Choices, choices, choices. And all of them are important. Where to stay? Where and when to fly? How to get around by train? When to book passes and make reservations.

All of these combine, if expertly accomplished, into a stress-free, memorable, rich travel experience to:

• Paris, London, Amsterdam
• Loire Chateaux, Normandy Coast (with Mont St-Michel)
• Tuscany, Venice
• Cinque Terre, Florence
• The Swiss Alps and into Italy to Lake Como

So how much is this going to cost? And how will you come up with the money? Will this trip cost more than a trip to Epcot Center? Should you take the kids and incur the additional expense? Again, there are optimal ways to think about all this.

Planning ahead will help a great deal. And you may be surprised at how relatively reasonable the costs will be, especially once you arrive. And there are some very fun ways to balance your travel budget, alternating between splurges and economies. Even those economies will add to the richness of your overall experience. 

Although there will be variations budget-wise among these 10 trips, there are some good-to-know commonalities too that make predicting costs fairly straight-forward. One such positive discovery is that by traveling independently, you actually will spend less than you would on a group trip. And have much more fun.