Family of 4 - Europe itinerary suggestions in August!

How are getting from Milan to Vienna? Flying or night train?
If you cut something, it would be Vienna as it is just too far away. Skip Zurich altogether and spend it in Luzern. It is a lot closer to Titlis. Jungfraujoch is weather dependent (like Titlis). Spend another day in Salzburg and you can do Munich as a day trip.

Seems like a whole lot of rushing around. Don't worry about wearing out the kids. Worry about your selves.

Day trip from Milan to CT---- that's at least 6 hours on a train you sure you want that?

If you want to do a day trip to water, go to Varenna 2 hrs of train travel

we would like to explore new cities in Italy as well as venture out to Switzerland, Austria and possibly Germany.... I was thinking of adding Munich if we can...

Well, if that's the case, this isn't going to help:

We have our airfare in and out of Milan and now need to plan our trip!

It's really best to have some plan in place before you nail down your flights. It looks to me like you are planning to cover a lot of ground (maybe too much). With your current flights, the fact that you will need to return back to Milan is going to work against you. You could easily end up burning an extra day or two (and associated costs) by circling back to return to your origin point. A more efficient plan would be to fly "open jaws" - in to one city, and fly out from another - this both saves you money and also essentially "buys" you an extra usable day or two for your trip. Maybe fly in to Milan and out of Vienna, Zurich or Munich.

You say your flights are already booked. Maybe it's not too late to tweak them - you should figure out where you really want to go, and adjust your flights accordingly. Even if it ends up costing you something to change the flights, I believe that it's often "cheaper" to pay a fee to get a more efficient routing (you'll save money overall by not having to circle back for your departure). For most of us, the commodity that's most constrained is the number of usable days in Europe.

I have not been to these places but I can tell you that yes, it will be exhausting for your kids. Mine are similar ages and last year we went to Italy for 10 days and changed hotels several times and by the end, everyone was spent. I'd try to keep the number of different hotels to a minimum. Drop one city and add a day to two others. Cinque Terre is great but you really need a full day and a night to enjoy it. I'd drop it, too far and not enough time to really enjoy. We are heading back to Europe this May and have learned that fewer hotel changes is good. Looks like you will have a great time, maybe just simplify the itinerary. :)

I have to agree that your plan looks exhausting. I'm betting that somebody, if not all, will "hit the wall" somewhere around Salzburg.

Do you really want to spend 6 hours sitting on trains on your CT day? Only to be faced with the hordes of other day trippers arriving as you are? I think the advice of going to the lake at Varenna is a good substitute.

I also think you should consider the advice of dropping Zurich and adding those nights to Luzerne and Salzburg. You could go to Munich on your extra Salzburg day. The extra Luzerne day would be a cushion if you had a cloudy, rain day.

Well I've seen some itineraries on this forum but this......

There is absolutely no way you should consider this. You don't say how you intend to travel between locations but Milan to Vienna...... and THEN a bus tour and concert.... that's 10hours of travelling unless you fly which also makes no sense (if you want to visit Austria get flights to Austria).

So many places in Italy to explore and enjoy. Go to Verona, one of the great Italian Lakes. Yes you can head to Switzerland or Austria but I really ask the question why when you already havknow so much to explore in your start and finish point? In August driving can be a real slog around Austria, Germany. It's taken me 5 hours just to drive between Munich and the Austrian Tirol in August.

Please reconsider!

First, you absolutely cannot go to Cinque Terre! Unless you want to spend a few minutes there, while you wait for you train back to Milan.

I see most of your stops are for 2 nights only. That is a lot of traveling around, instead of staying put and enjoying where you are. Remember you lose a lot of time packing up, leaving hotel, getting to train, arriving next place, finding hotel, etc. I would consider fewer stops for a longer amount of time.

Thank you all so much for your thoughtful feedback. We are for sure reconsidering our plans!!! Thinking of Northern Italy and Switzerland only. I'll post a new topic when we have a better idea! Thanks again!