The first step to preparing to go on our epic trip was to actually decide when we would return. We already had round-trip tickets booked to/from Ireland to attend Jon’s best friend’s wedding. It was a destination wedding and he and his fiancé had booked a group flight for their 30 guests from Dulles. We had to get the return date changed before we could decide upon our route or loose itinerary.
Ideally we wanted to change the departure city to somewhere more central than Dublin! We considered Nice, France which would have allowed us to end with some time on the French Riviera. We also looked into Paris, Vienna, and Frankfurt as possible departure cities because they would allow us to spend the most time traveling in mainland Europe. In the end though, Aer Lingus allowed us to change the date of departure, but not the location of departure, so we knew we had to somehow find our way back to Dublin by the end date.
The only other known at the onset of our planning was that we wanted to visit our friend Christine in Switzerland. I contacted her about our plans and she was enthusiastic that we come. She had a couple of days off in August, and requested a couple more on top of what was already scheduled so we could have a nice stretch of time together.
Now we could get serious about making our two month adventure with kids a reality!
This Way Maybe 