We're thinking of taking a family trip to Germany (Bavaria) and Austria next June and were wondering when the children in this area get out of school for the summer. We would be there from around June 6th to the 20th and didn't know how that would coincide with their summer vacation. We know that British kids get out at the end of June but didn't know when German/Austrian schools let out.

Thanks.

The German friends we know who live in Konstanz have a two week break the beginning of June. They don't get out of school until the beginning of July.

I don't know if these exist for Germany, but the "Travel Planner" Michelin maps for France have a table that indicates when different parts of the country have school breaks. It's a powerful planning tool if you want to avoid the crowds.

Just because children are out of school doesn't mean that the city they live in is going to seem that much more "crowded" unless they are all roaming the streets. And I'm not convinced once they're out of school they'll suddenly start clogging the museums and other "tourist" places they've been living near all of their lives. The big vacation month all over Western europe is August..that seems to be when the PARENTS are free to travel and probably packing th kids along with them. I donlt think you really have much to worry about.

In Bavaria, the school is out from Aug 2 to Sept 13, 2004 (July 24 to Sept 8 this year). In Austria the school is out this year from June 28 to Aug 30 in Vienna and the surrounding Lower Austria, from July 5 to Sept 6 in the rest of the country. http://www.schulferien-termine.de/

School holidays in Germany are staggered
by State, usually from north to south. The southern states typically have their holidays later, as was already pointed out.

This is done to get some control into the summer tourist traffic down to the countries on the Mediterranean. Even so there is often enormous congestion on the autobahn through Munich towards Austria and the Yugoslav states and on the three running due south through and past the Black Forest. A lot of this traffic is also from Holland and the Scandinavian countries, so you would need to see when their vacation times are, as well.

There are always kids around during school term anyway, as classes normally only run from 8am to midday or so, after which they are free to do their own thing.

I still remember taking a trip from Stuttgart to Munich on the first day of vacation in the state of Baden Wurtenburg. What should have taken about 2 hours took about 8 hours as the entire autobahn was filled with cars heading south on vacation. And that was 33 years ago!

The problem with school vacations is not clogged streets, but clogged highway. In France, at least, everyone heads south as soon as the kids are out of school. I don't know where the people that live in the south go, because they would fall into the Mediterranean if they went south.

just as an aside, British kids (certainly in this area) don't finish school until around 25 July.