Europe String

The Sunday Telegraph, a UK newspaper recently surveyed a bunch of popular tourist attractions around the world to see which city was the most expensive for travelers. I know this will come as a big surprise to some of you but LONDON turned out to be the biggest pound snatching town.
The paper looked at the cost of visiting 9 of each city’s most popular attractions plus the price of an open-top bus ride in London and 10 other cities around the world. In Europe, they also examined Dublin, Edinburgh, Paris, Rome, Barcelona, Cardiff and Berlin. The price for all …read more

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That’s me and my husband, hamming it up for the camera as we waited for our food at one of your basic tourist trap restaurants in Siena, Italy. Yes, I should have know but we were hungry and traveling with an antsy 2 year old. Plus, my husband just shrugged it all of with, “who cares… we’re on vacation”. Obviously, I have yet to forget.
It is pretty easy to judge tourist trap restaurants. Usually they have superb locations, right across the most famous landmark in the city and they offer ridiculously overpriced meals.
In this case, though, …read more

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It’s been labeled a “must” for those traveling to Verona. I, on the other hand, consider it (paying to go inside Casa di Giulietta to see the balcony) a tourist trap.
Here’s why:

Shakespeare’s Juliet did NOT really speak from this balcony.
Even if there were 2 feuding families in Verona, no one has really proven the existence of their star-crossed children
You do not need a “symbol” to encourage you to write love notes to the person you love. You can actually do it anytime, anywhere.
Besides, those notes left outside look a lot like graffiti to me.

Anyway, unless you have a Verona …read more

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Some tourists are stupid. Some of them (okay, okay, I could probably write WE hehe) pay for twice or even thrice the usual amount. Others are easily tricked into paying to see an insignificant establishment that not a single soul who know any better would even pay a centavo for.
Of course, unsuspecting tourists only realize that they have been had only in the end… after the money has disappeared into someone else’s pockets and they become part of a stupid-tourist-stories exchanged between dubious characters who are out there to pry on, well, stupid tourists.
Some are kinda obvious …read more

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So you are finally in Paris and you just HAVE to have your portrait done… just like in the movies.

Street artists flock to the city’s tourist spots. If you want one done, it’s easy to find an artist. Paris, with its wonderful ambience and numerous picturesque backdrops available, is perfect for this.
But… be careful.
There are some who are pretty good and you may be immensely happy with the result but, they may charge you the earth. Apart from watching artists at work to gauge the quality, it is also important to shop around. And when you finally find the artist …read more

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Unscrupulous vendors have been known to charge tourists more than the real worth. It’s a con which a lot of tourists have fallen for. To be conned during a tightly-budgted trip could (for some) mean a meal lost. So, be very careful.
Tourist trap is a new category here at Europe String. Apart from tips on where to get the best prices, I’ll try to feature places that offers overpriced goods and services to tourists. Places we should avoid, at all cost.
More later…

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