Looking for help from German-Austrian Rail Experts.
 

We will be in Munich for a few days right before Christmas with a daytrip planned to Nurmburg (maybe coming back thorough Regensburg and Passau. Then on Christmas eve we will go to Salzburg for two days then finally to Vienna for 3 more days before flying home.

There are two of us in our early 60s and we are trying to decided between a rental car for part or all of this transportation between cities or rail.

We have always rented cars before and thought it might be nice not to have to hassle with parking and driving for all or part of it.

Rail experts, can you give us advice on how much this would be on the train and how long the trips are? Thanks for your help.

you can check out schedules at www.bahn.de. Click on the Internat. Guests. link on the top right to get an English page.

That German rail site will show train prices within Germany, and the Austrian site http://www.oebb.at/vip8/oebb/en/ will show you prices within Austria.

Thanks J62

Dear Asile,

These are the easiest cities to travel between by train. Munich to Salzburg is about 1 and half hours and Salzburg to Vienna is about 2 and half hours. There are many direct trains going between these cities and it is better to use public transportation than private car IMO. The day trip you plan are easy as well.

Since you will be trqveling around Christmas I would suggest reservations, which you can make at the train station when you arrive in Munich.

Have a good trip.

Greg

A car inside of Vienna is not of much use unless you want to pay quite a bit for scarce parking. Salzburg is something of the same way because the Old Town is compact and the streets are very narrow with some being barred to vehicles.

I was there once and stayed in a pension south of the city where we could park for no added cost. Once in the city, we found parking expensive.

Munich and Nürmburg are not cheap to park in either. I have seen very little free public parking in Munich.

I think you could travel between the cities fine with a car, although the road between Salzburg and Munich can be very crowded on weekends - crowded to the extent that traffic is at a dead stop. It is the navigating within the city and finding parking that causes extra expense and tricky driving.

I think your trip would be less stressful if you used the train.

Normally we drive everywhere too, but for these cities in the winter I would definitely recommend train travel. The cities themselves are totally walkable and you won't need a car while you're there. I would imagine that the train will actually be faster than traveling by car once you factor in navigating and parking, plus you can enjoy the view!

Forget (what I think is) the hassle of parking in Munich. The public transportation system is excellent and easy to use and between the U-Bahn, the S-Bahn, the trams, etc., you can get about everywhere not to mention the fact that the place is walkable in many instances.

Salzburg is definitely walkable in the "old town" where a car is forget it.

Depending on where you are staying in Salzburg you could spring for a cab from the RR station.

You can check exact timings and prices at the GermanRail site:

http://reiseauskunft.bahn.de/bin/query.exe/en

Also, be aware that for the Nuremburg/ Munich and Munich/ Salzburg, you can use the Bayern ticket, where up to 5 people travel for one low cost fee, after 9Am on weekdays and all day on weekend. For more info search this forum for Bayern ticket.