This is a guest blog post from myTab -www.mytab.co.
When I was a student, at aged 19, I went away with two friends to Inter Rail around Europe. It’s a very common thing for British students to do during summer. It’s cheap, flexible and a ridiculous amount of fun. The one thing that none of us envisaged was getting train sick. Within 2 hours of being on the train from Leeds to Harwich (so we could get the ferry to Rotterdam), I started feeling queasy. Now this is not the light hearted ‘not feeling too well, so I get attention.’ But the serious ‘I need this train to slow down.’ Within minutes of hitting my pain threshold, the train started smoothing out and we were on our way. The relief was amazing.
We spent the next 30 days raking through Den Haag, Amsterdam, Cologne, Munich, Stuttgart, Vienna, Czech border (back to Germany overnight because we didn’t have visas, who knew!), Prague, Verona, Florence, Antibes, Juan Le Pins and straight back up to England again. It was exactly in this order re city visit. I cried at the Stuttgart zoo because I wanted to take all the animals home, we haggled and won VIP tickets to a Madonna Blonde Ambition Tour, in the South of France and got so lost in Munich, the police had to drive us back to our hostel.
We took a ton of photos and only at week 3 realized we’d absolutely forgotten to put film in the camera (can’t describe that feeling), we made a ton of friends on the train that we vowed to stay in touch with but never did and we only ate cheese sandwiches for 4 days because we didn’t know how to say ‘meat’ in Dutch.
Where I’m going with this story is that wherever you are going, on your travel stories, make sure you truly make the most of it. Plan where you want to go, negotiate between friends so you each see one city as an absolute must and then just start wandering off the beaten track. If you do study abroad in Europe, then you must Inter Rail. It’s the best experience of your life since cities are just a train track away. You’ll see more in this trip than you ever will in a given 30 days period, over the next 20 years (excluding work trips).
It’s the time for freedom, seeing the most ridiculous street acts in Prague’s Charles Square, getting lost in Amsterdam’s red light district, embarrassing yourself at Romeo & Juliet balcony in Verona with a romantic quote and pretending to be an incredibly rich ‘somebody’ in Antibes.
If you’re not studying in Europe, then find the next best rail package in the continent you’ll be staying in. If you miss out on this opportunity, you’ll just have to confess to be a Loser on your resume and that just won’t look impressive. Get packing, study abroad and then travel!
By Heddi Cundle
www.mytab.co is an online travel gift card to help you fund, plan & save for your travels. BTW, set a reminder to check myTab’s new design upgrade mid October. It’s fun, interactive & going to blow your mind away…maybe to another continent!