Lleauric

ME and wife have narrowed our next vacation to somewhere in Europe..

Specifically.. either Florence or Paris..

What does our resident Euro Trash think?
Be about 5-7 days there..

Kein Bojangles

Florence, or Venice.

Just went to Italy over the summer, and Venice was amazing.

Taino

Thats a hard one...
I'd say Parins. but the problem is that I heared several times, poeple in paris aren't too nice to tourists.
I speak french so its np and I had an incredible time in Paris. But as I said, maybe its not that great as english speaking person. Florence is nice, too. But if you go for Florence, you should aswell consider Venice and Milano. Oh and once you're in Milano just make a short trip to Switzerland aswell.

Kein Bojangles

btw, if the trip would be in the summer, I would stay on Lake Como for a few nights as well. Beautiful area.

Anterak

Florence is a very nice place, but in one day you have visited all.

Paris on the other hand... A great place to go, especially in summer, because it's empty.

My choice would go for Paris.

Kelraz Bladesinger

I am gonna disagree with most of the above, I really didn't like Paris one bit. Nice on the other hand was awesome. And well Florence is my 4th favorite european city (coming after Prague, Vienna, and Budapest ... and then closly followed by London). If you want to catch me in game, coming as an American Tourist as well as someone who's lived in Europe for 6 months, I can share a lot of the pros and cons of a lot of the locations and help you pick out which one is best for you.

Taino

Nice?
Only good thing about Nice is the nightlife.
It is not a very pretty city, the beach is not even made out of sand....
I had a great time in Nice, but just cause I have a friend there *wink Anterak*. Other then this I don't feel the need to return there anymore.
So unless you wanna go have nighttime hardcore dancing fun, Nice isn't the right this, IMO.

Ruthey

I went to Paris and warned the person I was with about how rude the Parisians are reputed to be. We went out to a medium-grade restaurant and, on the way in, I repeatedly warned that the waiters were likely to be very mean to us and not to be offended.

Cut to: the waiter says "Oh - let me translate the menu for you it is my pleasure, please - no I insist."

The entire time we were there people were incredibly sweet to us - so go figure. Maybe we were in the wrong arrondissement. =)

One other thing - drive through France (although directions can be hard to figure out because the French head *to* something rather than taking I-whatever North to Exit whatever). We drove around Southwest and Central France in the Toulouse - Dordogne - Montpelier areas and kept bracing ourselves for that ugly industrial city with toxic waste that we felt sure to find.

But never did.

Town after town with incredible views and amazing architecture was all we saw. Walled cities, castles - amazing rock formations - winding rivers by parks with cave drawings by Neanderthals - whew. Incredible. We kept rubbing our eyes and saying "Can there be so much beauty in one country??"

On the other hand - Venice... is the most romantic place on earth I think (Paris is just too big of a city to be that romantic). I always wished I would be proposed to in Venice. The canals, the old beautiful buildings, the winding coblestone streets.

Florence is incredible too, don't get me wrong.

Tough decision. I'd almost fip a coin except for one thing. You should probably take the international situation into consideration before deciding which country to visit. The French (and understandably imho with their large Muslim minority) weren't exactly on the US side for Iraq - and we weren't terribly nice about it either (also pretty understandably).

Just based on that alone you might want to try neutral Switzerland. I haven't been there in too long a time, but the mountain views there are, of course, incredible. I went to Lausanne and Geneva for just a few days, but remember the fresh air, spotless streets (we kept looking for some litter, like we're used to in NYC, but none to be found), blue-blue lake, and snow-capped mountains. Also met a few interesting artist-Taino-types over there. Dunno if things have changed there, though.

Kelraz Bladesinger

The whole Parisans are mean thing is a bit of an exageration. Some hate Americans (or foreigners in general), others don't. Hell my roomate (an American) was repeatedly hit on by his host father in Paris, the host father kept coming into his room in the nude and all sorts of creepy stuff. Apparently he didn't hate Americans.

Selwen Soulgazer

The People of NYC are reputed to be rude,too. I have been to the city several times and never been treated any way but nice. Except the large Italian guys in suits that wouldn't let me take a picture in Tony's Nuthouse /shrug.
Anyhoo, my point is, each place has its own reputation,but you never know until you go yourself.