Trip itineraries, planned day by day

Five days in Paris: The Art of Slowing Down in the Capital of Speed

Enough time for the Louvre and the Orsay without running them together, a morning on Montmartre, and evenings spent walking rather than queueing.

Five days in New York City: Beyond the Checklist and Into the Grid

Manhattan is thirteen miles long and two wide, which is smaller than it sounds and entirely walkable in five days if the days are grouped properly.

Four days in Rome: Ruins, popes and long lunches

Enough time to see the ancient centre, the Vatican and the baroque middle of the city properly, on foot, without spending the trip in queues.

Ten days in France: Beyond the Capital on the Rhône Line

The north-south spine of France in ten days: the capital, the country's best eating city and the Riviera, joined by two fast trains and nothing else.

Paris → Lyon → Nice

Ten days in Italy: Three Cities That Couldn't Be Less Alike

The three cities everyone means by Italy, in the order the railway puts them. Four nights in Rome, three in Florence, two in Venice, and no car at any point.

Rome → Florence → Venice

Six days in Hong Kong and Macau: Two Riverbank Stories Across the Delta

Five nights across the two places, joined by an hour on a ferry, with a full day on Lantau and enough time in Macau to eat properly and see it after dark.

Hong Kong → Macau

Five days in Berlin: History Written in Concrete

A capital rebuilt three times in one century, where the twentieth century is still legible in the street, and nothing has been tidied away.

Four days in Washington DC: World-Class Museums, Zero Tickets

Three nights within walking distance of the Mall, in a city where nearly everything worth seeing is free and the queues are for the free things.

Six days in Helsinki and Tallinn: Two Capitals, One Sea, Opposite Histories

Helsinki and Tallinn face each other across eighty kilometres of the Gulf of Finland, were founded as trading rivals four hundred years apart, and are now joined by more than twenty daily ferry crossings taking about two hours.

Helsinki → Tallinn

Ten days in Spain: From Mediterranean Light to Andalusian Heat by Rail

The classic first trip to Spain, done on two train tickets instead of two flights, with an evening in every city rather than a morning at an airport.

Barcelona → Madrid → Seville

Ten days in China: Two imperial capitals and one city that invented itself

Nine nights across the three cities most people want on a first visit, linked by trains rather than flights, with a full day each for the Wall and the warriors.

Beijing → Xi'an → Shanghai

Ten days in Germany: Four cities that barely agree they are the same country

North to south by fast train through four cities that were separate states within living memory, and in two cases within the last century.

Berlin → Leipzig → Nuremberg → Munich

Twelve days in Scandinavia: Three capitals on one railway, and each one contradicts the last

Denmark, Sweden and Norway in one line, with the two border crossings done on the ground: five hours from Copenhagen to Stockholm and five and a half on to Oslo.

Copenhagen → Stockholm → Oslo

Five days in Istanbul: Eleven Centuries of Empires on Three Hills

Four nights is enough to see the imperial city properly on foot, cross to Galata and the Asian shore without rushing, and still have afternoons left over.

Five days in Beijing: A capital built to make you feel small

Five days is enough for the Forbidden City, a full day on the Great Wall, the Summer Palace and the old lanes around the lakes, without turning any of them into a march.

Four days in Los Angeles: How to Love a City Without a Centre

Three nights in a metropolis the size of a small country, arranged so that each day belongs to one district and one drive.

Four days in Chicago: The city that invented the skyscraper and still does it best

Three nights in the Loop, an easy walk from most of it, in a city built flat on a grid beside an inland sea.

Four days in Madrid: A capital with no river and four centuries of paintings

A capital that keeps its best paintings in three buildings on one boulevard, and its evenings outdoors until well past midnight.

Four days in Hong Kong: Vertical, crowded, and greener than anyone tells you

Three nights covers the harbour at night, a full day on Lantau, the Taoist temples and street markets of Kowloon, and the new museums at West Kowloon.

Four days in Helsinki: An imperial capital that behaves like a small town

Finland's capital is a city of 690,000 spread across a peninsula and several hundred islands, with a white neoclassical centre built for the Russian empire, a gold domed Orthodox cathedral over the harbour, and a working sea fortress twenty minutes offshore.

Five days in Rio de Janeiro: Where the rainforest comes down to the beach

A five day plan for Rio, grouped so each day stays on one side of the mountains, with the two great viewpoints, the rebuilt port district, the hill neighbourhood and the long walk from Copacabana to Ipanema.

Ten days in Poland: Kraków to the Baltic, and the century in between

Poland's three best cities stand almost in a row up the middle of the country, and the trains between them are fast, cheap and frequent, which makes this the easiest big trip in central Europe.

Kraków → Warsaw → Gdańsk

Nine days in northern Italy: What you see when you skip Rome and Florence

The Po valley from end to end: a working city with a Leonardo in a monastery, a Roman amphitheatre that still sells out, and a republic built on mud.

Milan → Verona → Venice

Six days in Wallonia: Three citadels on one river, and hardly a visitor on it

A six day trip down the Meuse through French-speaking Belgium: two nights in Liege, two in Namur below its citadel, and one in Dinant under the cliff.

Liège → Namur → Dinant