The Hubs and the Spokes

All-exclusive international travel on a budget

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Aug 12, 2025

Let’s admit there are easier ways to travel internationally. All-inclusive cruise ships and resorts are popular. They’re just not for us.

Being couped up in one place with hundreds of people who are just like us — tourists out to “see the sights” — just doesn’t appeal. Several years ago, we began thinking about a different way to experience another country and its culture, while having the freedom to move around and discover things on our own. The thought of following a tour guide holding a tall sign like a group of lemmings and snapping pictures of precisely what everyone else sees still makes me shudder.

But how can we explore a whole country or region in just a couple of weeks without spending all our time driving and toting heavy luggage from place to place?

The answer we discovered was this: rent an apartment or condo in a central location within your chosen country/area (the “hub”) and use the excellent train systems in Europe for periodic excursions (the “spokes”). The trains are generally so fast, and the distances so short (compared to the US), that you can take day trips all over the place in two weeks or a month and still have plenty of time to explore the hub city.

There are still lots of other questions to answer before embarking on a journey like this.

Where to stay?
How and when to book your flights?
How to use local transportation, both cross-country and in-city?
Should we rent a car? (Hint: generally, no)
How to negotiate language barriers?
How and when to change currency? (Hint: don’t)
How to pack?
What to eat and drink, and where?
How to travel with special medical needs?

Luckily, we have already found answers for many of those questions, and more. Part of the purpose of this mailing list is to share those answers and enable others to start enjoying the same kind of immersive travel and exploration.

But we also want to share the concrete details of some of our recent itineraries to fascinating hubs, like…