cameras with my current # of megapixels anymore... ha!   So if anyone has advice/recommendations, chime on in... though not looking for anything terribly schmancy... though Todd suggested that I should get one that "looks like a camera"... boy, there are some tiny/thin ones out there!

Comments

[Gail]

You made the right choice of vacation spots if you want me to hate you. You're going to have a blast. Go with a Canon SD series camera with whatever megapixels you want and you're almost guaranteed a winner.

[Jeff]

Yay, you know I love vacation planning. Glad to hear you're booked! Let the countdown begin...

[kenneth]

Congrats! You guys are going to have so much fun!