Hello, everybody. This is our first trip in Germany ( me and my husband ). We have about 8-9 days and the first day we%26#39;ll be staying in Nurnberg ( my ant leaves there ).
Could you advice please what cities we should visit ( where to stay ) and should we rent a car or use the train. We%26#39;d like to see castles, museums, etc.
Also, it would be great to see Salzburg and Vienna. Don%26#39;t know if it%26#39;s possible with our time frame.
Thanks a lot, Alla
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Well, if you start in Nürnberg and want to see Salzburg and possibly Vienna, you should probably limit yourself to the south of Germany.
Here%26#39;s a schedule I would be thinking of (there are hundreds of additional possibilities to be added):
From Nürnberg you could go to Munich, which is a nice and big city with quite a few good museums (Pinakothek, if you are into science, the Deutsche Museum is not to be missed, it%26#39;s probably a bit similar to Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago) and a nice inner city. Then you could go to somewhere near Füssen and visit Neuschwanstein and Hohenschwangau, probably two of the most famous castles in Germany. Do some hiking in the Alps, if you like that. From there, it is not too far to Salzburg, which would be the end of my recommendation. In my opinion this is already a quite tight schedule. So there would not be time for Vienna. Of course, you could skip Munich and end in Vienna, but that%26#39;s a bit more travelling. Where are you flying in and out? Frankfurt or Munich?
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Castles seem to commonly refer to two different structures on this list: 1) a fortress like those on the Rhine River and 2) a palace like those in southern Bavaria. I love them both and you might decide if you have preferences for either.
Nuernberg has the Germanishes Museum (*** in Michelin) and was a walled fortified town.
If you are flying into Frankfurt and out of Vienna, you might want to add another Franconian city along the route: Rothenburg, Regensburg or Wuerzburg. Rothenburg is a well preserved fortified town. Wuerzburg has the bishops baroque residence and the Marienburg fortress as well as the works of Riemenschneider, a wood carver that I like.
Salzburg has the fortified Hohensalzburg Castle and several beautiful churches. The walk up to the castle is one of my favorites.
If you choose to go on to Vienna, you might want to visit Melk abbey on the Danube along the way. Vienna was most pleasant to me and I enjoyed that Schonbrunn Palace. Their coffee houses are great places for people watching.
Munich and the royal castles to the south are both most enjoyable but like Mark I do not think that I would want to combine them with the travel distance to Vienna. If you combine Munich with Vienna, I do not think that you would have much time for either.
Regards, Gary
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I%26#39;ll give you my usual advice for visiting Germany. It is full of interesting things to see and do, and you can hardly go wrong what ever you choose to do. The hard thng is realizing all that you are missing. Get books about Germany (from library, not just travel guides) full of nice pictures and decide from the pictures what you would like to see and do. Then with a good map of Germany, put together an itinerary based on a few of the places that you really want to see coupled with other nearby attractions.
A pleasant trip might be to visit places in Baden-Wuertemberg and Bavaria, accompanied by Salzburg (one of my favorite places in Europe). The Fruehlingfest (spring beer festival) in Stuttgart will run through May 7 this year. I believe that it is the largest such spring festival in Germany. Stuttgart also has the Porsche and excellent Mercedes Benz museums, and many excellent sights nearby including the largest baroque palace in Germany at Ludwigsburg (and its fairy tale gardens) and the wonderful old town center of Esslingen both reachable by S-bahn from Stuttgart. The excellently preserved old maonasteries at Maulbronn and Bebenhausen, the fairy tale-like castles at Hohenzollern (Hechingen) and Lichtenstein (almost as nice as Neuschwanstein by Fuessen, but without all the tourists), the Black Forest and the old college town of Tuebingen are all wonderful places to visit nearby. I myself enjoy the multitude of nice baroque churches and monasteries in Oberschwaben between Ulm and the Bodensee (Lake of Constance). If the cherry trees are blooming in the Rems Valley just east of Stuttgart, it is one of the most beautiful things I%26#39;ve seen anywhere in the world.
May is a wonderful time to visit Germany (at least Baden-Wuerttemberg). The chestnut trees will be in flower in the beer gardens and many restaurants have multi-page asparagus menus in addition to their regular food. You should have a good time whatever you do.
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Thank you so much, guys.
I think we%26#39;ll go with Mark%26#39;s scenario and using the train will be the best, right? We have 2 weeks, but in the middle we%26#39;re flying to Lithuania from Munich, so staying in this beautiful city makes cense. So, may be at first 4 days we%26#39;ll visit sights at Munich and area and the last 5 days Salzburg and Vienna.
The train from Vienna back to Nurnberg takes half a day, right? So if we stay 2 days in Salzburg and 3 days in Vienna we should be back on time.
I have another question about the railway in Germany/Austria. I think that we should get a two-countries pass for 5/6 days. Does it make sense? My husband doesn%26#39;t drive manual ( me neither ) and the automatic cars are so expensive. Plus when you%26#39;re taking a train you enjoy the view, etc. On a second hand you are tied to the schedule, so I%26#39;m still not sure...
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Being %26quot;tied to the schedule%26quot; is a problem in some countries where one train per day is considered a train service rather than a disgrace, but when the next train is always going one hour later it is not that problematic.
ON the other hand, you don%26#39;t need a %26quot;rail pass%26quot; - it will be cheaper to buy a single ticket Munich to Vienna (it is an international one, thus valid for two months) and in the same way a ticket Vienna to Nuremberg. The latter is going along another line, so a return ticket won%26#39;t work.
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When you are in Munich and provided the weather is fine, I would recommend taking public transport to Starnberger See (accessible with S-Bahn from Munich) for a day trip and visit the monastery Andechs (http://www.andechs.de/). They brew their own beer and its considered to be an absolute highlight. Additionally, the surrounding countryside is really nice and the walk from the station to the monastery is a picturesque hiking tour (roughly 2 hours, if I can remember correctly).
If you want to find out about train schedules check reiseauskunft.bahn.de/bin/query.exe/en. Have fun!
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