skhynes

bcnoelle · August 2009

Hi Sarah, I saw your wedding bio and wanted to ask you about your honeymoon. My fiance and I are looking to go to Europe. We are thinking probably Paris and Rome, but are unsure. Can you give any recommendations of sites or hotels when you went to London and Paris? Thanks so much!!! -Noelle

skhynes · August 2009

Two of the biggest recommendations I have for you are these:1. We stayed a week in Paris and instead of paying an arm and a leg for a tiny hotel room, we rented an apartment. European hotels are very small compared to American hotels, and unless you want to pay big money they are often disappointing. The website we used was called VRBO.com (vacation rental by owner) and it was recommended by a co-worker who travels to Paris often. It lists TONS of apartments for rent in just about any city in the world and most have lost of pics to look at. Honestly, it worked out great because the apartment was very clean, we had a full kitchen, washer and dryer, living room and separate bedroom, free internet and international calls to landlines, all for 700 euros for the week. We stayed in the 7th arrodisment one street over from Rue Cler which is an awesome market street. We were about a 10-15 min walk from the Eiffel Tower. I loved the location because it wasn't really touristy so it felt more authentic and quaint. I highly recommend this area and vbro.com.2. Rick Steves travel books/website. His stuff was honestly was a life saver to us. He gives awesome advice on where to stay/eat and what sites are worth it and what to skip. I don't think he ever steered us wrong. Gave advice on when things are the most/least crowded and seriously we never waited in line for maybe more than 20-30 minutes for anything. We got his travel guide for Paris and even though we were only in London for two days, we wished we would have had it there too. It was that helpful. He has various walking tours in the books and you can also download audiotours for free on i-tunes and listen to on your i-pod later. We would use them to walk through various sites and neighborhoods. It saved us so much time. When you're going someplace as large and overwhelming as the Louve, it's incredibly helpful. He also has little maps in the books with various monuments and sites drawn on them which were really helpful too.There are SO many things to do in both cities that it's hard to talk about all of them, but there wasn't anything that was particularly disappointing or anything like that. All the big famous stuff is completely worth it! If you want to email me any specific questions at skhynes57@gmail.com, I'd be happy to answer them for you.

bcnoelle · August 2009

Thank you so much for all of your advice! I will contact you once I look into things more!!!

skhynes · August 2009

BTW- our London hotel was City Inn Westminster, near Westminster Abby/Parlimetn/Big Ben. I also recommend this hotel. Good price, very cool and modern inside. We had huge Macs for our TV/computer. Very cool!