Europe- Backpacking Experience

The continent of Europe has been on my radar since the year 2013. I was a 16-year-old girl when the movie Queen was released. Little did I know then that the film would create such a long-lasting impression and motivate me to travel solo to Europe. 

My Europe checklist was simple. Walk a lot, cover my face with SPF and travel as far and wide in Europe as possible. Lucky are those who have families and friends abroad. I am one such fortunate soul that has three cousins living in Europe and friends who are family-like. 

Many thanks to all the kind people for taking me around and helping me plan this vacation, as this trip wouldn’t have been possible without you all. 

I drew a rough map in my head and kickstarted my preliminary research. I had a budget and wanted to wind up everything within that budget, including airfare, accommodation, food and shopping. I narrowed my list down to 4 places that I wanted to cover, and they were 

1. Paris – France.
2. Amsterdam and a few small villages in the Netherlands.
3. Palma and Barcelona – Spain
4. Berlin and Central Germany. 

I started my travel prep in June 2022. As a cabin attendant, documentation and getting leave approvals for the trip were significant challenges. I saved INR 2,20,000 over three years, which was my travel fund. And the challenge was to plan this journey within this budget. 

Once the paperwork and finances were sorted, I submitted my documents for Visa. Anxiety hit the roof upon submitting my documents for my Visa. After three weeks of sleepless nights and constantly monitoring the VFS website to track the movements of my passport- I received my 3-month travel French Schengen on the 2nd of August, 2022. 

I booked my return flights for Rs. 62,000 and had to book a few internal flights and trains to travel within Europe. I chose hostels over hotels and homestays as it was economically convenient and had a lot of other advantages too. 

I rolled my sleeves up and started reading about the places I wanted to visit. Based on my research, I made notes and saved routes to cafes I wanted to eat at from where I stayed. I utilised August and September to plan the entire trip. 

As I made most of my bookings online, I carried Euros 500 only and had an international credit card as a backup. 

So sit back and relax. We are about to begin our journey to Paris.