Everything arranged. So, you are going to Europe this next vacations, and you have already asked for permission at work, your family agrees that this is a nice place where you can spend your holidays, and you are already looking forward for the time to pack your bags.

Good beginning. In any case, up to which point you understand Europe as a whole entity? Many times I have heard people only telling me that they want to visit Europe, and the question I ask them is: "What are you looking for?" The cultural variety of the countries that share this old small continent is exceptional in all over the world. In this article I am going to focus in one of this sectors of Europe, the recently discovered Eastern Europe.

It is not anything new, it's not a last trend I'm uncovering for you. Eastern Europe, far still from being a touristic hot spot as other countries in Europe, is on its maximum growing potential. If one thing identifies those countries is an economic situation that almost certainly is not as good as we can expect in the rest of Europe. Nothing to do with their habitants, of course, but times have come in which their political alliances didn't work as good as expected and right now they are on the way of development.

What you can expect in Eastern Europe, is first of all unspoiled destinations. You will have the opportunity to avoid the mass tourism now that it is still possible and visit many cities with a large possibility of sightseeing opportunities, in some cases as much as in any other touristic destination. The word to describe very generally Eastern Europe is "contrast".

Contrast means basically that you will find there cities that try to be but still aren't. You will find commercial centers and high skyscrapers in the city center, surrounded at just some 100 meters by buildings that are on the way to fall down, sometimes even placed wall to wall. The highly demanding society that belonging to Europe means to be, compared with the actual resources that this countries have, puts them in a bit of trouble when it comes to select the adequate investments for the growing cities.

Some of those countries suffered a lot during the recent world war, specially all the ones that used to belong to the old Russia. All this countries where placed in the middle of the way, and German troops and allied countries created an absolute chaos on the territory. Tallin, for example, had more than a 60% of its residential areas destroyed by bombings.

If you travel a bit closer to central Europe, you will find countries such as Poland, the Czech Republic or Slovakia. They are possibly the ones that are more close to the good quality of living in Europe and the way they are integrating is now very fast. Instead, going south, more war problems left countries like Bosnia and Serbia with destruction everywhere. Let's give them a breath and they will soon become great nations as their habitants are.

Even if many has been destroyed in some conflicts, many of the Eastern European countries, and this including the city of Moscow, have incredible buildings standing there. Cathedrals, churches and palaces that have a special style, sometimes with some more Asian influence than the most occidental part of the continent.

When it comes to people, it is important to understand that war and problems have been faced by many of the habitants in some of those countries, specially going east and south. Even if the city center is full of joy and movement, the feeling still roams a bit in the air, and sometimes you will need to work a bit harder to gain confidence from somebody. At same time, as it is always true in relations, as soon as you manage to make somebody open to you, it will be easy to make ever-lasting friends there.

Finishing with all this, a trip to Eastern Europe in one side will be exactly the same as any other part, provided that the cultural variety and architectural proficiency are enough as to keep any tourist occupied for a long time. It will be good to get insight in what has happened in every region in the early past events to understand the contrasts you will find there. Keep an eye on security, as poverty is more extended than in other European Regions, but following your common sense, I wouldn't consider it a dangerous region.

To find guidance in planning a trip to Europe: Travel to Europe