My husband and I are travelling from Dusseldorf down through the Mosel Valley region in mid June. We will be traveling by car and stopping at Remagen, Trier, Beilstein. Our plan is to take our time and visit/stay one or two days in each town before flying out of Frankfurt back to the states. My question is: do we need reservations in these town (and/or in between these towns). I have heard that there are a lot of bed and breakfast type places in this area. It would be awesome if we could just go from place to place and find a place to stay the night as we go. Any input from fodorites would be much appreciated.
thanks!

Unfortunaterly, that is about the time that school vacations start in some of the German States. Thus, some of the places might be quite busy, such as Beilstein (which is not very big) and Trier. You might want to call ahead to the tourist information offices, two or three days before you expect to get there. The people there are usually very helpfgul in finding you quarters, and usually they have at least one or twopeople who speak English.

When my wife and I travel without reservations,we arm ourselves with a copy of the Red Guide Michelion for Deutschland. It gives hotels, etc. for even very small locations and, more importantly, contact information for the touriust information office in each of the listed towns and villages. Some US libraries carry the Guidse. It must not be the latest edition. The info. you are looking for doesn't change every year.

Incidentally, there are two Beilsteins listed in the Guide. You wsant the one in the state of Rheinland - Pfalz. It is one of our favorite places along the Mosel.

I think what you are asking is a matter of taste with no single answer. You are looking for certainty on the supply side while looking for flexibility on the demand side. The supply side is a probabilistic event. If there is a mismatch between the two, how one views the event is a matter of personal taste.

Those who value staying in specific locations in specific cities within target price, not being able to stay at a target accommodation is a stress and a disappointment. On the other hand, those without specific destinations and who value flexibility above all else would be served well by not making reservations. If you read endless discussion on this subject, such as http://www.ricksteves.com/graffiti/a...ervations.html, some people are so flexible they can even change target countries if there are no last minutes accommodations.

thank you treplow for the advice on the red michelin guide. I will get that! Also, greg, you offer some realistic advice and I appreciate it - it's definitely something to consider and weigh the options.

Good advice. But if you do decide to go without reservations, My suggestion is, get your hotel reservation in the morning and not in the afternoon, especailly later in the afternoon.

ref getting somewhere to stay as you go, this was our style for many years when there ere just two of us [and occasionally when our ranks had swollen to 4] and we never failed to find somewhere, though sometimes we were a tad inconvenienced.

we even managed to find rooms for 4 of us at lake Titisee [southern Germany] on what turned out to be some sort of national holiday.

there is usually a plethora of rooms let on a B&B basis in any german town or village which is on a tourist trail; you are looking for a sign that says "Zimmer frei" [literally room/s to let]. the vast majority will have en-suite bathrooms and they will be impeccably clean and generally include breakfast. one thing to watch out for - they are usually priced per person not per room.

with just two of you, in June, i would be vey surprised if you had any problems getting what you want, where you want.

This area gets lots of tourism, but most "hordes" you see up and down the Mosel or Rhine in summer are day-tripping locals from the Cologne/ Rhine-Ruhr metro area or Frankfurt.
If people stay there overnight it's more or less a weekend short trip. So if you can avoid the 3 weekend nights, you should be on the safe side. There are so many villages and towns so demand is spread over quite a huge area --- only in Fodorville the Mosel consists of three places.. in reality there are more ;-)
Beilstein should be most "crowded". If you have a certain hotel in mind, you should consider to make a reservation.
Trier will hardly sell out as it is already a city with many more beds than the small river valley villages.
And in Remagen you should find places to choose from even on a Saturday night. An alternative to Remagen (which should be a bit dull after you have visited the bridge museum) could be to stay in Bonn. The former capital has a nice old town with many restaurants and pubs.
Actually, that part of the Rhine valley is usually not seen as the most scenic anyway. Most people like the leg between Koblenz/ Boppard and Bingen better.
As you will need just 1-1.5 hrs from Düsseldorf to Remagen, you could think about just spending a few hours there to explore, but eventually go further upstream the Rhine, or head over to a destination along the Mosel. Here, most people seem to like the part between Cochem and Bernkastel-Kues best.