things i learned from traveling southern europe for a month

For the first time ever I went on a one-month trip to Southern Europe after I finished my final exams. It was a hell of a ride and a ton of fun to jam-pack all the places I've always wanted to see into one trip, as I didn't know when I'd get this chance again. Here's a bit about my takeaways and some tips I've learned if you want to go on a similar trip of your own!

trip itinerary

• May 13 - 15: Athens
• May 15 - 17: Santorini
• May 17 - 18: Athens
• May 18 - 22: Dubrovnik + day trip to Bosnia
• May 22 - 25: Rome
• May 25 - 30: Southern Italy (Gragnano, Amalfi Coast, Pompeii, Sorrento)
• May 30 - 31: Venice
• May 31 - June 3: Nice, Monaco, Ez
• June 3 - 5: Barcelona
• June 5 - 8: Madrid
• June 8 - 10: Porto
• June 10 - 12: Lisbon

key takeaways

waking up early is op ☀️

Unintentionally through cursed flight configurations from budget airlines, we arrived in some places really early, like landing in Santorini at 7am. It ended up being the best thing ever because we got to see all the little shops prepare to open in the morning sun, walk the coastal route along the caldera, and get pictures when no one else was around. It makes it feel like I've lived an entire day before it was even noon.

Any day I woke up after 9am I felt like I already missed a lot of the day!

people are ridiculously kind

People take the host mindset to the next level here and it was so inspiring to see.

• We were only staying in Athens for one night after we came back from Santorini, and our host was so kind enough to hold onto our luggage for us so we would only need to take our backpacks on Ryanair.
• In Dubrovnik, our host, Sandra, helped arrange transportation for us and gave us tips by pointing us out to the grocery store to save money and got us a cheaper trip to Bosnia through her friend compared to what we originally booked.
• Our host, Fabio, in Gragnano, recommended a hike to us. We went on the hike and shortly it started pouring. I randomly saw a car wave to us on the hike and it turned out it was our host coming to find and pick us up to our surprise. He drove us to the train station on our first day, gave us breakfast at 6:30am because we had to make an early train, and gifted us with homemade Gragnano pasta.

• I realized I had forgotten my headphones 30 minutes before boarding my flight in Santorini and the hotel staff brought my headphones in a taxi super speedily just a few minutes before the gates closed.

These were all random acts of kindness that were beyond what I would've expected! My takeaway from this is to surprise people with your kindness, even if you might not see them again.

~20k steps a day was the norm

With many places like Dubrovnik and Amalfi coast being filled with stairs, I really got my steps in. I mostly relied on walking and public transportation everywhere. My record day was Rome with 36,000 steps. I think my happiness correlates a lot with being in a walkable city, so I'd definitely love to build more walking into my day post-grad.

i relied on other people's recommendations a lot!

Before going on my trip, I sent a screenshot of my itinerary to a couple of friends who went on exchange in Europe or went on similar trips. Since I was going in a more busier season and wanted to be more cost-effective, our route and accommodations were all planned out beforehand (although I'd love to try a more spontaneous trip the next time). I think our itinerary went through ~ 3 iterations. One of my friends told me I just had to go to Croatia, and although it was a bit out of the way it was definitely one of the highlights of my trip and one of the most beautiful places I went to.

When I went to Madrid my friends gave me a document of some of their favourite food places and would text me ideas of things to do on the fly and it was a really special experience to feel like you're visiting a place through their eyes.

For all our accommodations and restaurants, Google Maps and Booking.com reviews were a lifesaver! For accommodations specifically, I optimized for lower prices and high reviews. One of the places I stayed in the South of Italy, Gragnano, with a 9.9 rating on booking.com ended up being one of the best places we stayed in during our trip, even though it was a bit off the beaten path. The host was so kind and it felt like a very personalized stay along with sweet treats left in our room each day.

things can be achieved async

I've never taken a break for this long in my life and I made it a principle for this trip to try not to take many tech-related calls this trip. I shared a blog post on twitter and got a bunch of inbound from it while I was traveling and it felt a bit awkward replying "Hey I'm on my grad trip right now but I'll be available to call in a month, but if you have any specific qs you're welcome to send them via email or text me".

This was much more efficient - it filtered out the people who wanted to call just to call and had people narrow down their asks into specific questions I could provide thoughtful responses to at my own pace. I realized not everything has to be a meeting. Although I still love get-to-know-you-calls sometimes and have made some good friends from it, I liked that this trip was a lil forcing function to limit them to certain periods. This way I can build a rapport with people via text first before calling and limit distractions on my end.

budget traveling is fuel to come back

I wrote this down in my notes app that budget traveling right out of college is fuel to work hard so I can come back to these places in a few years much more elevated. Manifesting that someday I can come back to Santorini and get a cliffside hotel, but I wouldn't have it any other way right now.

bringing the beauty from travel to the places you call home

I feel like it's really common when going on trips to all these beautiful places to underappreciate the places you call home. I think it's much more fun to cherish the things you've seen and make it a lil scavenger hunt for yourself to see how you can find similarities or bring back the experiences you had on your trip!

Like the Ponte 25 de April bridge looking identical to the Golden Gate Bridge, the hills in the cliffside village remind me of all the hills in San Francisco, and the beautiful fountains in the piazzas of Rome have inspired me to add a small fountain when I have a garden someday.

packing

This was a struggle for me! I was actually packing for 6 weeks of travel because I stacked my trips back to back. I had an offsite in LA for Netflix that was during the last week of April, and then an alumni reunion for the Cansbridge fellowship during the first week of May. I already bought my Europe tickets to leave from NYC so it just made sense to go from LA --> NYC instead of going from Toronto in between.

Luckily Netflix is a bit more casual, but it was definitely tough coming up with outfits I could wear at a work offsite, in cooler weather, and going out in NYC, along with vacation wear in Greece.

It was a fun challenge though - I kept trying things on and kept the items I could wear with multiple pieces and came up with different permutations.

If I were to do this again, I definitely would've spaced my trips apart as there were stuff I brought solely for the earlier two trips but didn't end up wearing the rest of the way. I kinda realized after a while though, I didn't really care too much about what I wore as I mainly just wanted to be comfortable, as I already got a lot of nice outfit pictures at the beginning of the trip.

the packing set-up

I ended up getting some new luggage for the trip as I wanted to finally invest in some good quality ones, and my current carry-on never fit the Air Canada sizers. I ended up getting the Monos carry-on and the Beis expandable backpack. I saw other people use this backpack as a personal item in Ryanair, and when I expanded it I could fit an entire packing cube of clothes in case I did some shopping before I came back which worked well!

This was the first time I've ever travelled with just a carry-on bag for this long. Although I still had to check my bag in for some flights because of ticket restrictions it's always best to opt for the smaller bag as it's easier to bring up the stairs on public transit or accommodations that don't have elevators.

quick rapid-fire packing tips

• Sometimes when we go on trips we pack our suitcases to the brim - make space in your suitcase for things you can take back. I ended up packing some stuff I needed to drop off for a friend in NYC which actually worked well because it forced me to make space.
• Pack a small totebag. I ended up getting one from the conference I went to and it was really helpful to throw my jackets/sweaters that I would carry on hand to the plane. It was an easy way to store extra things I got that didn't fit in my suitcase, and I never had any trouble bringing it on the plane. And it was small enough to just roll into my backpack.
• Opt for comfort. I packed some cute clothes that I didn't wear that much because they weren't as comfortable. Since I'm usually out the entire day I'd rather wear more comfortable clothes I could wear for multiple activities rather than a restrictive skirt that looks nice but is harder to walk around in.
• Ditch the athleisure. I packed leggings and athletic clothes for hikes but only wore those once on the airplane. The linen pants I had were fine for it, and usually the hike was slotted with other stuff during the day so I mostly wore stuff that I could wear to restaurants etc. after.

planning the trip

I went on this trip with just one other person mainly but had a few friends join us for different legs of the trip. This was a big contrast to the trips I went on with larger groups while on exchange. With a small group, I had a lot more agency on what I wanted to do - my original motivation for the trip was wanting to visit Southern Italy after reading One Italian Summer so it was fun bringing in inspo from different places.

One of my friends, Ayla, is a google sheets queen and made a template for her South East Asia trip so I ended up using hers for my trip! It was an easy way to keep track of all the bookings in one place along with costs and cancellation dates in case we needed to change anything.

Pro tip: Sometimes it's better to plan transportation first! We originally were looking at accommodations first but ended up swapping things around because we realized there were more efficient routes that could change the order and locations of our itinerary.

Something else we did was highlight the busy and more chill sections of our trip - you need to balance it out. Rome and Greece ended up being more hectic as we were fitting things in a short amount of days, but Dubrovnik and Nice were a good change of pace with all the swimming spots and beach days.

(Green being the chill section, yellow in the middle, and red being the most busy parts of the trip).

Another thing to think about is laundry. It somehow worked out that the places that did have washing machines (Dubrovnik and Nice) were spread out and made sure we didn't have to spend additional money on laundry and we could re-use the clothes we packed.

putting the itinerary together

Along with recommendations from friends who've done a similar trip, I also used Pinterest and other travel blogs to help put together my itinerary. I found the Pinterest blogs particularly helpful because many of them already have things packed into 2-3 day itineraries, making it easy to follow their guides directly.

wanderlog

Before we were using Google Sheets for everything but Wanderlog ended up being really clutch to plan day-to-day itineraries collaboratively. I loved that it adds everything to the map so while you're there you can see which attractions are all near each other, and it tells you how far things are from each other so you can optimize your route. I also like that there's a separate section for places to visit so you can add things on your wishlist before consolidating your itinerary.

It also automatically adds your flights and bookings to the app and makes it easy for us to coordinate when we have more people join us. Definitely a huge fan and want to explore using more software platforms to make travel planning easier.

what i would do differently

Wanted to share some tips from my trip in case you're looking to recreate a similar one!

• I would spend probably a day less in Dubrovnik, or use that extra day to go to Montenegro instead
• I would spend a day less in Madrid and maybe add another day to Barcelona or part of the Portugal trip
• I withdrew USD in cash and brought it on the trip which I regretted. A lot of the exchange places we went to didn't really have great rates so I just held onto it for most of the trip.
  • WISE ended up working out much better - you can reload your card in the currency you want right from your phone and it works as a regular VISA card without FX fees. There's also certain ATMS you can withdraw money from your WISE account with no fees. WealthSimple Cash is also another alternative as well.
• For some of the trip we bought dinners from the grocery store when we could to save money, but looking back I realized you're only in a new place for such a limited amount of time so it's nice to be able to use those opportunities to try different types of cuisines.

superlatives

After all the places I've been to, here are some of the highlights:

• Place I would love to live in: Nice. It felt very familiar as I could speak a bit of French, and there were a ton of public spaces and parks with kids running around. It didn't feel as touristy and the Promenade des Anglais stretch along the beach was absolutely beautiful! I love how easy it is to bike along there and the public transport was super easy to use. I also liked the French Riviera pass and how convenient it was to use that as a guide to explore the South of France. It also has bits of every place I liked - the blue water I loved from Dubrovnik, take a bus further brings you to a cliffside village that gives Amalfi vibes, and it also has some shopping like Madrid and Barcelona.

• Place I wished I spent more time in: I really liked Mostar and it felt like a town that came out of a fairytale. The Bosnian food was also delicious and much more affordable!

• Best swimming spots: Dubrovnik. The weather was great, there were a ton of great swim spots you just needed to walk a bit to. Southern Italy on the other hand although beautiful the spots were much busier and most places were private beaches (especially if you're worried about leaving your stuff).

• Best food: This is a tough one! I will say by the end of Italy I was pretty tired of pasta (although I've had some great ones there). I really liked the Spanish food in Barcelona and Madrid. It was fun ordering Tapas as in South Asian culture we also eat food family-style so it was a great way to try a bunch of different dishes. Paella was also a cool experience!

• Most affordable: Porto! The only place where wine is the same cost as water.

• Coolest architecture: Athens, Rome, and Barcelona. Athens had the Acropolis, Ancient Greek Temples, Rome had Vatican city, Ancient Roman ruins, and Barcelona had the interesting Gaudi architecture. It's all hard to pick!

• Most scenic: Santorini! The Caldera is like nothing I've ever seen before. The water is such a deep blue and it's so cool that the town is built on the rim of a volcano.

tips and must-have apps for traveling europe

• If you already have an Apple Watch (by no means do you need to get one just for the trip) I found it helpful using Apple Maps for directions and looking at it from my watch! It let me keep my phone zipped up in my bag in case there were pickpocketers around.

• WISE card as I mentioned above!
• WhatsApp for communication between hotels, hosts, tours etc.
• In Greece, a lot of excursions are reduced price if you're under 25. Bring your student ID to get a reduced bus ticket. There are also other deals if you look for them like Aegan Airlines has a discount if you sign up for an account.
• Moovit for more accurate transit lines that Google Maps might not have.
• Get your Guide, Viator, Klook to look for tours.
• Download Google Maps or Apple Maps for offline usage when you're around there.
• Wanderlog and Pinterest for planning out your itinerary.
• Cross-body bags were the easiest to travel with and small enough to store in my backpack. I used the Uniqlo shoulder bag for my entire trip as my day bag.

closing thoughts

After going on this long trip I realized some different categories of travelers there are (tag yourself! Or let me know if there are any categories I'm missing).

• 🌊👙📖🍷 relaxed, lay on the beach traveler
• 🌮🍝 🥐 foodie traveler
• 🏛️🕶️ 🖼️ 🌇 history, art, culture traveler
• ⛰️ 🚴‍♀️ active traveler
• 👯‍♂️🍾🪩 party, meet locals traveler
• 💻 🛹 🏞️ living/working there and being immersed
• 🛍️👗 shopping and souvenir enthusiast

Going on your first big trip allows you to learn a bit more about yourself and where you fall on the spectrum. I like that my trip catered to little bits of each - got the more beach travel style in Dubrovnik and Amalfi, the history and culture in Athens & Rome, and shopping in Madrid and Barcelona.

I think from now on 2.5 weeks would probably be my max long trip with this level of pace, but two other trips I'd love to do in the future are (1) a solo trip where I engage with more travelers and locals in hostels, and (2) a more immersed experience where I stay in one location for a longer period of time and get the experience of working and living in one place.

If you're still in school reading this, this is why I'd really recommend going on study abroad if you can, or if you're a Canadian student, apply to the Cansbridge Fellowship and get the experience of doing an internship in Asia in the summer.

Thanks so much for reading and let me know if you have any questions!