Help with Itinerary for Vienna, Prague

You can do Prague, Vienna, Budapest. If you can fly open jaw (to Berlin, back from Budapest) it would save you time. P, V, B each deserves at least 3 days. I am afraid you won't have time for Krakow in your time span and also it takes longer to get there. It's about 4 hours by train from Prague to Vienna, 3 hours (or less) from Vienna to Budapest. People of many different ages stay in hostel. I am sure you won't be the oldest there. Another option: look at airbnb.com.

Yes, 10 days is enough time to see those three cities - we did 10 days, 9 nights last year on the same trip. You should fly home through Budapest though, as the previous comment suggested. No sense in wasting time to backtrack. If coming from Berlin, you should do Prague, Vienna, and Budapest, in that order.

I would like to go to Krakow one day myself. But Prague to Vienna and then Vienna to Budapest are relatively short train trips (like 3 or 3.5 hours max). I believe Prague to Krakow or Vienna to Krakow are substantially longer, in excess of 8 hours.

Prague and Budapest are comparatively cheap cities. Vienna is more in line with other European cities (though still cheaper than somewhere like Paris or London for sure).

Thank you both so much!

Steve,
I am so excited that you replied since you did basically this exact same trip! Did you get a rail pass, or just buy individual tickets? Any other info you would like to share would be great as well! Did you do any tours? What areas did you stay, etc? Help with the itienerary would be fantastic!

Thank you so much!
Fara

"...hostels are made for the younger set...." Yes and no is the way I would respond. True, you will find the overwhelming majority under 30, but does that matter to you? I stay solo one or two nights on a trip at a private independent hostel which like everything else has its pros and cons. In Krakow the hostel at the train station (Greg and Tom) is reputed to be one of the very best.

Great that you've set aside ten full days for Berlin, a truly fascinating city as you will discover. About traveling solo you'll see lots of women of various nationalities doing exactly just that in their 20s, 30s, etc.

In Prague, you can take a bus to Terezin. You'll need a whole day to see it all properly. The bus stops first at the fortress, then continues to the town. The fortress was used as a prison, mostly for political prisoners (who were then executed), while the walled city was turned into a concentration camp for Jews. It's an easy walk from the prison to the town center and you'll see the city walls along the way. There are several museums in the town detailing life in this "model" camp that the Nazis used to show how "humane" they were.

On my visit, 5 years ago, I got good deals on rooms in Vienna and Prague using priceline.com (name your own price). Read about how to use it best at biddingfortravel.com . In Budapest I stayed at the Mercure Museum Hotel which was close to public transportation and about a 5-minute walk from the Great Synagogue and the old Jewish Quarter. The center was about 20-25 minutes' walk. It was very easy to manage in English (and a little sign language) in all three cities. While most of the people at hostels are 20-somethings, there are usually people in their 30s, 40s, and older, and families with kids too. Most hostels have single rooms, many with private baths. Hostelworld.com is one of the sites where you can locate hostels and read descriptions and comments from people who've stayed there.

Not counting travel time, I would allocate 3 full days for Prague (one of them for Terezin), at least 3 days for Budapest, no more than 2 in Vienna (just because I found the other 2 to be more interesting - added bonus, they are cheaper). If you have more time, I recommend Budapest. I found more interesting things to do there, even though it is the least "pretty." The Holocaust Museum is very well done.

Doing just Berlin-Prague, Prague-Vienna, Vienna-Budapest you will get quite better price when you buy point to point ticket than railpass. To get some ideas about Prague (where to stay, where to eat, what to see) check these websites:
http://www.pragueexperience.com
http://www.praguepost.com

I just bought individual tickets - they are much cheaper.

We didn't do any formal tours, we like the freedom of exploring ourselves (with guidance from Rick's books and other sources of information, of course).

We stayed at proper hotels, although not expensive or fancy. We stayed at U Zlateho Jelena in Prague. The rooms were spartan, but the breakfast was good, the rooms were clean, and the staff was very friendly. The location could hardly be beat - about two blocks from the Stare Mesto. If I stayed there again, I'd ask for an interior room, as the exterior rooms got a little loud at night (though not that bad). In Vienna, we stayed at the Hotel Erzerzhog Rainer - I would highly recommend this. It's about a 10 minute walk from the opera house, and very convenient to public transportation (it's a 5-7 minute walk to Karslplatz). The free breakfast was probably the best hotel breakfast I've ever had. One note though is that they don't have air conditioning, which wasn't a problem for us in May, but could be a problem in, say, August. In Budapest, we stayed at the Eurostars Budapest Centre. It was fine, a proper business hotel, very clean and with AC. Nothing special, you could probably do better (I was using points, so it was free for us).

If you have additional specific questions, I'd be happy to answer them.

For Vienna check out K&T Guesthouse (in Rick's book when we visited in 2013) -- no breakfast but great people and good price (was €79 then.) Amazing schnitzel restaurant nearby, excellent transportation, even a market for cheap snacks.
We took point-to-point trains throughout Austria and Germany, and the train-boat-train day trip to Melk.

Thank you all so much! This has really helped a ton. I am starting to get so excited.

In Vienna, it's K&T Boardinghouse. Tina and Kalid are good friends of Rick Steves. We've stayed there a couple of times--last was a year ago. Their new location is great--50' from the entrance to the Metro that gets you to The Ring in 1 stop. It's just off a vibrant business district just east of the Westbanhof (West train station).

DAY

1 Train Berlin to Prague; about a 5 hour trip. Look at the Hotel Ventana – if it’s in your budget. One of my favorite hotels of all time. Otherwise look as close as possible to Old Town. You can arrive about 1pm, check in and begin your Prague Experience. Especially efficient if you stay near Old Town.
2 Prague
3 Prague
4 Morning, Bean Shuttle to Cesky Krumlov. Afternoon, Bean Shuttle to Vienna. About 5 hours of road time leaving you about 4 hours to explore Cesky Krumlov. You will be in Vienna by 7pm. If you stay near the Kärntner Straße you can enjoy the evening in the pedestrian area very easily. Lovely in the evening, with food, shops, great architecture, etc.
5 Vienna
6 Vienna
7 Morning train from Vienna to Budapest will get you to Budapest in about 3 hours so you can arrive by noon. Here you will find my idea of where to stay: http://1drv.ms/1CUDXz2
8 Budapest
9 Budapest
10 Budapest Home

It’s all a little rushed for me. Two more days would help. I just think less time in Budapest is worth the time spent in Cesky Krumlov; and I love Budapest. If you have one more day, spend it in Budapest. If you have two more days spend one night in Budapest and one night in Cesky Krumlov (Hotel Dvorak).

In all of these cities a very cost effective way to stay is rent an apartment. Generally they have 2 or 3 night minimums which works. The cost for a nice well located apartment will be between $50 and $100 a night. You really need to see Cesky Krumlov and you really need to add one more night for Budapest.

My husband and I did a similar trip last summer. We had more time (3 weeks), so we spent a little more time in each place and also visited Cesky Krumlov, Salzburg (briefly), and Munich, but our main stops were Vienna, Prague and Budapest.

Rather than repeating myself, I'm posting a link to the last part of my trip report, which has links to the other parts, in case you might find any of it helpful.

Enjoy your trip!

https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/trip-reports/3-weeks-in-east-central-europe-part-6-munich