happytourist

I am starting to plan a trip for us (Americans) and a couple who live in the UK but have never been to Germany. We will be retracing places that we have been, but I love Germany enough to do that so they can enjoy it also. My itinerary is below, but I'm looking for suggestions for other/better towns. We will combine one day on the Rhine with train travel. My DH is too old to drive in Germany anymore and the other gentleman is a Brit so is uncomfortable driving in Europe. The trip will be about ten days.

The itinerary is: fly into Frankfurt, Bingen, KD ferry to St. Goar, Würzburg, Rothenburg ob der Tauber, Nürnberg, Augsburg, Munich.

I'm thinking about substituting Heidelberg for either Würzberg or Augsburg. Any suggestions?

rhkkmk

looks perfect to me, but too much moving around for 10 days

Gary_Mc

This would be a little fast paced for my taste but you know your best travel speed. If you want to skip something, I would consider St. Goar. I loved St. Goar but it is off your route. It will be hard to see much of the Rhine in a short time anyway. Sounds like a great time in any case. Gary

bilboburgler

as above, seems a pity to fly across the pond for only 10 days.

I'd drop Nürnberg, well I'd also drop Munich but hey we are not all the same.

I'd spend time in the Mosel but you don't have enough time

logandog

We cruised from Bacarach to St.Goar a few weeks ago.
Other than the castle and the world's largest coo-coo clock there wasn't much to see.
Bacarach was more interesting.

ira

Hi HT,

Are you using a single base and then taking day trips?

If so, looks good.

If not, too many overnights.

ira

PS

Don't mention the war.

PalenQ

You are taking enough trains to take a good look at the German Twin Railpass which lets yo hop virtually any train anytime with few exceptions that you will not encounter.

The more days you buy the cheaper it becomes - no restrictions, complete flexibility. Also strongly consider first-class travel for a group of 4 - much more relaxed than a good enough 2nd class - often IME of taking German trains for decades oodles of empty seats in first class but finding 4 empty seats together or even two in 2nd class could be problematic.

A 'Twin' Pass is for groups of two - cheaper than buying two solo passes - you could get two Twin Passes for 4 people.

In first class the pass is even a better deal vis-a-vis regular walk up fares - check fares at www.bahn.de/en and for pass prices check out these IMO superb sites with lots of great info on German trains: www.budgeteuropetravel.com; www.ricksteves.com and www.seat61.com. Passes are fully valid on the K-d boats plying the best part of the Rhine (between Rudesheim/Bingen and Koblenz - go downstream for a few hour float - upstream takes a lot longer.

www.k-d.com for Rhine boat schedules on boats on which a railpass is fully valid - just flash it when boarding - no advance reservations TMK needed.

Again no restrictions like on regional passes where there are black out times and you are restricted to regional trains, IME much much more uncomfortable and always can be very crowded as they act as commuter trains. The pass lets you ride the faster and infinitely more comfy high-speed trains.

annhig

The itinerary is: fly into Frankfurt, Bingen, KD ferry to St. Goar, Würzburg, Rothenburg ob der Tauber, Nürnberg, Augsburg, Munich.

I'm thinking about substituting Heidelberg for either Würzberg or Augsburg. Any suggestions?>>

How long is this trip going to last HT? are you looking at having a couple of hubs, or just travelling from point to point?

we just did a 10 day trip to Germany and found that the travel one day, stay put the next [ie 2 nights minimum in each place] worked well. Alternatively, Wurzburg would make a very good hub - you could easily get to Bamberg, Nuremberg, Rothenburg, even Heidelberg. As a brit, I think that your friends should enjoy all these places and find them interesting.

Do give yourselves enough time in one place. i find that the older i get, the less I can cope with one-night stands!

happytourist

We're going for a month but our friends from the UK are working and only have ten days. We've decided to do the following:
St. Goar / Würzburg / Rothenburg ob der Tauber / 3 nights in Nürnberg / 3 nights in Munich. We'll do a second night at one of the first three towns, based on their wishes.

I've looked at the German railpasses, but I think we can do better by getting Länder passes. The first two towns are in Rheinland-Pfalz and the others are in Bayern. We can get all-day passes for four for 35 euros total. There's no way we could get out the door before 9am so this ticket will work well for us.

annhig

sounds like a great plan, HT. your friends are lucky to have you as their guides.

Where are you going when you are not with your friends? [and what time of year is this going to be?] I had forgotten how lovely the Pfalz is until we spent a few days there with our friends at the end of our trip earlier this month. Lovely little towns, castles, mountains, and very few tourists.

happytourist

annhig, I think we'll spend a week in Belgium and Luxemburg, then go to Trier and into the Black Forest. My husband was stationed in Bavaria in the army (centuries ago) and wants to revisit some of his favorite places. We might even extend our visit and go to Lüneburg, where I have family. We're retired so we can do pretty much whatever we want.

bilboburgler

Just back from the Black Forest, Alsace, Constance and Mosel, weather lovely.

annhig

sounds nice, HT. if you are in Trier, you could detour down the southern Weinstrasse which goes through the Pfalz, and is exceptionally pretty, IMO; also the Neckar valley would be on your route.

bilbo - did you get to the Wurstmarkt? when we were there they were worried that no-one would turn up due to the [then] awful weather. We didn't go but certainly the local wine festival we went to was down in numbers due to the heavy rain. Of course it meant that there was more for us!

however the night before we left for home the weather changed and it looked set fair for a lovely few days, from which you clearly benefitted. Glad you had a good time!