whete to cut (Germany trip) ?

Old Jan 25th, 2016, 08:20 AM
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whete to cut (Germany trip) ?

Hi !
I hope someone can help us plan our trip to Germany next summer ! We are a family of four (2 adults and 2 kids of 4 and 8 years old). We plan to travel 22 days (we can ad a day or 2 to that). We plan to flight from Montreal To Luxembourg since it would save us 800$.
So here,s the plan (we want to know if we can cut bacj some places so we are less rushed)
travel dates: july 11 to august 3 (those date are flexible)
July 11-13 : luxembourg (our flight arrive in lux july 12). So one night Luxembourg
July 13-18: Train to Rhin base (maybe Boppard) Five nights in Boppard
July 18-23: train from Bopard to berlin (maybe 2-3 hours stops in Köln) 5 nights in berlin, Daytrip to Potsdam
July 23-25: Berlin to Dresden (2 nights in Dresden)
July 25- 29: Dresden to Nuremberg (4 nights in Nuremberg, day trip to Rothenburg, Wurzburg and bamberg)
July 29- august 1: Munich (3 nights Munich,. We have hope doing a daytrip to salzburg but maybe lacjk time)
August 1-3 : train From Munich to Trier (6 hours train.. a long ride), 2 nights in Trier.
August 3. take a bus from trier to Lux airport to catch our flight back.
Of course coming back from Munich would have been best but it coste somethinh like 1200$ more thna coming back from luxembourg.
One more question: the flight is with Swiss (yul-zurich-Lux and Lux-Zurich-Yul). Is it a good company ?
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Old Jan 25th, 2016, 09:43 AM
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I think your itinerary sounds fine. I would really try to do that day trip to Salzburg from Munich.

I wasn't crazy about Nuremberg, but it is a practical place to base for day trips. I loved Rothenbourg ob der Tauer, but in August I imagine it is super-touristy and is a pain to do day trips from.

It's a shame you can't fly directly from Luxembourg City directly to Munich at the beginning and then train back, but I understand the need to save money. As long as you book your train super early - as soon as the saver fares become available for August - it would save you a lot.
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Old Jan 25th, 2016, 11:11 AM
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Would this work. Forget Luxembourg.

Fly Wednesday to Wednesday, into Frankfort and out of Munich.

Air Canada, non-stop on the way over and one stop on the way back with Swiss Air. [About $1017 PP, July 13th thru Aug 10th.]

If that would work, then you could reset the itinerary and spend time in Salzburg, a wonderful city and compact for children.
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Old Jan 25th, 2016, 03:26 PM
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Iris 1745,

we were also looking to fly to Frankfurt and get back from Munich. but return flight from Luxembourg would save us 800-900$.

Thos date your are giving me means to be there 5 mores days than we initially planned. Adda the expensive to fly to Frankfurt and from Munich and our budget get a big hit !

We also have to take in consideration that we are from Canda, and that our money is freefalling since copuple of months.
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Old Jan 25th, 2016, 03:48 PM
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I've found something else Montreal to Berlin with a layover in Zurich) then Lux to Montreal ith a layover in Zurich too. That would cost 370 more that Return flight to Luxembourg but 450 less than fly to Franckfurt and come bach from Munich.

We could begin our trip in Berlin then Dresden, Munich, Rhein valley and Luxembourg to get back to home.
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Old Jan 25th, 2016, 04:00 PM
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That's a sweet $625 flight to Luxembourg. You are right to plan your trip around it.

If you need to cut, my guess is you could cut a night from Dresden and add it elsewhere. Other than that I think you have a wonderful trip planned.
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Old Jan 25th, 2016, 04:44 PM
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We like Nuremberg, walk to the castle, Albrecht Dürer's House is very close to it and the store across from it sell's copies of his work.
http://www.hotelvictoria.de/en/contact/contact.html but not sure if there is ac for the summer. Good street markets and nice places to eat.
Your schedule sounds good but would rather go to Garmisch Partenkirchen for the day than Salzburg,
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Old Jan 25th, 2016, 08:16 PM
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Your kids would love the Playmobil theme park near Nuremberg! No rides, just a lot of creative physical activities. http://www.playmobil-funpark.de/en We also enjoyed Bayern Park - a small theme park with rides closer to Regensburg. We had good luck balancing adult sight-seeing and kid-sight seeing. Germany is fabulous with kids. We encountered some of the best parks, playgrounds, pools, etc... You'll probably find those amazing luge rides in certain parts of Bavaria. There were a couple of great ones near Bamberg. Here's our blog with some German entries from two separate trips, 2011 and 2014. http://familyineurope.travellerspoint.com/33/ It sounds like you have a great trip planned!
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Old Jan 26th, 2016, 06:30 AM
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"...we want to know if we can cut bacj some places so we are less rushed"

I don't think it's terribly rushed but ALL that pre-planned ground travel and ALL those big cities IMO is going to wear on kids and ultimately on you. There's no achievement in covering Germany geographically from north to south. I suggest you focus on AndiM's advice by...

"...balancing adult sight-seeing and kid-sight seeing. Germany is fabulous with kids. We encountered some of the best parks, playgrounds, pools, etc..."

Keep your cheap LUX flights. LUX is a fantastic small airport that's well connected.

You have 3 weeks. Try 3-4 smallish base towns with the features AndiM suggests at your doorstep. Pick places that will allow you some flexibility about where you go and when, places near enough "the big city" that you can take in some museums on one day, maybe relax on a sandy beach the next. ONE SUGGESTION:

COCHEM (near Trier on the Mosel River and near one of Germany's best castles, Burg Eltz) has...

a waterpark good for little ones and big ones: http://www.moselbad.de/kinderland.html

a falconry show at the castle: http://www.falknerei-reichsburg-cochem.de/fotobuch.htm

a riverfront playground: http://www.geotrip.de/wp-content/upl...el2014_370.jpg

a nearby amusement park - http://www.ferienland-cochem.de/next...348&newsid=147

Day trip by train into Trier in less than one hour each way. Day trips to Boppard or to Marksburg Castle in Braubach will take 1-1.25 hours.


"4 nights in Nuremberg, day trip to Rothenburg, Wurzburg and bamberg"

Instead of big-city Nuremberg I would look to stay in a different small town central to these places. I've stayed in Neustadt-an-der-Aisch previously with good results but you can screen the area for other small towns that not only have train stations (for access to these towns and Playmobil) but maybe pools or other infrastructure, or perhaps look into a farm-stay (popular with families in Bavaria.) Another very attractive town on the rail line between Würzburg and Nuremberg is the art/wine town of Iphofen...

http://www.gdl-regensburg.de/Iphofen.%20Fachwerk.JPG

http://tramino.s3.amazonaws.com/s/ip...en-english.pdf

http://vgn.de/ib/site/documents/imag...y=90&Confirm=1

kids pool and swimming facility: http://tramino.s3.amazonaws.com/s/ip...93219/1200.jpg
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Old Jan 26th, 2016, 10:51 AM
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Thanks a lot Fussgaenger for that precise and plentyfull answer ! It's much appreciated.

Of course we have to take in consideration that we will be travelling with our children but we also hacve to take ourselves in consideration. If we want to go in Germany is to find things/places that we can't find here. Watetslides, poools, forest we have plenty of them here. it,s a good idea to add some of them to our trip but we don't want to do a trip only based on them.

I love hitory (in fact i do teach history) and it will the only time we could go to Germany. I really want to put Berlin, Nuremberg and Munich in that trip. maybe we could cut a bit in those places, but i dont really want to scratch tem completely. That,s why the ide to flight In Berlin first seems to be a good idea (maybe it's not !)
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Old Jan 26th, 2016, 11:36 AM
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"Watetslides, poools, forest we have plenty of them here. it,s a good idea to add some of them to our trip but we don't want to do a trip only based on them."

Well that's good because I didn't suggest that, and I wouldn't do that with my family either; neither did anyone else suggest you only concern yourselves with such things.

The point is that if you pick the right town, these things for children WILL BE THERE if you decide you or your kids need them or want them.

Another point is lodging; vacation apartments (Ferienwohnhungen) for families tend to exist in those places where German families tend to vacation (places like Cochem and Boppard for example) and are less common within metropolises (especially at reasonable prices.) It's quite nice to have the extra room and a place for light food prep when you have kids. Stay in big cities and you'll sometimes find hotel rooms for a family of 4, but these too are surprisingly less common than in North America.

"I really want to put Berlin, Nuremberg and Munich in that trip."

Great, you are narrowing your priorities.
I suggested a reasonable way to do Nuremberg and the other nearby towns on your list. You can probably do something similar outside Munich. Berlin is the sort of place where you need to stay in town, but Berlin laws have cracked down on vacation rentals - as I understand it they've been outlawed on the grounds that they deprive locals of living space and drive up rents. Maybe someone else can elaborate.
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Old Jan 26th, 2016, 05:12 PM
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Once again Fussgaenger thanks a lot (the same goes to other people who take time to answer my questions !)

At dinner I was talking about the conversation i've got with with my girlfriend and we agrred on the fact that you are right about the idea of not needing to stay in those big town.

I gave you an exemple of waht we talk about: We have planned 5 nights In Munich, maybe we could do 1-2 nights in Prien, 1-2 night in Salzburg and 2 nights in Munich.

We want to stay for many days at the same place for parts of our trip: Berlin (4-5 nights) Somewhere near Nuremberg (4 nights), Cochem (or somewhere else, 4 nights).

I'll try to get informations about Airbnb and such in Berlin (does the same apply to every places in Germany ?).

We will have 21-24 fulls days in Germany, we want to do the best with that amount of time. Is not a lot but I hope that my initial plan is a bit better than those peopl who want to see 5 country in 14 days !
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Old Jan 28th, 2016, 08:35 AM
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As an option to Salzburg, do a day trip to Neuschwanstein castle. It's closer to Munich and easily accessible by train.
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Old Jan 28th, 2016, 09:41 AM
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One more thing. Air BnB is good, but occasionally it doesn't work out and then you have to rush to find accommodations at the last minute. Definitely not fun with two kids.

Sometimes you're better off looking for local listings, small B&Bs, and accommodations like that. They can be harder to find, but I find the rates can be pretty comparable to AirBnB in some situations, especially when you account for the cleaning fees in many AirBnBs.

If you have girls who love Disney, seeing the "Cinderella" castle of Neuschwanstein might be worth the visit.

Finally, have you calculated the cost of train travel compared to renting a car? I'm not recommending it, especially as both your children will be free on the train, but it is worth checking out. The Train ride from Munich to Luxembourg is like a transatlantic flight... 10 hours at least.

German ICE trains 'technically' have high speed 300km/h+ trains like Japanese, Spanish and French trains, but in practice many runs are slower than that in places as the population is not as decentralized as France.
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Old Jan 28th, 2016, 09:43 AM
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Ack. Can't edit posts. I mean... Germany is MORE decentralized than France, which has a strong central population concentration in larger urban centres like Paris.
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Old Jan 28th, 2016, 03:38 PM
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''The Train ride from Munich to Luxembourg is like a transatlantic flight... 10 hours at least.''

On dbbanh i see 6-7 hours. Long ride but maybe we could find a stop somewhere. 6-7 hours train to save 500 Euros is ok for us.

About the lodging, we want to make all reservation before the train (as soon as the flights are booked) less flexibily, but some peace of mind !
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Old Jan 28th, 2016, 04:48 PM
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There is no massive action against illegal or usually semi-illegal apartment rentals in Berlin. It has been investigated a bit, but mostly because many apartments have not been registered. And thus 'avoid' the city tax for accomodation.
But in principle, it is not illegal to sub-let an apartment for short periods like a few days. Less of an issue here than in Paris, for example.
Aside form AirBnB there are also many apartments advertised on sites like HomeAway or VRBO. So you should not only check AirBnB.
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Old Jan 29th, 2016, 10:48 AM
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Flights are bought ! Finally we will leave Montreal july 10 and we will arrive in Berlin (via Zurich) at 10 am july 11. The return flight will be at 10:40 AM august 4 From Luxembourg to Montreal (once again via Zurich).

We have 24 full days to plan, and it's very exciting ! I'm also thrilled that all the flights are with Swiss since i've read a lot of good things about them .

First question (maybe many more will come !), is there a neighbour In Berlin that would allows us to go easily from Tegel airport and that will be convenient for getting around Berlin qithout being too much expensive ?

Thanks !
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