Summer travel plans

Well, I have been thinking a lot lately, although I've been neglecting my blog. And rather than actually post a proper update, I'll just copy and paste an e-mail I wrote to my mom. It's a compromise we can all be happy with.

-Chris

Well, this is the rough plan at the moment:

Mark has booked tickets that arrive in London on Aug 17 and depart
Amsterdam on Sept. 6. I think that on the 18th we will fly to Oslo or
Stockholm. The plan is to spend the first couple days in the big city,
then kick off our 15 day unlimited rail pass. We'll use that throughout
Scandinavia, eventually working our way down to Amsterdam (before the rail
pass runs out!) then spend a couple days there before mark flies back to
Canada. Aug. 18 - Sep. 6 is 20 days, and the rail pass is good for 15
days from the first time that you use it, so we figure if we spend a few
days on either side in big cities, we should be set. Now, for
expenses....

The Eurail pass that we're looking at is this one:
http://www.raileurope.com/canada/rail/passes/eurail_youthpass.htm

it seems like the best deal...15 days unlimited, and it lets us travel in
norway, sweden, finland, denmark, germany and the netherlands (as opposed
to some of the other options, which restrict which countries you can
travel through) that's $500 CDN (I'm going to do the rest in Euros)

Flights to and from London, plus transportation to and from the airport
will be about €120 (€50 or so for the flight, plus €10 or so for a bus to
the airport/city centre)

beyond that, I'm going to try and budget €80/day for everything else
(accomodation, food, beer, sightseeing, etc.) realizing that some days
will be more expensive and some will be less. Sarah said she did Western
Europe on about €50/day, but Scandinavia is much more expensive (or so I
read/am told). So multiplied by 20 days, that's a whopping €1600. In
pounds sterling however, that's just over £1000, and I've already got £300
saved, so that's about £250-300/month between now and then. That wouldn't
cover my flights or rail pass however...

The other thing I was thinking about was that I don't necessarily have to
leave when Mark does, however financially speaking, it's looking like I
will. I'll have the time, so it would be nice to take another week and
work my way down to, say, switzerland, however that would mean additional
train expenses, and even at €40/day, that would be and additional
€250-300. Also, after 3 weeks I may be ready to head back.

The real question though, is where do I head back to? By that point Oli
will have returned from chicago and will be wanting his room back. I'm
sure it will be no problem to store my stuff there, and I could crash on
the futon for a while, but I need to sort out within the next month or so
whether I intend to stay in oxford or move on when I return to the UK.
(Or come home to Canada or move to France or Switzerland or whatever it is
that I do next! I think the UK is the safest bet at the moment, and I
don't want to waste my visa)