We will be going to these three cities in October for 15 days and need some advice on Hotels(100-150 E,clean and location are a must). Our plan is Prague 5 nights, a visit to Cesky Krumlov(overnight or is a day trip enough) train to Vienna 5 nights and then to Budapest for the rest (a day in a spa would be great). We do not want to rush to every tourist spot if it means missing a great photo op.(I am an avid photographer) and we do enjoy stopping to smell the roses.We are also thinking of an overnight in Saltzberg if it is feasable. We need some input to plan our trip. Thanks for your ideas.

Hi
there is a lot of information on Prague at www.inyourpocket.com, http://tinyurl.com/mx89e,
and also www.livingprague.com which is maintained by someone who lives there.
For accommodations, look at the Cloister Inn, the Certovka, and Pension Dientzenhofer,they all have good locations.

Hi em,

It's 3 hr by train from Vienna to Salzburg.

Do stay overnight in Cesky Krumlov, and I would overnight in Salzburg too. Did you search this forum for many, many hotel recommendations?

Thanks for all your info. I will look into those hotels and email info. We may stay overnight in ck and saltz.Can't wait to go.

My new question is does anyone know how difficult it is to get from Prague to Salzberg by train. Do we have to change trains to get there, and how long does it take. Judging by the map, it pays us to go to Salzberg from Prague, stay there overnight and then head to Vienna for 4 nights. Also we are considering the Hotel Am Schubertring in Vienna. Any feedback would be appreciated.

We stayed at the B&B Bellevue in Budapest. It is well located and very quiet:

http://www.bellevuebudapest.com/inde...az=1&aaz=0

Consider a day trip to Melk from Vienna. It's a nice little town with a great abbey above the town. When I did it there was a "combo" ticket available at the train station that included the train to Melk, a return boat cruise on the Danube through the beautiful Wachau Valley and train back to Vienna from Krems, also a nice town.

I wouldn't spend 6 hours on a train to visit Salzburg. In my opinion, it doesn't live up to the hype promoted by its apparently well funded tourist agency. It's at least a 7-hour train trip from Prague to Salzburg. The easy to use German rail website will give you more schedule information for European trains.
http://bahn.hafas.de/bin/query.exe/en

Spend at least a night in Cesky Krumlov. It's would be too much to try as a day trip.

Pension Nossek in Vienna has an excellent location right on the Graben (pedestrian only street), charming rooms and very nice breakfast for about 110 euros.

Definitely stay overnight in Cesky to appreciate the atmosphere after all of the tour buses have departed. You will feel like you are in a tiny kingdom.

In Prague, I have been suggesting the Hotel Kampa Garden in your price range. October is still high season in Prague with the changeover in November. The hotel on Kampa Island exceeds your criteria and is in a location that IMO can't be beat.

Last year the castle at Cesky Krumlov stopped their inside tours on Oct. 31. Hope this helps in your planning. We missed out by a few days, unfortunately.

Thank you Jeff for your response. We were thinking of a day trip to Melk and your combo trip sounds really enticing. It does however depend on the weather as we are going the last two weeks in October. We now are pretty sure that Salzburg is out of the question as we will lose a day travelling there for only an overnight.

We are doing Prague, Vienna, and Budapest. How would you allocate the time for a 13 day stay?
We are traveling by train. Is a side trip to Ceske Budejovice worth trying ?

Hi Betsy, our trip is going to be for 15 days and we have decided to spend 5 nights in Prague ( the first one we will probably be out of it from the flight) 5 in Vienna and 5 in Budapest. We will do some day trips from each of these cities including Cesky Krumlov (not far from Budejovice) Melk from Vienna and we want to experience a spa in Budapest. When are you going, and what hotels are you staying at. We have booked the Maximillian in Prague but do not have any other ones booked yet. We are not going til Oct so we have time.

Hi Jeff. Can you tell me how you booked your combo trip from Vienna to Melk and then the boat ride? Was it overnight or a day trip, and approximately how much did it cost? Thanks for the info.

I just bought it the day before at the Westbahnhof railroad station. The ticket agent didn't know what I was talking about at first: it was spelled "Kombo." It probably wasn't more than $30-40 and included admission to the abbey. This was in 2001, so maybe they don't offer it anymore. It was an easy day trip. I decided on which trains and boats to take. It's only about an hour by train. I'm not sure where I heard about it. It may have been in Rick Steves' Austria book.

You might check by email with the tourist boards. Maybe these sites will help:
http://www.stiftmelk.at/englisch/index.html
http://www.tiscover.at/at/guide/5483...home/home.html

Thanks Jeff for your great info. we will look into that tour when we get there. We did book our hotels in the three cities and would like to know if anyone has any comment on them as they can easily be changed if we get negative reviews. In Prague we are at the Maximillian, in Vienna the Premier Am Parkring ( this is a Schick hotel) and in Budapest the Premier Hotel Parliament. These are supposed to be in good locations and are clean. The Prague hotel is a bit pricey but that city seems to be quite expensive. Any comments?