Visit five beautiful European capitals at once in one trip and do it on a budget! An article for those who want to go to self-guided tour of Europe.
Have you long dreamed of visiting exquisite Vienna, seeing the Eiffel Tower and the Colosseum, strolling along the canals of Amsterdam and enjoying real Czech beer? We dreamed, but could not decide in any way what to choose from this? And the matter is that it is not necessary to choose one thing at all! All this can be done in one trip, and, moreover, very inexpensively.
So, here is a detailed plan of how to travel to Europe cheaply and see five charming cities at once!
Stage one: Vienna
(Photo by neiljs + filter. License cc by.)
You can get from Moscow to the capital of Austria by paying about 3,500 rubles: Ukraine International flies from Sheremetyevo and Domodedovo with a transfer in Kiev; the second option is airBaltic with departures from the same airports with a transfer in Riga.
If you want a direct flight, then your option is Transaero at a price of 4,500 rubles.
The easiest way to search for cheap tickets is through the so-called metasearch engines - they study offers for the direction you need among hundreds of airlines and air ticket offices, and having found the most profitable option, they offer it to you. At the same time, search engines do not charge any commission from the buyer, but simply redirect to the agent whose offer is the most profitable. For Russians, perhaps the easiest way is to use the Aviasales metasearch - this aggregator was developed by our compatriots and shows excellent results in finding cheap tickets. We sincerely recommend it to you, and therefore have placed a search form on our website (to the right of the text). Be sure to try experimenting with it - a very convenient thing (we searched for all the tickets indicated in the article through it). You can also search directly on the Aviasales website and Skyscanner.
We also recommend reading our articles on free admission to Vienna's museums and how to get to Innsbruck from Vienna.
Budget travel from the airport to the center of Vienna
Vienna-Schwechat Airport is located 16 km from Vienna. The city center can be easily and quickly reached using public transport.
The cheapest way to get to the center of Vienna from the airport is the S7 S-Bahn train to Wien Mitte / Landstrasse station. 26 minutes - and you are in the center of the Austrian capital! The ticket will cost € 4.20 at the pre-sale box office or at the machine. Each passenger must have two tickets at a cost of € 2.10 each. Both tickets must be validated before boarding.
The second option to get from Vienna airport to the city center on a budget is the City Airport Train CAT. The train will take you in just 16 minutes, but in this case, you will have to pay 11 €. The interval of movement is every half hour. Opening hours: daily from 6.05 to 23.35.
Vienna public transport prices
One-way ticket: 2 €
Daily pass: 6.70 €
48-hour pass: € 11.70
Monthly pass: 45 €
If you plan to move around Vienna a lot and visit various cultural institutions in large numbers, then buy the Vienna Card (Vienna Card), which gives 72 hours of free travel on public transport and many discounts in museums and shops in the city. It costs 19.90 euros.
Cheap Accommodation in Vienna
Hotels in the Austrian capital are not cheap, but nevertheless it is quite possible to pick up a fairly budget hotel room or stay in a hostel.
For example, a good option is the Geblergasse Hotel (Geblergasse 19-21), located in a quiet area near the city center. Double rooms here start at € 30.
It will be even cheaper to stay in a hostel. Here are some examples of the most popular ones:
Wombats City Hostel The Base (address: Grangasse 6) - from 10 euros.
Jacks Hostel Vienna (address: Lerchenfelder Gürtel 26-28) - from 11 euros.
Vienna City Hostel (address: Dampfgasse 8) - from 12 euros.
Look for hotels on Roomguru - it compares the prices of various booking systems and finds the best one.
Useful information resource about Vienna: wien.info/ru.
Second stage: Prague
(Photo by Moyan_Brenn. License cc by.)
The easiest way to get from Vienna to the capital of the Czech Republic is by bus. For example, the Eurolines company makes several flights a day. The ticket price is 550 CZK (about 20 euros). You will spend less than 4 hours on the way.
Be sure to read before your trip about free museums and attractions in Prague - this will allow you to seriously save on cultural programs. Read about it here. The article on food, hotel and transport prices in Prague will also be useful for travelers. We also have a special article about how to get to Prague from Russia cheaply.
Stage three: Amsterdam
(Photo by Moyan_Brenn. License cc by.)
The cheapest (and fastest!) Way to get from Prague to the capital of Holland is by air. In this case, the flights of the low-cost carrier easyJet are ideal for us, which will take you from Prague to Amsterdam on a direct flight for only 1,700 rubles (again, the metasearch engine finds the best options - look for the search form at the bottom of the page). If you're planning to spend a few days in the capital of the Netherlands, explore what to see in Amsterdam. Also read about how to get to Amsterdam from Russia.
Stage four: Rome
(Photo by Moyan_Brenn. License cc by)
We travel from Amsterdam to Rome, of course, by air - and here again easyJet is for us. The ticket will cost only 2300 rubles, and the journey will last a little over two hours.
Would you like to know how you can fly to Rome from Russia cheaply? Then read our article! And also material about free museums in Rome.
Stage 5: Paris
(Photo by wlappe. License cc by.)
The cheapest way to get from the Italian capital to the French is to fly aboard the main European low-cost airline, Ryanair. You can fly away for only 800 rubles! If you dislike Ryanair for its extremely strict rules and large restrictions, then you can use the services of the carrier Vueling Airlines, which in the same two hours of flight will take you with a direct flight to the capital of France. This option will cost 2,000 rubles. Ryanair, Vueling Airlines, and the aforementioned easyJet are low-cost airlines (read more about them in our article "Low-cost airlines in Europe").
Looking for affordable accommodation in Paris? Read on for a selection of the most charming yet affordable apartments in the French capital.
And to find out how to fly to Paris from Russia cheaply, read our instructions.
Final stage: return
No matter how much you fly to European capitals, no matter how you postpone, you still have to return. And the easiest way to do this will be if you fly from Paris to Moscow on a direct flight on an airBaltic plane. The ticket will cost 4,700 rubles. The only drawback is a transfer in Riga, but it is quite acceptable in terms of waiting time, so the whole journey will take only five and a half hours. Well, what to do - direct flights start with a price tag of 11 thousand. Try to play with the dates when searching for tickets through Aviasales (the form is located just below) - often changing the date of the flight for a day or two allows you to find a much cheaper ticket. It is worth a try - you may find prices even lower than those stated in the article.
Outcomes
Thus, summing up all the costs associated with getting to Europe, moving between cities and returning home, we get an amount of 13,800 rubles! People often buy a ticket to visit one European city for more than that. Draw your own conclusions.
For the sake of fairness, it should be noted that the total amount we received can be slightly reduced if we use a more budgetary, but, alas, far from the most convenient scheme of getting into the EU zone by train or bus to Lithuania, followed by a flight from Vilnius or Kaunas to the desired city. But this option is complicated and time-consuming, and it will save on the strength of 2-3 thousand rubles at best.Therefore, it would be wiser not to unnecessarily terrorize yourself, but to fly to Europe directly from Moscow.
And, of course, we must not forget that cheap tickets are bought several months before the planned trip.
Where to find cheap tickets? This is most conveniently done using the search engines Aviasales and Skyscanner. To find the best price, check both and see tickets for different dates. Read also the instructions on how to search for cheap flights correctly.
How to book a hotel? You can find a convenient accommodation option for yourself on the Roomguru search engine - it compares the prices of various booking systems and finds the best one.
Visa
If you already have a Schengen multivisa, then there is nothing to worry about. Those who do not have it will need to get it. The question arises, which consulate should I go to? There are two options here: either you get a visa from the country of first entry (in our case, Austria), or the country where you plan to spend more days and nights (and in which of the listed cities you decide to spend the most time, it's up to you).
Bonus: sixth capital
(Photo by Eximius84. License cc by.)
And those who do not have enough even five European capitals to overcome their travel hunger can quite easily visit another European capital city - Bratislava, the capital of Slovakia, located just 80 kilometers from Vienna.
So get there Vienna to Bratislava in several ways:
- By train. It runs every hour or two, connecting the central stations of both cities. The cost is 11-14 euros. Travel time is 1.5 hours.
- By Eurolines bus. The ticket is sold for 6 euros, and the journey will take you 1 hour and 20 minutes.
- High-speed catamaran on the Danube. The most expensive, but at the same time, the richest way to get from Vienna to Bratislava and back. The ticket costs 18 euros, round trip - 29.
It should be noted that hotels in Bratislava are much cheaper than in the Austrian capital. Therefore, those who want to save money should think about spending the night in the capital of Slovakia and from here travel to Vienna.