Travel Advice - Cheap Drinks With Ice in Europe

We created ThereArePlaces to help convey to you the “ins and outs” of how to travel with comfort and convenience when you are away from home. In the "travel well" context, you may wonder why we  bring up US fast food eateries.  The answer is simple:  sometimes they are good places to seek respite when you are traveling internationally.

When you think about world travel, you generally do not visualize touring a world famous attraction and, then, stopping off at McDonalds or Burger King for a snack. Our intuition tells us that sometime during your trip abroad you will  run across "good old American fast food" and we recommend that you take advantage of the opportunity.

One of the customs you will need to get used to in the UK and Europe is that drinks are usually served without ice. If you ask for ice, you will either be met with a blank stare or provided one or two of the smallest ice cubes that you have ever seen.  We are sure that some of the cubes we have been offered in Europe were frozen during the last Ice Age (and taste like it).

• If you want to wet your whistle and have a reasonably priced, ice-laden, cup of Coke or Pepsi, you need to head for a U.S. based food outlet.
• The most reasonably priced soft drinks that you can find in Europe will be served at McDonald’s or Burger King. Be prepared to pay more than you do at home, but less than you will pay down the street.

Note: in many countries, the pricing is different for food or drinks you take-away as opposed to food you eat in the shop. If you pay for take-away (less than eating-in), don’t try to eat the food in the shop, as you may be asked to leave. The difference in price has to do with the Value Added Tax being applied to food eaten at the restaurant but not on "take away" food.

While we are at it, an additional, attractive aspect of McDonalds and Burger King Restaurants in Europe and the UK, that is relatively rare in other shops, is air conditioning. If you are overheated, head for the American junk food oases.

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