Berlin - Hotel de France

My go-to site for finding lodgings is Tripadvisor.

From the aforementioned site, I found the Hotel de France.

It is a gem of a hotel located in the outskirts of Berlin in the Wedding district.

Pros:

• Inexpensive
• Staff speaks multiple languages, notably French, English, and German
• Close to Rehberg U-bahn stop which takes you downtown in about 30 min. from which you can connect to all tourist stops
• It is closer to the airport than the downtown hotels.  The bus to/from airport stops only a few metro stops away from the hotel
• The room is clean.
• It is in a safe mostly residential neighborhood.
• It has a restaurant and is next to a movie theater (kino).

Cons:

• If you like to regularly return to your hotel midday to nap or to quickly retrieve things, it is not conveniently close enough for that relative to the major tourist attractions
• The hotel room door takes some getting used to.  I've stayed at a lot of hotels in the US, and I've never had to deal with such a fastidious door.
• The elevator is small.
• The internet works...most of the time.  Once it was off-line most of the day on the weekend, and when it was back up, it only worked in the lobby area.   
• If you like to live near exciting nightlife, this is not the place for you.  It is next to a church and seems to be a residential neighborhood.  I got food, entertainment, etc. elsewhere and only returned here to sleep.

Would I stay here again?  Yes, if price was a deciding factor and also for the convenience of proximity to the airport and U-bahn.  If I could find another comparable place closer to the vegan restaurants in the Prenzlauer-Berg Schoenhauser Allee, I'd consider staying there, too.

Tower of Babel

What's the best way to immerse yourself in your destination?  Learn the language!

If you've already studied foreign languages in high school or college, you're all set.

If you need a refresher or want to pick up a new language, here are the resources I found useful:

• Textbooks
• These are useful for learning grammar and spelling and for practicing writing and reading skills
• My sources: Amazon.com for used textbooks (old editions are sufficient), used book sales
• Specifically, I own or have read all or part of:
• Italian- Oggi in Italia
• German- Alles Gute!, Neue Horizonte, Deutsch Sprache and Landeskunde
• Online learning modules from Mango Languages are available for free from  many public libraries.
• Mango consists of self-paced modules featuring a seemingly intimidating conversation at the beginning of the lesson that is your 'goal' as you work to deconstruct the dialog during the lesson.  
• There is a lot of repetition, which is useful for learning
• The English and foreign language are juxtaposed and color-coded
• You can click on the word to hear it repeated as much as you would like
• If you have a microphone, you can record and compare your accent to the standard reference
• Units 1 and 2, if available for your language of interest, are part of the library subscription package.  They cover very basic material.
• Subjects include- greetings, shopping, sightseeing, eating out, weather, direction, basic medical terms
• It took me about 10 months total to complete both Units 1 and 2 for two languages. I completed about 1-2 lessons per weekday and 2-4 lessons per weekend day, with an occasional day or a week of break.
• Each lesson takes about 10-20 minutes to complete.
• Units 3 and 4, if you're interested in more in-depth learning, require individual subscription which is currently under $180 a year. 
• Subjects include- arts, history, more medical terms, customs, hotel, chores, sports
• Audio learning (CD-roms)
• Pimsleur has 5 levels of several major languages.  These levels may be split depending on what version you have, i.e. IA and IB  = level I.
• Level I for the one language I tried consists of 30 lessons split among 18 CD-roms.
• It comes with a reading booklet consisting of a list of vocabulary words.  The words correspond with past or future lessons.
• Each lesson takes 30 minutes to complete.  The last 5 minutes is devoted to reading the vocabulary list in the 'reading' booklet.
• Pimsleur also has smaller collections, for example, of Swiss German which consists of ~10 CDs
• I used Pimsleur after already having learned the basics with Mango and textbooks.  If you try Pimsleur by itself, I think your grammar and spelling skills will be deficient.  It depends on how you learn best.  I'm quite a visual person, so seeing the words and how they're spelled makes a lot of difference to how I learn, so Pimsleur is not good for the visual learner.  Pimsleur is good auditory reinforcement of words that I previously learned audiovisually.
• A disadvantage is that I cannot get the CD to save where I left off when using a CD player, so I end up having to finish the 30 minute lesson so as to not have to repeat material.  If you use a computer or other device with a time tracker, you can resume at the time where you last left off.

Travel Books

Here are the books I found most or least useful by destination.  My favorite source of these books are:

• Public Library
• Used book or rummage sales (e.g. held by library or local charity)
• Amazon.com

Italy
You can't go wrong with any of the Rick Steves' books.  I personally preferred getting the individual books for each city so that I could abandon them en route if I needed luggage space.  I like the flexibility of packing several smaller books vs. one gigantic, heavy book.  Plus, for the cities I really liked and hope to return to some day, I saved those books while donating the others for cities I don't plan to visit again.  The comprehensive tome that covers multiple major cities is like an encyclopedia and is too heavy to lug around for day trip traveling.

In addition, I also liked Eyewitness Travel's Milan and the Lakes since I did not find a city-specific Rick Steves book that covered Milan as well as this book did.

Montreal
Secret Montreal
If you want to go off the beaten path, I highly recommend this book.  Several of the 'secret' sites are free or inexpensive public art or building facades.

Switzerland
Cadogan Guides Switzerland
It features more detail on cities like Basel than other tour books.
I found Rick Steve's book to be woefully inadequate.  It is heavy on Eastern Switzerland and misses a lot of cities.  It is very cursory and overall a disappointment.

Paris
I used Fodor's books (top 10 and comprehensive books) as well as websites for free things to do in Paris.

Berlin
Besides Fodor's and Rick Steves' books, I also used Lonely Planet's Berlin City Guide.

All about Geld - Argent - Dinero - Euro - $$$

Check to see if your bank has any partner banks in other countries to save on transaction fees.  For example, I have used these banks which partner with my American bank:
- Scotia Bank in Canada
- BNP Paribas in France
- BNP in Italy
- Deutsch Bank in Germany

Make sure you notify your bank in advance that you will be traveling so that your card isn't blocked.  You may be able to set up a travel notice online.

Request your credit card pin in advance of your trip.  Some automated machines in Europe require credit card pins, e.g. at public transit stations.  It may NOT be something you can request on the phone or online during your trip.  They mail it to you a couple weeks after you submit your request.

My bank charges a ~$7 transaction fee plus their conversion rate for foreign currency orders. It takes about 2 business days to arrive at a local branch for pickup.  You can request small bills, large bills, or a mix.  No coins are provided, though.

Check with your financial institution to see if they have travel credit card deals.  For example, my travel card has no foreign transaction fees and also accumulates points related to travel spending which can be redeemed towards future credit card payments which do not have to be related to travel spending.  It's like a rebate for a portion of your travel expenditures.

Bring your 1-800 number help line with you in case you lose your card(s).  Store it separately from your cards.  I had the misfortune of losing my cards once while overseas, and it was a lifesaver to be able to call collect (at bank's expense) to be able to report the loss right away.  Luckily my travel companion had their cards such that my frozen accounts did not damper my ability to cover expenses for the rest of the trip.

Flights

I buy my flights at least 6 months in advance.

International (from USA)
For international flights, among existing companies I have flown Air France, Lufthansa, and United.

My favorite is Air France

Pros: huge selection of French movies, decent food, decent customer service

Cons: from the US most flights go to Paris, which, given recent security concerns, one may view as a risky place to which to travel.

Lufthansa has had recent bouts of sudden strikes which can leave passengers stranded.  Their food is so-so, their movies are way better than United but not as good as Air France.

United sometimes doesn't even provide individual seat-back movies for international flights!  Avoid if at all possible.

Word to the wise: Regardless of what your chosen airline is, beware of codeshare flights, i.e. you buy a flight from airline X but due to its partnerships even though it has a flight number for your preferred airline, in FINE PRINT it will say "operated by ZZZ Airlines" which might be the evil company you despise.  Beware!  I lost a lot of time and maybe a few gray hairs due to computer problems between Lufthansa and United.  I had bought what I thought was a Lufthansa flight, but United was operating it, and United's computer system reversed the flight order sent by Lufthansa's computers such that I could not check in for my flight 24 h prior to departure.  Needless to say I got bounced around like a ping pong ball on the phone and even at the airport.  Caveat empor!  It took one heck of a savvy United agent to decode my flight so that I could *finally* check in.  And, to boot, the code-share companies don't correctly transfer or receive your diet order, so vegans can expect to starve, slowly, on the 10+ hour flight unless you call ahead to confirm they got the info correct (assuming they correctly identify you as their customer for the correct flight number...see above how even 24 h before flight no guarantees that will even happen).

I have paid just above $1200 round trip to Europe off-season in winter and usually around $1500-1600 for sort of off season fall trips.  In peak season like summer, expect to pay more.

Domestic (USA)
For domestic flights in the US, among existing companies I have flown American, United, Southwest, and Jet Blue.

My favorite is Southwest.

Pros: free check-in luggage (with limits), reasonable fares, free snacks, open seating, usually upbeat staff (though I've had a rude attendant once), free on-board online TV if you have a laptop, tablet, or other device that can connect, decent on-board magazine with interesting stories

Cons: sometimes rates might not be the lowest; only goes to major cities in US

The other major airlines tend to be pricier, nickel and dime you for on-board food (though United is now providing snacks but still of inferior quantity and quality vs. Southwest), luggage, flight change fees, etc. and they are notorious for poor customer service, overbooked flights, etc.

The latest Transportation Security Administration news is they're cutting down on security agents, so folks should get to the airport at least 3 hours prior to departure for domestic flights.

In their heyday I used to snag a Southwest deal for $49 one-way trip along the west coast and a cross-country trip for $200!  Nowadays one-way cross country trips are $200 if you're lucky.

Welcome! Herzlich Wilkommen! Bienvenue! Benvenuto!

Follow me in budget travels across the globe while maintaining my pocketbook, sating intellectual curiosity, and maintaining a primarily vegan diet.  From the preliminary planning to the logistics of transportation and the activity itinerary, you will learn from my experiences and avoid my mistakes!