Vacation indecision

I need a vacation. One of the benefits of working in Old Europe is that I get plenty of paid vacation. Sure I may not make as much as I might in America - but I get a good amount of time off. Plus my work lets me bank leave days as well, and I carried over some time from last year. I've taken one day of leave this financial year (beginning 1 April) - so I have 31 days that I could use - and 21 that I must use. Plus I get about a week off between Christmas and New Year. (My three week trip to America over Christmas cost me about 9 days).

But I'm a hoarder. I hoard old magazines, bits of paper, lengths of string, clothes, shoes, random bits of crockery, etc. I might need it. I hoard leave, too. I might need it. Of course, what happens is that I hit my bankable limit and then struggle to take the time off in drippy, icky, dark cold March when the Vol-in-Law is busy, busy in the academic calendar.

Plus the Vol-in-Law has decided that I'm no fun to travel with. This might be true - actually, I'm fun enough when I get there, but the journey's not so great. I get a bit anxious about missing flights, trains or connections. I get anxious about not seeing enough while I'm there.

And then there's the fact that we have different expectations of a holiday. The Vol-in-Law would like to bask on a beach - and to me that sounds like hell. I could lie around at home with all my bits of string and crockery and shoes about me. When I go on vacation, I want to get up, see a museum, walk around a city aimlessly, drink a beer, eat a cheap meal, see a museum, have another beer and then maybe another one. I like city breaks packed with culture - visible culture I can see in a painting on wall - and beer. And not only that, I like to do it in emerging economies where the hotel and the beer and the food are cheap.

The Vol-in-Law abhors the stink and the chaos of the developing and post-communist world.

Now for the past couple of years, I've gone on vacation with VolBro, and this has worked out very well indeed. VolBro likes cheap beer. VolBro likes obscure developing places. VolBro tolerates my obsession with museums (though he drew the line when I wanted to take a special trip out into the wild suburbs of Budapest to visit a statue park of communist heroes now surplus to requirements). VolBro doesn't just tolerate my need to get to the airport early, he has to get there a full hour earlier than I do, which means that I get to seem like the sensible one.

But this year VolBro isn't coming to Europe. So my plan of a cheap flight to Vienna (for some culture and stuff) and then a boat ride down the Danube to Bratislava, Slovakia (for some more culture and cheap, cheap beer) and then a cheap flight back to London hasn't worked out. And now I'm casting around for a new idea that the Vol-in-Law will agree to.

Suggestions welcome.