An article appeared in the Chicago Tribune Travel Section yesterday, Sunday April 13, with a full page of Rick Steve’s recommendations on stretching your money against the Euro. Good suggestions with the exception of two.

Rick’s Suggestion #6, was to skip your hotel breakfast with its 10 Euro charge and eat in a local cafe for 7 Euros, a 3 Euro savings and/or the breakfast buffet (approximately 15 Euros). I disagree because:

- A cafe traditionally serves ONE cup of coffee and ONE croissant with charges for an extra cup of coffee and/or roll. You will only save money if you are satisfied with this. We are not.

- Your hotel usually serves a small pot of coffee and basket of rolls, and are very nice about bringing more, free, if asked. No hotel has ever turned us down.

- Breakfast buffets can turn out to be a real deal at 15 Euros. There is usually yogurt, cereal, rolls, cheese, occasionally lunch meats, enough food to make skipping lunch easy. That’s what we do. Think about it.

Rick’s Suggestion #12 was to learn the local word for “tap water” and ask for it in a restaurant so you don’t have to pay for a bottle of mineral water. I agree. We have always done this but not all restaurants will go along with your request. We’ve asked for tap water many times in whatever language only to hear the waiter refuse, in perfect English to serve it. They out-and-out say …”I’m sorry, we don’t serve tap water” leaving two choices. Buy a bottle or go thirsty. We just returned from three days in Rome and none of the restaurants we ate in would serve tap water.

Another suggestion from me, based on this last Rome trip. Italian restaurants usually bring a basket of rolls for lunch or dinner and then charge 3-6 Euros for this. If you don’t want any rolls, ask them to remove it from the table immediately. I don’t mind paying for bread if we’re going to eat it but ex-Marine (husband, Steve) went berserk when I picked one lonesome breadstick out of the basket to eat and this happened to be the restaurant that charged 6 Euros for the bread basket… $9.50 U.S. for one bread stick since he didn’t want any. I’ll never live this one down…

His other 18 suggestions were excellent. It’s not easy to save money in Europe right now (by our American standards, it’s brutal). Don’t eliminate Europe, just watch the Euros more carefully by lowering your standards a bit and look for deals.

Bon Voyage…