Austria & France Market Trip Dec 2024

looks good, but just know the markets in Paris aren't like the ones you'll see in Germany and Austria. Still amazing places tho. I know you don't want Germany, but you can't beat the markets there - hope you can make it back there one day. You will have ample time to enJOY and explore those areas.

My husband and I took our first Christmas market trip this year, including Strasbourg & Colmar. We also went to Frankfurt (one night) and Cologne (3nights). Cologne was our favorite for the markets, by far.

The train from Salzburg to Strasbourg will take over 7 hours with at least 3-4 connections. You might consider flying instead, or breaking up that journey. That would cut into your time elsewhere. I would probably eliminate one stop, and give yourself more nights instead. I really don’t think you’re giving yourself enough time in Paris.

In Strasbourg, know that the entire main island is closed to cars (including taxis) from 11:30 am to 9 pm. You will need to take the tram to the ONLY stop on the island open during the markets (Homme de Fer), or walk from one of the bridges to your hotel. Choose your hotel with that in mind if you don’t want to walk too far with luggage. We stayed at Citadines Kleber and it was great.

The markets will be insanely crowded on weekends and in the evening. I was not prepared for how crowded, and I did not enjoy those times. Shoulder to shoulder and you just go where the crowd takes you. I would use weekends as travel days or do other sightseeing.

Limit your packing to a carryons bag that each of you can manage on your own. We encountered many escalators at train stations that were not working, so you need to be ready to go up & down stairs with your luggage. There are usually 3 steps up into the train car, and some trains have a second level. Reserve your seats in advance.

Your plan is workable but you will spend a lot of time on trains. Make it a priority to choose a hotel near the Strasbourg train station, since your one full day will be consumed by going to Colmar. It took us two full days to see all the Strasbourg markets this year so you might consider giving it another day just to see something other than Colmar. The Paris markets will be nowhere near as satisfying as the others but Paris has other charms. It will be a full day to get from Salzburg to Strasbourg but doable. The Deutsche Bahn and SNCF apps are well worth having for your train reservations and info. You will have an insanely wonderful time, just some transportation issues.

Just to clarify, our focus for Paris won't be any markets. If we happen to stumble upon them, great, but the goal there is for Mom to see the highlights. She will be thrilled just to see the Eiffel Tower, so our time there will be spent seeing the Tower, popping into the Louvre (we're not museum people), exploring the Latin Quarter and whatever else suits our fancy.

Should I remove a night from Salzburg?

Thanks again

PQ

There are 10+ train connections per day from Salzburg to Strasbourg.

The shortest travel time is 5:18 hours, involving 2 changes of trains.
The least number of changes is 1, but the ride will be one hour longer (6:18 hours).

I am doubtful about attempting to see much of Strasbourg and Colmar with only two nights in the area. Two nights after such a long train ride is barely more than one day. There's a lot of very pretty architecture in those two cities, and the Unterlinden Museum in Colmar is great. I'm sure Strasbourg has interesting museums as well, but I haven't been there recently.

2 nights in Salzburg is enough, in my opinion, especially if you can get there around midday from Vienna. The city is very compact, and the sights are not large. I am not sure about how long a "Sound of Music" tour takes, though - I know very little about that musical, which is not famous in my country.
3 nights would allow for a day trip out of Salzburg, e.g. Hallstatt or Berchtesgaden, but December is not the best time for those.

This change would let you add a night to Strasbourg, and I would recommend doing so.
The train from Salzburg to Strasbourg is not that long as shown above, and it is not difficult, with a change of train in Munich and usually another one in Stuttgart or Karlsruhe. In 2022 I did Paris to Salzburg by train and even that was OK, time-wise.

Thanks all for your help so far. I took a look at some schedules to get an idea of what it might look like come December and it looks like we could get to Strasbourg by about 12:15 using the earliest train from Salzburg. We tend to be early birds and have no qualms about being up at 5am if it makes the day more enjoyable later on.
Given this, would a half day in Strasbourg and the next day in Colmar be enough or do you think we'd still want another day (taken from Salzburg)? We won't be visiting any museums in the Alsace region, mostly interested in the atmosphere and the markets there.

Am I correct in thinking that Vienna deserves its 4 nights and that Bratislava is worth the day trip? We have really enjoyed day trips in the past and have heard that Bratislava is a completely different experience than the others so I'm thinking it would be an enjoyable addition.

Thank you!

PQ

We visited Colmar from our base in Strasbourg on a Monday in early December. We arrived in Colmar around 10:30 and took the bus across town to the Vauban stop, very close to the market at Place Jean d’Arc. We arrived just before 11, when the market opened. We then wandered through the markets along the Grand Rue and over to the gourmet market. It wasn’t crowded, so we were able to move through the markets easily. We stopped at the covered market for lunch, after being turned away from many restaurants that were full.

I think we missed the market at the cathedral, but we made it to all the others. We ended at the “market” at Champs de Mars, which is really just some kids rides and food stalls, and made our way back to the train station around 3:00.

We had been to Colmar previously, so we were just going through the markets. Not doing the typical sightseeing. So it’s definitely doable in a day.

We did a similar trip last year and planned to visit all of the places you are planning. We did two nights in Salzburg and it was sufficient, but we had been to Salzburg previously. We did the Sound of Music tour and it takes a half day. Unfortunately while we were traveling there was a train strike in France that we found out about while on the train to Strasbourg. We were planning 3 nights in Strasbourg, but we had to forego them. Planning to return this year.

Local Christmas market expert here. Skip Bratislava. Spend one more night in Salzburg. When in Salzburg, be sure to visit the Christmas market at Hellbrunn Palace. Also spend a full day visiting the markets on Wolfgangsee. Very special.

Read my previous posts with summaries of the markets in Vienna, but the ones at Karlsplatz, Spittelberg and Schönbrunn are the best ones.

Thanks so much for all the info so far!

@Emily - You're recommending 4 nights in Salzburg? I see a half day for a SOM tour, probably 1.5 days for seeing Salzburg and a 3rd for Wolfgangsee. What would you suggest for the 4th day? We tend to take the earliest train when arriving into a city so even our transition day is pretty much a full day.

Also, to everyone: I'm considering dropping Paris and adding it to our Spring 2025 trip to Amsterdam/Belgium instead. If I do that it would free up those 3 nights which I'd love to use in another city. If I don't have a ton of interest in Germany, any ideas for where might be a good fit in between Salzburg and Strasbourg perhaps?

Thanks again,

PQ

We are also headed to some of these areas for the Christmas markets in December. Last year we went to Salzburg and Munich for them. I would give Salzburg more than 2 nights, especially with wanting to do a SOM tour. We did that tour with Bob's Special Tours and it was so good!!! It was a regular minivan, so the guide and I think there were 8 of us. We had the best time! The guide was really good at telling us what the real story of the Von Trapps was and details about filming at various locations, etc. Really insightful and much better than if we would have rented a car and drove around ourselves. We also did a cooking class one day in Salzburg, and now Bob's partners with the chef and you can do a half day SOM and half day cooking class. We made apple strudel and cookies, and the chef had prepared goulash for us for lunch. It was just as much fun as the SOM tour was.

In Salzburg, we adored the Hotel Alstadt Weisse Taube. It is just around the corner from the markets and just such a sweet little hotel. I was with our daughter and our son's girlfriend, and this was the perfect girly hotel! One thing we did not realize is that breakfast is hard to find in Salzburg earlier in the morning. The day of the tour, we skipped the hotel breakfast thinking it was a bit expensive, and wandered off. We ended up having breakfast in another hotel and paying just as much, lol, but honestly it was the best breakfast and the hostess knew we were in a time crunch and could not have been nicer. So just plan ahead for the tour day and either eat at the hotel or having something in your room ready to eat.

This year we are headed to Vienna for 5 nights with a day trip to Bratislava, and then we head over to Strasbourg for another 4 or 5 nights. Still nailing all of that down, as right now I am working on flights.

Some of the best Xmas markets are in Germany. They actually originated there. We go over every other year and our favorites are Vienna, Saltzburg, Cologne, Passau, Regensberg (the private market at the Thurn & Taxis Palace), Nuremberg. You could add a German one and take the train to Munich to fly home (Munich has some decent markets too, not our favorites, but it's an easy direct flight home, so we typically end our trip there).