Christmas Market/Alpine Trip: Prague or Ljubliana. Vienna or Munich?

Hi,

We can only comment on the places we visited during the Christmas Markets in early December 2010 and 2013. Loved Innsbruck. Probably our favorite place during this time of year. Incredible experience and atmosphere with high snow capped alps as a backdrop. Hall in Tirol, a few miles from Innsbruck, is where we stayed 5 times so far. Halls market is more of a low key, local event. Very charming. Across the border in Italy Sterzing/Vipiteno is extremely charming. Brixen/Bressanone is also very pretty. Both are less than an hour from Innsbruck and Hall in Tirol.

Basing in Salzburg or the area, we loved cruising on the Wolfgangsee lake ship, visiting St. Gilgen and St. Wolfgang. Berchtesgaden is also very nice. Hallein, Austria also has a market.

Check the days and dates of markets in smaller towns and villages, as some are only Thursday - Sunday, some are weekends only, and places like Munich, Salzburg, Innsbruck, Hall in Tirol, Sterzing, Brixen are daily. They really become magical in the evening. The lights, decorations, fires to warm up by, stalls selling all sorts of things, food stalls, the smell of chestnuts roasting, music, warm drinks, incredible!

Paul

We are doing a semi-similar trip - I too was confused about what to pick so we ended up giving up on the smaller alps ski towns and are sticking to cities. We had been to Munich so didn;t want to repeat, but if not, I would have totally picked it.

We ended up doing into Frankfurt, Nuremberg, stop on train in Salzburg on way to Vienna, Prague, Berlin ( 2 weeks). Prague really caught my interest too when I looked at all of their stuff. This is a good website.

https://www.pragueexperience.com/events/christmas-opening-times.asp

There are many links on that site to markets, concerts, sights etc....

I really wanted the Alps Xmas backdrop too, but I just couldn't make it work out for various reasons! The ski places I was looking at were Garmisch, Innsbruck, Zell am See, St Anton and Kitzbuhel.... if that helps, but I have not been to any of them, those were just the places that people mentioned.

Have a good trip!
Kim

Thanks, Paul. Hall looks beautiful and I now think Tyrol is a must. But now I'm stuck between Flying into Vienna, seeing Salzburg, Innsbruck and of Munich; or flying in and out of Munich and making a circle to Salzburg, Ljubljana and Innsbruck. In and out of Munich is $230 less for two people, but I wouldn't let that keep me from seeing Vienna if others think it's a must see in winter.

Thanks, Kim. So if you had to pick one big city to visit the Christmas Markets would it be Vienna, Prague, or Munich? I've found that hitting smaller cities and towns in between the big ones works well for my wife and I. I just can't decide which big cities to hit with only two weeks at most.

We flew into/out of Munich. Actually we've flown into/out of Munich 9 times since 2001. Very convenient for a loop trip of Salzburg/Berchtesgaden/Wolfgangsee, Innsbruck and Munich. If heading to Ljubljana, we can recommend staying in Ramsau am Dachstien on the way there. We stayed in Ramsau am Dachstien in Dec. 2013. Beautiful scenery. This is about 3 to 3:30 hours from Ljubljana.

If interested, our early Dec. pictures (and others) are at:

www.flickr.com/photos/pjbassplyr/sets

We've stayed in the Berchtesgaden area 5 times, 18 nights. Same for Hall in Tirol.

If looking for wonderful places to stay in these areas:
www.badl.at
www.mayringerlehen.de
www.friedwiese.de/enska/isl.htm
www.pensionhausmaria.com

Paul

ooh hard choice.... this is exactly what I just went through! I have not been to Munich markets (but I have visited and loved it) or to Vienna at all! So we picked Vienna. Plus it looks really amazing!

I think 4 nights would be too long for me in a small Alpine town... unless you will ski maybe ok. We have the kids along so that wouldn't work for us.

I would be inclined maybe 2 nights Munich, 2 nights Alpine town - travel distances are short, and then you can see both!

Kim

My husband and I spent about 12 days in early Dec 2015 in Austria/Munich to see the Christmas markets. We flew into Vienna and visited five markets in three full days, took the train to Innsbruck and saw 3(?) markets in three days, took the train to Salzburg and saw 3 or 4 markets in three days, and then another train to Munich and went to several other markets. In Salzburg, we also listened to a Christmas concert in a Cathedral (on the opposite side of the Old Town). It was wonderful.. if you go
know that the church is not heated. Wear lots of clothes. If you get there early enough, they do pass out lap blankets. We also saw a few museums in each city except Innsbruck. The weather was very mild, in the low 40s-low 60s. The trains were easy to use, clean and reasonable priced.

We're looking at Prague and Budapest this year.

Or you could sign up for one of the December Munich-Salzburg-Hallstatt-Vienna tours posted on this website :-) If you arrived a day or so early, you could visit Innsbruck.