Germany/Austria Itinerary
 

Hi All -
I think I have finally come up with an itinerary that works for our family trip in June. Please let me know what you think and if you have any suggestions on improvements or any farmhouse, inn or B&B recommendations. Also I realize the distance between some of the stops, but we will be renting a car when we leave Munich. Thanks!
Day 1 – Munich
Day 2 – Munich
Day 3 – Munich (day trip to Dachau)
Day 4 – Depart Munich in the afternoon – for Fussen
Day 5 – Fussen (visit Garmisch, etc.)
Day 6 – Fussen – stop at Mittenwald on way to Schonau am Konigssee
Day 6 – Schonau
Day 7 – Schonau
Day 8 – Salzburg
Day 9 – Salzburg
Day 10 – Salzburg
Day 11 – Depart Salzburg, drive to Vienna
Day 12 – Vienna
Day 13 – Vienna
Day 14 – Depart Vienna

Your itinerary looks fine to me. I've been to each of the places you are planning on visiting, and all are great and worthy of time.

I absolutely loved Schonau and was glad you included it! Most people stay in Berchtesgaden but I prefer the smaller town atmosphere of Schonau.


Since you have a car, you may want to consider taking a daytrip from Salzburg to the nearby Salzkammergut, visiting St. Gilgen on the Wolfgangsee and Hallstatt, among other areas. Absolutely beautiful and different from the mountains around Schonau. Salzburg is interesting enough but you should have plenty of time to see everything and still take the daytrip.

From Salzburg to Vienna I would suggest a stop at Melk to visit the glorious abbey. Its not too far from the autobahn and absolutely gorgeous. Melks is a great time to visit and have lunch in. The other towns along the Wachau, especially Spitz and Durnstein, are also very nice and worthy of some time. You could spend 3-4 hours in this area and still have plenty of time to get to Vienna. Krems, at the end of the Wachau, is only about an hour from Vienna.

We stayed at the Pension Pertschy in Vienna and highly recommend it. The area is great for sightseeing; right off of the Graben and within close proximety to the Hofburg and St. Stephens.

http://www.pertschy.com

Good luck!
Tracy

Sorry, that should have been "Melk is a great town to visit..."

Does anyone have suggestions on a nice guesthouse in Schonau? There are so many to choose from and after awhile they all begin to look the same! Thanks

Also, any recommendations for a place to stay in Vienna, preferably under 100 euros per night. I'd like it to be in the city center, but that issue is flexible.

Couple of suggestions for day 5 and 6:

If you want to visit the castles, day 5 will be too much for cramming in Garmisch and then returning to Fuessen.

Suggest the following Day 6, Fuesen - Garmisch - Mittenwald. From Mittenwald backtrack about 4km to where Bundestrasse B-11 heads toward Wallgau -Kochel.

At the northern end of Wallgaul, look for the sign to Vorderriss (it's not a big sign, on yopur right side). Take that road. It's a toll road and a bit narrow. At Vorderriss,the end of the toll road, continue along the lake until you come to the B-307 toward Rottach, Egern.

Take it along the east side of the Tegernsee until you come to the Schliersee turnoff. Follow the road (still B-307) along that lake to Hausham, and Oberaudorf.

At Oberaudorf you have a choice: You can either take the Autobahn A-93 north for about for about 21km to the interchange with the Munich - Salzburg autobahn A-8, and then head east to Salzburg, or you can continue on the Austrian B-172 to Walchsee, Koessen and then on the German B-305 to Berchtesgaden and Salzburg.

This is a very scenic trip, and off the "American beaten path". I have driven it many times.

Now, whichever way you go, DON'T enter an Austrian autobahn without the required user's decal.You can buy it for various length of time at any Austrian or German service station at the border of the two countries. If the Austrian police catch you, it'll cost you about $150. The decal for 10 days costs about $10.

Also, be aware that picking up a car in Germany and dropping it off in Austria I(Vienna) incurs a substantial cross-bordeer drop-off charge. Finally, the Austrians are kind of sticky about (1) that you have an International Driver's Permit (you can get it at any US AAA office, you need it only for Austria, not Germany) and that your car is equipped with the offical reflective safety vest, in case the driver has to exit the car on the road. Check with the rental car office in Munich. I agree it's crazy, but the latter is a fairly new Austrian law.

I think you are probably going to have a difficult time finding a hotel in the center of Vienna for under 100 euro a night in June.

treplow made a good point that I forgot to mention; definitely check the prices on the car rentals. The rates for picking up in one country and dropping off in another is usually substantial, possibly adding hundreds of dollars to the price of the rental. And definitely get the sticker for the car. They can be found at most gas stations, and many will advertize them as you are headed towards the boarder.

Tracy

Do you suggest dropping the car off in Schonau and then either relying on trains throughout Austria or renting another car when we leave Salzburg? Also, I was looking at the website for Durnstein and it looks beautiful. Do you suggest staying overnight there? Is it possible to take the train from there into Vienna?

Kate,

Another issue to consider with the rental car. Cars picked up at German airports or train stations get a whopping 21% surtax. Other lots are OK. You can avoid the drop fee IF you can get a car with Austrian tags. You may even save by going to a different class car to get the right tags. A good place to reserve a car is with Bob Bestor at Gemulichkeit Gemut.com. Send them an email and see what they can come up with.

In Munich (and possibly Vienna) you won't want or need a car. Traffic is heavy and parking is expensive. Take public transportation (Munich has a great system that is easy and convenient) and save the car till you are ready to leave town.

I would reconsider your separate stays in both Salzburg and Schonau. Schonau is only about a 45 minute drive or less to the city of Salzburg and you can easily spend time in Salzburg on one or more days by driving or taking the bus or train. Stay in Schonau or a similar area for the entire time - you will spend a lot less money, have larger quarters and a room with free parking.

kateny17, Durnstein is a great little town and would make a nice stop over if exploring the Wachau. The Wachau is a great place to rent bikes too, if you are interested. We parked our car in Krems, rented bikes and biked down to Spitz. From there we took a very pleasant boat ride back to Krems and picked up our car.

There is a way to train between Durnstein and Vienna, but it involves a train switch in Krems. The train that runs between the Wachau villages is a small little milk-run train with only a few cars. According to the German rail site (http://reiseauskunft.bahn.de/bin/query.exe/en), the total journey from Durnstein to Vienna would be about 1.5 hours.

The area around Berchtesgaden, in my opinion, is much better explored by car. There is no train station in Schonau, although there is one in Berchtesgaden.

If you are trying to avoid the drop-off charges, and AisleSeat's method doesn't work, I would suggest keeping the car in Berchtesgaden and possibly Salzburg (especially if you are planning on daytripping to the Salzkammergut) and then dropping it off in Berchtesgaden (or another town in Germany) and training to Vienna (switching trains in Salzburg along the way). Personally, especially if you want to go to the Wachau, I would consider renting another car and dropping it off somewhere outside of Vienna. The train from Berchtesgaden to Durnstein is much longer than the car ride (check out viamichelin.com for routes and mileages).

Good luck!
Tracy

I also agree with Emily. When we stayed in Schonau we drove to Salzburg on three seperate occassions. The drive was under half an hour.

Tracy

Thanks for the great advice, Emily and Tracy. I was considering just staying in Schonau to cut back on the expensive hotel rates in Salzburg. Do either of you recommend a guesthouse in Schonau or Ramsau. I found two guesthouses that look nice, but they are both in Berchtesgaden. These are the links: http://www.berchtesgadener-land.info...ww.rehwinkl.de
http://www.berchtesgadener-land.info...runnerlehen.de

Also, is it possible to keep the car to use as transport between Berchtesgadeland and Salzburg (assuming we buy the sticker), and then leave it in Germany when head into Austria?

Regarding the car, the purchase of the vignette for travel will be cheap- for under 15 days, I think we paid around 15 US dollars. You can easily drive into Salzburg and park in a public parking garage inside of the mountain in a huge cavern created inside one of the mountains right in town ( Altstadt Parkgarage).
The best way to approach the car drop off would be to rent in Munich and drop off in Salzburg, if you can stand to pay the price.
I have stayed in quite a few places in this general area - can you be more specific about what you want in a hotel/B&B in the Schonau area?

Unfortunately I can't recommend any guesthouses in the area, as we stayed in an apartment. If you do a search on the Bertchesgaden website for B&B's you will get a list of available ones. From there, you can click on "more information" and access their website, if they have one. There are tons of guesthouses in Schonau alone.

Berchtesgaden is a very nice little town to visit, but if I had my choice I would rather stay in Schonau or Ramsau and drive into Berchtesgaden for groceries or to explore the town. Still, you can't go wrong in the area.

You can absolutely explore Austria with the car if you pick it up in Germany. The fees come with picking it up in Germany and actually dropping it off in Austria. We drove all around the Salzkammergut and to the Wachau as daytrips from Schonau without any problems at all. Just make sure you purchase the sticker. As you make your way towards Austria from the Berchtesgaden area, there are several gas stations right across the border that advertise the sticker (called a vignette, I believe).

Tracy

Sorry to be a pest but I did come across this website that has accomodation listings in Schonau, among other cities in the Berchtesgaden region:

http://www.berchtesgaden.com/e/citie...nau/hotels.htm

By the way, when you see "FeWo" its short for "Ferienwohnung", basically a vacation apartment.

Tracy

Tcreath,

I hate it when people hijack threads, but here goes- Can you expound on why you'd stay in Schonau instead of Berchtesgaden? You graciously replied to one of my other posts on our upcoming March trip, and I thank you for that.

Would you also stay in Schonau if it were cold & snowy? Again, sorry for the hijack, but I had to ask!
H

phieaglefan, not a problem! Honestly its just a matter of personal preference. We enjoyed Berchtesgaden but we liked the peaceful serenity of staying in Schonau. Our apartment was in a wide open valley with tremendous views all around, and it just felt so quaint! We loved walking into town to go to the bakery each morning. I think we were just looking for somewhere without a touristy feel and we found it in Schonau. The area around the Konigssee was a little more touristy than in the actual town.

Berchtesgaden was very pleasant and we greatly enjoyed wandering around the pedestrian-friendly old town. We went into Berchtesdaden quite often, but in the end we were glad we stayed in Schonau.

That being said, Berchtesgaden may be a better place to stay if it were cold and snowy. There is more to do, more restaurants to walk to, and woudl probably just be easier given the time of year. Honestly, the whole area is gorgeous though!

Tracy

Thanks so much for all the great info! In terms of a guesthouse, I did a lot of searching on the Berchtesgadenland website, but there is so much info - the entire search becomes daunting. I am looking for a friendly, clean place with great views of the mountains and surrounding countryside. I don't, however, want it to be isolated from everything else. Good food would be a plus too.

Also, I was thinking about the idea of staying in Schonau and traveling to Salzburg for day visits. If we want to stay and eat dinner in Salzburg, is it easy to drive back and forth at night? Are the roads dark?

To Tcreath, Thanks for the clarification. I appreciate it!

To Kateny - Good question, I'd like to know about the roads as well.

kateny17, I wish I could give you better hotel info. There are so many in the area and they all looked so cute, but I don't know anything about them. Hopefully someone will see this and respond.

There are many restaurants in Schonau. Most are gasthofs, a mix of hotel and restaurant that look like they are in someones house. We ate at several that were popular with locals. I loved German food and did not have a bad meal there.

For a memorable dinner experience, consider driving to Ramsau one night and having dinner at the Hotel-Gasthof Nutzkaser. We found this recommendation in a guidebook I had. The food was good but the view was spectacular. We drove way up into the mountains and thought we were lost when we finally found it. We sat in an atrium-like dining room with beautiful views. Here is a link:
http://www.hotel-nutzkaser.de/engl/index.html. Click on "restaurant" on the right-hand side.

The road into Salzburg is a very nice road, extremely easy to navigate. We ate in Salzburg on two evenings, not getting back to our apartment in Schonau until after 9:00 or 10:00 each night. Schonau is in the valley; you won't be navigating any mountain roads so the drive is very easy.

Is Berchtesgaden in the valley too? I want to stay in Schonau, but the guesthouse in Berchtesgaden looks appealing. I will keep looking through the Schonau lodging options.

Also, thanks for the info on biking the Wachau region. Our family really enjoys biking and it would be nice to travel through Austria on two wheels.

Berchtesgaden is in a valley as well. Schonau is only about 5 -10 minute drive from Berchtesgaden so that should be fine. Berchtesgaden is a great little town and would be a fine place to stay. If you found one you like, I say go for it!

For pictures of both places, you may want to check out webshots.com and put in "Berchtesgaden" or "Schonau" to view other people's pictures. This should give you a good idea of what the area looks like.

Tracy

We did a simular trip a couple years ago with 3 teenagers.
http://fodors.com/forums/threadselect.jsp?fid=2
It was a great trip and hope it gives you some ideas.

Can anyone recommend a good guidebook to use for the region? I'd like to have one that has pictures in it also. Thanks!

Most books that cover the area cover large portions of Germany or the Bavarian Alps so its hard to get one with a whole lot of info. We used two books: Eyewitness Travel Guides Munich and the Bavarian Alps, and Fodor's Exploring Germany. Both had sections on the area, but I think Fodor's did a better job. The best thing to do would probably be to go to Borders or your local book store and browse through various books until you find one that you like.

I know you are also considering Austria so I will go ahead and say that we used Austria's Best Loved Driving Tours as well as Vienna and the Danube Valley to help plan our trip.

kateny17, I know I tried to send you the link to my pictures on a different post and it didn't work. If you are interested, I do have quite a few pictures from several of the areas you are planning on visiting, including the Wachau, Berchtesgadenerland, Munich and Fussen. I don't know how to get the link to work, but if you are interested you can feel free to email me at [email protected] and I can get on kodakgallery and send you the picture slideshow directly from their sight. I don't want to try to invade your privacy or anything so if you are not interested, I completely understand.

I couldn't find much information on this area myself before I went in May, so I understand all the questions completely!

Best wishes,
Tracy

I've never quite understood why people would want to take a guidebook with lots of pictures in it with them on a trip--they're going to be actually seeing and even touching the real thing after all. Do you look at the real item and then look at the photo in the guidebook to be sure that someone hasn't switched sights on you? Plus guidebooks with lots of pictures tend to be heavier to tote around.

Why would one need pictures? If you just want to see what the sights are going to look like before you leave, go to the library and check out a bunch of books for free. If you want a book of pictures for the memories after the trip, get a nice coffee table book which would have much better and bigger pictures.

That's my curmudgeonly rant for the day. So ignore me completely and get whatever kind of guidebook you like.

The choice of where to stay in this area should be guided by the types of activities that you enjoy, your experiences to date, if you have a car,how adventuresome you are, and how many people are going with you.
Berchtesgadener Land comprises a vast area including the towns of Berchtesgaden as well as the outlying areas of Schonau a. Konigsee, Ramsau, Bischofsweisen and Markschellenberg. Each of these areas has their own claim to fame, such as Konigsee Lake and the beautiful church in Ramsau.
If you stay in the town of Berchtesgaden itself, you will be able to easily walk to all of the restaurants and shopping and you can choose to use the bus or train to visit other areas if you don't want to drive.This is probably a better choice for larger groups or families with teenagers who may want to do a few things on their own. We used to stay in the town before we got into hiking and we always had a great time. If I were staying in town again, I would choose the Hotel Vier Jahrezeiten or the Hotel Post. Both of these places are close to all of the activites in town. The Vier Jahrezeitin is more upscale and has a great restaurant called the Hubertus Stuben (great fondue!!).The Hotel Post has great outdoor dining in the center of most activities in the town. There are also many, many other places to stay in or near town. If you go to this area and you are not sure of accomodations, you can always go to the Kur and Kongresshaus in town or the visitor center across from the train station and they will help you with accomodations. It is customary in this area to ask to see a room before you rent it, so don't be afraid to ask. It is also customary that the smaller hotels and guesthouses do not like to rent out for just one nite or two in the peak seasons.
Staying in Schonau will give you a closer drive to the Konigsee and quicker access to lifts and certain hiking areas and this is a popular spot in the summer for tourists. I personally would not stay in any of the lakefront hotels at Konigsee because of the hordes of tourists who flock though this area every day. At any given time, you may have several hundred people just a stone's throw from your hotel room. The Konisee area has a huge parking complex. At the back side of the complex ( dorf Konigsee) , there is access to the Jenner ski lift and some very large fields which are popular both in winter and summer. In summer, the hang gliders go up to the Jenner peak and enjoy a long flight down to these fields when there are sufficient warm currents. If you are looking for a quieter place to stay, this area will give you easy access to the sites mentioned and from here it is about a 10-15 minute drive into B'gaden. If I were staying in this area, I would pick the Hotel Bergheimat (www.hotel-bergheimat.de). There are also quite a few smaller guesthouses in this area and any would be fine. Unless you are very comfortable with the bus system, you would want a car staying in this area.
A recent favorite of ours is the Berghotel Rehlegg, which happens to be a Best Western.(www.rehlegg.de) This hotel is run by the family Lichmannegger and it is located in Ramsau, about 25 minutes away from Salzburg and about 20 minutes into the town of B'gaden. This is a great spot for hikers and those seeking peace and quiet and it is relatively near the Hintersee. You need a car if you choose to stay here.
I hope this helps everyone who reads it. Most importantly, it is hard to find a place that isn't nice. In general, the further that you stay out of town, the better you will get to know the German folks who live in this area.
Driving is generally easy, but if you go up the Kehlstein to the Eagles'Nest or over the Rossfeldstrasse, you will be driving on steep mountain roads. Once you get used to it, it really is fun and the road system is great!

Emily - Thanks for all the great information! I think we have decided to stay at a guesthouse in Berchtesgaden. I wanted to find one in Schonau, but didn't see any I liked as much as the one Berchtesgaden.