Some readers probably wonder how much travel I actually book online. The answer, naturally, is as much as possible, but until last week I hadn't attempted to organise an entire trip (flights, accommodation, research, car hire) online. And this time I only had four days to organise a long weekend somewhere in Europe.

Expedia and Ebookers
Searching for two return flights under £150 was easy enough, but the results were disappointing. Not only did every flight seem to be full, but anything to the south of France and Italy appeared to cost at least £300.

Buzz, Go and easyJet
Earlier this year I picked up a return to Paris for £48 on Buzz, so I was happy to consider flying to Carcassonne, Bordeaux or Marseille with the airline. Unfortunately the prices had risen with the summer. Go was almost completely booked (deservedly so) and easyJet's flights to Nice were startlingly expensive. It was time to go lower.

Ryanair
Ryanair's website leaves a lot to be desired. It's hard to navigate, ugly and frankly misleading. One-way flights do start from £9, but there is no easy way of finding the cheapest way to fly, and airport taxes increase the price substantially.

Nonetheless, Ryanair had seats to Pisa on the appropriate dates and the cost was just over £130, which was slightly cheaper than flying Alitalia via Expedia and didn't involve a change in Milan. I booked. Ryanair suggested printing out the confirmation screen but didn't offer to send an e-mail.

Universal Currency Converter
My budget was immediately multiplied by 3,085 (lire to the pound).

Italy Hotel Reservation
IHR allows you to search for hotels in a particular region and links to their own websites. In some cases, it's possible to check availability and book online too. A pleasant two-hour trawl of bad English and large photographs ensued, which would have been shorter if the site had been capable of searching for availability across its database.

An appealing hotel in Colle di Val d'Elsa had double rooms available, but I had never heard of the town and the Rough Guides hadn't either. I was also unhappy with the site's security and unwilling to trust it with a credit card number.

AltaVista
Typing the name of the town and the hotel returned several pages on different booking networks. Visiting them all gave a much better picture of Colle di Val d'Elsa.

TuscanyNet
Booking on TuscanyNet appeared to be more secure, but there was no guarantee of a quick reply. Worried that the hotel would forget to check their email, I faxed them to reiterate what I wanted. They faxed back the following morning to confirm the booking, but added that they had not received the email.

Hertz car hire
Progress was halted by a call from my travelling partner. "I've booked the car, and it was only £70," he informed me.

"But I could have found a better price online!"

"Yes, but when I call them, they ask which flight you're arriving on, and you can talk to someone..."