It's going to be cheaper to fly, right?

[clickerish]

Even though I don't want to?

I am organizing the whole travel after the work gets done piece of August, and I absolutely loathe tiny airplanes. With the price of rail travel in Europe, though, I'm guessing this is unavoidable?

Any suggestions?

There will have to be flights from London to Lisbon, Lisbon to Madrid (and Salamanca), to Barcelona, to Paris, to Zurich...and you see why I am not enthused since I hate tiny planes.

[frlcb]

Why are you assuming they will be tiny planes? Most of them probably won't be actually.

[clickerish]

Because I have a lot of bad luck when it comes to planes...I have thrown up on more planes in this past year than in my entire life. But you're right. I should be optimistic!

[GilliC]

May 16, 2012 12:21:38 GMT -5 clickerish said:

There will have to be flights from London to Lisbon, Lisbon to Madrid (and Salamanca), to Barcelona, to Paris, to Zurich...and you see why I am not enthused since I hate tiny planes.

What do you consider "tiny"? A 737 isn't that bad on a 1-2 hour flight, and I'm guessing most of those routes will be 737 or the Airbus equivalent. The only times I've been on anything smaller within Europe were Oslo to Brussels and Oslo to London-City.

If you think it could help to know what kind of plane you'd be on, you can always do a quick check on a site like kayak with random dates and see what aircraft are showing up for the different options. I do that sometimes for long-haul flights, because I'd rather fly a 777 instead of an old 747, so I want to know which routes use which.

[crimsonandclover]

Depending on how many flights you have, getting a Eurorail or an Interrail pass (depending on how long you've been in the EU beforehand) might be cheaper. It will take longer, but I'm scared of flying and trains are often worth it for me to reduce the stress and see the countryside if I have the time for it. I haven't done long train routes down to Spain or anything, though, so I can't speak to that.

[mrsukyankee]

I've never been on a small plane travelling between countries in Europe - too many people flying for that.

[clickerish]

Yeah, the Lisbon London bit was a given So...yeah, planes it is. This is going to be one of my more interesting travel experiences!

[anna7602]

May 17, 2012 3:20:03 GMT -5 mrsukyankee said:

I've never been on a small plane travelling between countries in Europe - too many people flying for that.

Ditto this. I've flown Rome-Paris, Paris-Madrid, Paris-Seville, Paris-Vienna, Vienna-Moscow, London-Madrid, St. Petersburg-Frankfurt, and probably a few other European routes I am forgetting right now over the last five years or so and have never, ever, ever been on what I would consider a "puddle jumper" (like the commuter planes I've taken dozens of times in the U.S. between cities like Boston and NYC, NY-DC and even between southern cities like New Orleans-Birmingham, AL). I hate puddle jumpers and they make me want to hurl almost as soon as we take off, in addition to making my own ears and DD's ears pop like nobody's business, so I absolutely would not exaggerate or sugar-coat things for you. I really haven't been on puddle jumpers in Europe. Especially in August, when so many Europeans will be jetting all over the place for their own holidays, I think larger planes will be standard. Good luck!

[crimsonandclover]

I've been on puddle jumpers, but that has mostly been Stuttgart-Zurich, Stuttgart-Frankfurt, which I have flown as the first/last leg of a transatlantic flight several times.