I am planning a honeymoon trip with my husband in coming March-June to Europe trip. We have 10 days altogether, We are interested to see Switzerland (for sure), Rome, Venice. Spain and Paris are optional. But We have couple of question before we actually book everything upfront
for such short trip, how many countries or locations we should visit?
How to find best and cheapest hotel? booking.com or something else (We r in Saudi resident)
How to manage travel arrangements, like sightseeing or any other preferences from such people who have already seen these places.
As this will be a honeymoon trip you will not want to make it too stressful. Therefore I would suggest not to pack too many places into your itinerary.
Switzerland seems to be a must-see for you, so you will probably fly into Geneva to start with. There are direct flights from Riyadh and also from Jeddah to Geneva. I am assuming you are based in one of these two cities.
Interlaken, Geneva, Berne, Lucerne and Lausanne are the highlights in Switzerland. There’s much more than that but you won’t have enough time for that. The best way to move around in Switzerland will be by train. Check out Travel Europe with an InterRail Pass | Interrailnet.com where you can get a pass that allows you travel on all trains you want within a specified time.
After spending a couple of days in Switzerland you take a train from Zurich to Venice (via Milan) which takes approx. 6 1/2 hours and is very, very scenic. Venice is famous but actually quite small. So you will not need more than a day for that. Then you could continue on another train to Rome where you could spend a day or two as well.
After that if you have to choose between Spain and France, I’d go for Spain. Barcelona is a great city. Plus the South of Spain is spectacular and has a lot of Islamic History as well. So take a flight from Rome to either Barcelona or Malaga. Spend the remainder of your time in Spain and then fly back to Saudi Arabia via Geneva again. That should pack your 10 days.
For hotel and flight bookings there are several internet portals you can use. Just try them out and see which one gives you the best price. Apart from booking.com which you have mentioned yourself the following come to mind: expedia.com, ebookers.com, hotel.com, skyscanner.com.
I second Spain!!!! It is an amazing country, beautiful people and beautiful sights! We flew from US to Barcelona. Our trip was for 7 days, and we spent most of it in and around Barcelona (took a couple of day trips to Monsterat and Costa Brava area). We knew that we could not leave Spain without seeing Alhambra Palace, so we took a night train from Barcelona to Madrid, and then a quick train on to Granada.
I totally agree with Umer that you should not try to cram/pack in too much on your honeymoon. Pick one area/country that is of most interest to you and then plan from there (he gave you some excellent tips on Switzerland/Venice option)