Central European Tour (September '19)

Hi Ava, can’t help much(yet) with the other segments but we’re going to Prague in May and it seems to have a lot of the items on your wish list...things to look into; WW2 the assassination of Heydrich by Czech paratroopers(museum in St. Methodius/St.Cyril church where they were trapped and killed and several movies made on the subject), hiking daytrip to Bohemian Switzerland(google photos!), Prague Castle(night tour by TheNakedTourGuide)Astronomical Clock/Charles Bridge(early morning or late evening!), we’re staying right by Charles Bridge(heard Hotel Archibald is not too expensive) and coming in from a few nights in Cesky Krumlov b&b(fairytale village-especially after daytrippers depart) by CK Shuttle, as we aren’t driving here either. Beer-watch Honest Guide videos for where to best find it(perhaps Letna park in evening?) and other good tips. Hope this gives you some ideas for at least part of the trip.

Sorry, but unless you want to spend much of your time in transit, you need to reduce the number of destinations to a maximum of 4 places, particularly if you want to get out of cities and into the rural landscape.

Day 1 at least will be spent in transit and will be lost to jet lag. Your last day is just getting back to the airport.

Berlin itself can keep you fully occupied for 5 + full days plus any day trips from there such as Potsdam or a concentration camp. Budapest would be rushed in 4 full days there. Ditto Prague.

You will lose between 4 and 7 hours in transit each time you move location. That’s about 3-4 days lost in transit as you are currently proposing.

without jamming too much into the trip
With your timeframe you'll have two days per destination if you take travelling time into account. It's hardly enough to do the major sights and sites, let alone for some day trips. You should at least skip two destinations, and preferably limit yourself to three. My list would be Berlin, Prague and Vienna, with day trips to Potsdam (Berlin), Tabor (Prague) and Eisenstadt (Vienna).

The route: Berlin to Prague (about 4 hrs on the train; Prague to Vienna (another 4-5 hour train ride); day trip to Bratislava from Vienna if you run out of things to do in Vienna; Vienna to Budapest (another 4 hours on the train), then fly home. If you want to hit only the highlights, I guess you could cram in Munich if you fly there from Budapest. Count the number of nights you have on the ground. Prague/Vienna/Budapest is a classic trip and can be done with 11 nights. Add one for a day in Bratislava. If you only have 14-15 nights, that leaves either Berlin or Munich and frankly no time for "charming fairytale villages." If you want some of that, then you need to eliminate at least two of your cities, maybe more.

Use bahn.com to see train schedules. Oktoberfest 2019 starts on Sept 21. I've been to all those places, except Bratislava. I had no language/communication problems.

Chani is correct, except Vienna to Budapest is only 3 hours. But if you are young and enjoy the thrill of a fast paced trip, why not. I would fly Prague to Budapest, then back track on the train to Vienna, then fly to Munich. But that's just me.

I would say wittle it down to Berlin, Prague, Vienna and Munich. That way you could really enjoy each place and maybe some stops in between. Berlin learn about the wall, gestapo, visit the reichstag, museums, WWII memorials, Jewish museum, visit Sachsenhausen camp outside of Berlin etc... Prague Charles Bridge, old town square, Jewish quarter, castle, new town, mucha art etc... Vienna all it's great architecture and amazing art etc... On the way to Munich perhaps visit Berchtesgaden/eagles nest. Munich you can go to the documentation center, residenz, Dachau, walking tour, viktualuenmarkt, many churches and museums.

To enjoy your vacation and see what you want with this itinerary you would need at least 22 days. Generally each city plus day trips and hikes plus transport between cities at least 4 days (with the exception of Bratislava which is much smaller and two days would be enough). So 4 days times 5 cities equal 20 plus 2 for Bratislava equals 22.

My only suggestion would be to see Bratislava as a stop on your travel day from Vienna to Budapest (or reverse). A few hours will give you a taste of the city and give you more time in one of the other two.

The others are right: Except for Bratislava, those are all major tourist destinations, and for a reason. Each one is full of many days' worth of sights of great historic and aesthetic interest--maybe not Munich quite so much, but there you have the Oktoberfest. You do not have time to see the places you list at a pleasant speed, much less see cute towns or enjoy rural hikes. If you don't make major adjustments, you will find yourself running all the time, and as you do more research on sights in each city, all thoughts of side-trips will probably vanish.

I strongly urge you to divide those destinations into two trips so you can enjoy them fully.

Thank you all for your help!! This is far more information and response than we expected :) We had a feeling the list was a bit ambitious but wanted to start over-inclusive as we gather up information. I think the key destinations for us are Berlin, Prague and Budapest and we might save Vienna for another time. From the above, it sounds like given Bratislava's proximity to Vienna, it might make more sense to tack it onto a trip including Vienna (but let me know if that seems incorrect...). I think the bf is particularly set on getting to do a day of Oktoberfest and I personally have an affinity for gingerbread-style houses so Munich is not necessarily out just yet. I'm trying to compile a list of worthwhile side trips or day expeditions tied to each city to help us decide what / where to prioritize. Generally a huge wishlist and not an actual itinerary at this stage... Do you have any further recommendations or ideas for places that might not make the standard guidebooks but are beautiful and/or interesting and reasonably accessible for us that we should look into?

Thank you so much! Love all advice - it's tremendously helpful.
Ava
1. Berlin - (4-5 nights:

(a) daytrip to Potsdam;

(b) day trip to Sachenhausen;

(c) any scenic or rural over night trips worth taking (via bus / shuttle or train) that would get us into the countryside and away from tourist buses?

1.5 Dresden (1 night): one thing I came across while looking up travel itineraries was information about Dresden being quite interesting and a growing destination. Would it be worthwhile to stop here for a night on our way to Prague, visit either Saxon Switzerland National Park or Bohemian Switzerland National Park (depending on what hikes seem the best fit) for a day hike and then scoot down to Prague by afternoon / nightfall? Or... does this seem like unnecessary logistics?

2. Prague - (4 nights):

(a) overnight to Cesky Krumlov (are there other places similar to this that would be good to swap this out for or is this peak medieval charm? It looks like CK is very popular and the goal of getting out of the city would be to escape some of the tourist buses);

(b) day trip to National Park Bohemian Switzerland (if we don't go vis-a-vis Dresden);

(c) day trip to Terezin (if we don't do Sachenhausen in Berlin);

(d) day trip to Czesky Raj (is this too difficult to get to without a car / worth seeing?);

(e) any other scenic or rural overnight trips worth looking into (perhaps with a beer or wine focus)?

Train or fly to Budapest? Perhaps an overnight train would be efficient but any thoughts on this?

3. Budapest (3-4 nights: No day excursions out of the city or overnight trips - is this a fatal mistake??

Fly to Munich - ***would we be missing out on any beautiful scenery?* Seems like flying would be the way to maximize time on this portion.

4. Munich (2-3 nights):

(a) day trip to Rothenburg;

(b) day trip to Neuschwastein Castle;

(c) day trip to Nuremburg.

You had me with Berlin, Prague and Budapest - and then you added Munich. Also, while I understand you're still in the wish-list phase and not in the painful cutting part yet, you have too many day-trips. For example, you want to do three nights in Prague; I know it says four, but one is an overnight in Cesky Krumlov. Luckily, you seem to be coming from Dresden, so you can be in Prague for most of the first day. But then you have two day trips planned - which means you won't get to explore Prague! The same is true for Munich. At three nights, you have two full days and however much of the first day you have after traveling from Budapest - and you have three substantial day trips planned. When will you enjoy Oktoberfest, or Munich at large?

The area you've chosen is wonderful, and you can't go wrong with visiting any of the cities on your initial list. Where you CAN go wrong is trying to do too much and short-changing them. The challenge is to figure out how to piece together an itinerary that will let you enjoy these places, instead of rushing off to the next destination.

Given your listed priorities - Oktoberfest, mix of urban/country, beer/wine/good food, 20thC history - I think one way to do this would be to drop Budapest and focus on a semi-circle swoop of Berlin-Prague-Munich. Something like this:
Day 1: Arrive Berlin, check into your hotel, walk around, attempt to get over jetlag.

Days 2-4: Berlin. Berlin is a great city with too much to see and do, and it's really spread out, so you'll have to be strategic in how you plan your days. But it is chock-full of WWII and Cold War sites. Sachsenhausen is at the northern edge of the city; it's not a true day-trip, and you can get there by following the S-1 (I think it's the pink line) S-Bahn line to the end. There's a bus that will take you to the camp, or it's an easy half-hour walk. I think it took me about half an hour. I remember spending most of the morning there, but was back on the S-Bahn by lunchtime. So you should still have at least half a day to do other things in Berlin. I would think a trip to Potsdam would take most of the day, though.
Day 5: Berlin to Prague; hotel check-in; wander around.
Days 6-8: Prague. You have two listed day-trips here, and I would consider dropping one or both. I'm unfamiliar with Cesky Raj, and wish I'd had the time to see Terezin. That said, you would only have three full days to devote to Prague, and there are a lot of things that are worth seeing. Spend that time in Prague.
Day 9: Prague to Cesky Krumlov.
Day 10: Cesky Krumlov. If you're going here, spend two nights and enjoy at least one full day here. I haven't had the chance to go, but by all accounts it's beautiful - especially after the day-trippers have left.
Day 11: CK to Munich.
Days 12-16: Munich. Yes, in this I've given you six nights in Munich. Too much? Maybe. But the city itself is worth at least two days, you want to go to Oktoberfest, and you listed three long day-trips - so why not use Munich as a base? Get a Bayern Pass and choo-choo to Nuremburg, Rothenburg oT, Füssen - heck, go crazy and day-trip to Salzburg and head into the hills with a Sound of Music Tour. Check out Dachau. Head to Garmisch-Patenkirchen and head up the Zugspitze. Heck, I just googled "hiking near Munich" and found a list of top day-trips - including one to Lake Starnberg. Now, I've never heard of Lake Starnberg, but according to this little write-up, it's a charming area 30 minutes from Munich with a castle you can hike to. Sounds right up your alley!
Day 17: Fly home.

Feel free to ignore all of this. But do really consider doing only three major cities. It will free you up to do the day-trips to smaller towns.

3. Budapest (3-4 nights: No day excursions out of the city or overnight trips - is this a fatal mistake??

Naaa, but try and make Budapest 3 full days if you can

If you must do Budapest than cut Munich. If you must do Munich then cut Budapest. Given you've already said you'll tie Vienna and Bratislava together I would add Budapest to that itinerary for another time.

Love it! Rothenburg ob de Tauber was one of our favourites, we stayed at Pension Fuchsmuhle in the valley and walked up a woodland path to the walled town each day.
As with most “fairy tale” towns, there is daytime(tourists) and a different vibe when staying over. We actually ended up staying 2 extra nights when we lost our car keys and don’t regret it. That’s why we chose to stay in Cesky Krumlov too. Hallstatt Austria is probably similar.
I’m afraid you have some tough decisions coming up(or more trips) but I think most people would advocate for 3 nights per, to give you 2 full days in an area. Btw, your thought process seems to be very well thought out.