Frankfurt sucks… unless you’ve never been to a large American city before. It’s like being in New York, just the signs are all in German instead.
 
Brussels…. other people will disagree, but I see the place as a transportation hub, and that’s it. There are a few cool museums there (if you’re lucky and they’re actually open) but other than that, it just kinda has sentimental value (UN and all), and isn’t much to look at. There are a ton of cool places in Belgium you can get to in an hour or so from Brussels, however. 
 
Oh yeah btw… if you don’t like museums, that’s a shame because you’ll be missing a lot of good ones in the cities you mention.

From this list, I would skip Bern, Zurich & Venice, overpriced & you may not find much of interest there.

Frankfurt is very fun, they have a great RLD there.  Berlin & Copenhagen are both must do’s too IMO. 

I’d disagree about Zürich… it’s worth a day, at least. Really scenic and “liveable” city And if you stay a bit, there are lots of “day trips” you can do into the mountains.
 
I’ve never been to Venice, but well, I wish I had

I’d agree with the others and cut out Frankfurt. In it’s place, head to Munich! Lots more to do there and certainly nicer to look at.
 
If you were looking at Frankfurt because everyone tells you it’s cheaper to fly into there, I didn’t find that to be the case. I was going to for my Germany trip, but I found tickets that were 150USD cheaper to Berlin (Munich was pretty expensive).
 
Venice has it’s ups and downs. It’s a beautiful place, but there isn’t an awful lot to actually DO there. I would suggest if you plan to visit Florence for a few days, maybe make a day trip out to Venice. It’s worth seeing, but not really worth spending the night in, IMO.
 
 
 
 

Well we are flying into Frankfurt because it was the cheapest flight we found (about $550 USD), so we really didn’t plan on spending any time there… just starting there and ending up there for our flights. I would like to visit Switzerland because I’ve heard that it is beautiful and would like to do some hiking and sightseeing, but I didn’t know about Bern or Zurich so we could narrow that down to the best one out of those two.
 
As far as Italy goes, we sort of planned on doing one day in each of the four cities there that we chose. I could maybe cut out one of those but if it’s worth a day trip we will still go.
In Germany I didn’t know whether to go to Berlin or Munich or both so I just penciled one in. We do enjoy the night life, but will also be doing a lot during the days. I would like to visit any festivals that are going on in May, and a few museums but we just don’t have a lot of extra money to be spending on entrance fees in every city. Any “must do’s” in any certain cities that we need to know about??

If you want to go to Switzerland I highly recommend Interlaken, everywhere is a kodak moment and there’s lots of hiking options there

Hello all.  Thanks alot for all the helpfull hints.  We have revived our trip.  This is over the course of may 14 to june 4

fly into frankfurt and hop a train to amsterdam

ghent
paris
barcelona
montpellier
rome
florence
interlaken
munich
copenhagen and/or innsbruck

Is that too many cities?  Are they all good cities?

your new revised list is much better than the first, however you sound like people who should not miss Amsterdam, i was there last weekend so am still getting over the hype but if you like to party, drink and have a good time this place is not to be missed! EVERYTHING IS LEGAL! it is very beautiful as well despite the over-the-top red light district and is not far from Belgium where you are going anyway. It took us three hours driving from the north of france and we only stayed the weekend but i would have loved to stay longer.
 
have a great trip!

Good thing you kept Rome and Florence. Venice and Pisa are definetly a must see as long as you like art, museums and history and if you have a half of the day free I’d still recomend you go see both of them. But anyhow, better to have more days for Rome to see the Vatican and the roman history (wouldn’t know about the night life though, didn’t really have time), and FLorence which has a great night life!!! and is an all in all beautiful city  with lots of tourist attractions (Duomo, Offizi, Ponte Vecchio, Boboli if you’re a romantic, etc)

ps: don’t get too frustrated if the trains in Italy are late. It happens.

have fun!

I love Venice and would never recommend skipping there — although it is expensive.  It’s compact enough that a couple of days is plenty.

I found Zurich a disappointment — maybe it was the neo-nazi graffitti everywhere, but the place had a definite “edge” to it when we were there.  The views of the alps are good (for being in a city — you really need to get out of cities in Switzerland) if you happen to be there when it isn’t cloudy. 

I like Brussels, but for the cosmopolitan vibe and wide variety.  Medieval architecture plus the ultra-modern EU headquarters, Carribean tunes on one street corner, American Jazz (allbeit pretty bad) on the next, African beats on the next and Peruvian pan flutes on the next.  I’d do an overnight in Brussels just for the street music.

I thought Zürich was fine… I was only there for a day (night trains in and out) but thought it was pretty nice…

why Ghent?

i’d pick Brugge instead

i’d also cut down on the number of cities

for me spending more days in Paris would be important

Brugge is beautiful.  And, since you have stated that u love beer…. adding Munich is a great choice!  Lot’s to see there too!  Also, take our time in Barcelona.  It;s a wonderful city.