Is packaged ice available?
 

I will be traveling with my family to Germany, Austria, and the Czech Republic. We would like to bring a cooler from home to keep food and beverages cold during our drive. Is packaged ice readily available in these countries? I don't want to bring a cooler and then find it difficult to find ice

in some areas it will be difficult to next to impossible to find ice. And just about totally impossible in rural areas.

I haven't been to the CR -- but I've only seen ice for sale a few places in Germany

seen on sale in many places in the Czech Republic,ie stores like Tesco,Albert and Billa,many hotels have ice machines too.

In Germany - next to nowhere. I remember seeing ice for sale in a petrol station once (and I live in Germany). The common type of coolers hereabouts uses those thermal packs that are put in the deep freezer, so people don't need ice.

Try McDonald's. Many of the Danish branches sell ice, so perhaps they do in other countries, too.

It's tough to find ice in Germany, although it is becoming more popular. More and more petrol stations on the autobahn have it and some grocery stores in larger cities.

Can't you use the ice packs that usually come with these sorts of cooler bags and boxes? They can be reused and then you don't have to keep buying or making ice.

I'm confused. You say you are going to "bring a cooler from home" to Europe. Where is home? Do you seriously intend to check a cooler as baggage on an aircraft? Wouldn't it be better to buy a cheap cooler there?

Agree you are much better off buying an inexpensive cooler with the cold packs you freeze each night in your fridge. (If you don;t have fridges in your hotels I don;t think ice will keep the food cold long enought for it to be safe.

I, too, hope you're not lugging a cooler to Europe on a plane. And bags of ice are very difficult to find pretty much anywhere in Europe. We either go to the fresh markets and ask the fish mongers to give us a bag of it as the market is closing or we buy those cold packs at the grocery store and freeze them. We've asked hotels to put them in the freezer overnight for us on a few occasions and have never been turned down.

The suggestions above about the cold packs is a good one in my opinion.

Especially at smaller pensions or like - no trouble to have them frozen overnight - they last more than a travel day without a proble.

Picnic like coolers can be found at many shops and even in supermarkets like Hofer or similar at relatively cheap prices in summer- I would not recommend bringing your own- much trouble for no reason.

I can only speak for Austria and close by areas-
While some ice machines can be found- especially at larger gas station complexes by major roadways- this is still not common here- you would spend too much un necessary time looking for ice- time much better spent for sightseeing.

Buy a plug in electric cooler when you arrive.