Hello All,
I am planning a trip for Europe in April 2026 for 50 days.
I have already visited Italy, France, Belgium, Netherland, Portugal, Spain so I would skip them this time.
Would like to visit around 6 to 8 countries and start the journey from Greece and end in Germany.
Please suggest an itinerary using bus, train or plane between these countries.
Thanks in advance.
We have visited Greece three times, and have taken cruises between the islands. Also been over to Turkey a couple of times and visited Sicily and Malta. The easiest and best way to see Greece is by cruises if you are unwilling to rent a car.
We once came up the Adriatic and visited Croatia and Montenegro and ended up south of Venice. The east side of the Adriatic is difficult to travel on land as the roads do not really go from Greece to Slovenia. We still want to visit Slovenia, and return to Croatia to see the countries longer.
On land, we like to travel in straight lines to cities that are in the same general vicinity. We especially like Budapest, Bratislava, Vienna and Vienna--all easily reached by trains. We adore Dresden and the Saxony region of Germany. Another good trip is from Vienna to Salzburg to Munich and down into the Austrian Alps around Innsbruck.
We have driven from Munich over to Stuttgart and up the Rhine River to Bacharach, Koblenz, Cologne and ended up in Amsterdam. They have trains running this route too.
Thanks David for your input. As you mentioned it is hard to travel from Greece towards Slovenia, I was hoping there was some bus or train services along the way. Below is an approximate itinerary I was thinking of. Do you think there are transportation between these cities? Appreciate any input.
Athens, Santorini - Greece
Tirana - Albania
Ohrid, Skopje - North Macedonia
Pristina - Kosovo
Kotor - Montenegro
Dubrovnik - Croatia
Mostar, Sarajevo - Bosnia & Herzegovina
Split - Croatia
Ljubljana - Slovenia
Vienna - Austria
Bratislava, Slovekia
Prague - Czech
Budapest, Hungary
Frankfurt - Germany
Where you are hurting yourself are the points inbetween. Hopping on a bus and wizzing past the villages is a shame. The Balkans are a cheap place to visit. Personally I would spend 44 days there and 6 in Budapest. But with your request, something like this:
Very ambitious.
Greece 7 days
Albania / Kosovo 7 days: I would consider going from Athens to Corfu then the ferry across to Albania. In Albania I would consider Gjirokastër and Berat ad Kukes on the way to Kosovo. From Kosovo cross back into Albania and head for the Valbone river valley. No place more interesting or more beautiful. Then take the Koman ferry down the river to Koman and from there head to Shkodër and cross into Montenegro.
Montenegro 7 days: Work your way up the coast with Ulcinj, Stari Bar. Now head north to the Tara River Canyon then circle south to the Ostrog Monastery and end up in Kotor. Then cross over to Dubrovnik.
Croatia 7 days: Dubrovnik to Split and see a few of the Islands. Then Split to Mostar.
Bosnia & Herzegovina 5 to 7 days: Mostar to Blagaj Tekija to Travnik to Jayce to Sarajevo. Sarajevo to Budapest (flight that changes in Belgrade, not bad).
Hungary 7 days: Budapest, Szentendre, Gyor, Pannonhalma ending in Vienna
Austria 7 days: Vienna to Salzburg, then on to Cesky Krumlov, Czech Republic.
Czech Republic 5 to 7 day: Cesky Krumlov to Prague
Fly to Frankfurt
Some by bus, quite a bit by private transfer (relatively cheap in the Balkans), 100% planned with an expert. Especially in the Balkans.
Hi prn, I'm curious as to why you're winding up in Frankfurt. There's nothing wrong with Frankfurt but there are certainly more beautiful and more iconic places to visit in Germany while you're there. Or maybe you're just planning on stopping there first and then branching out into the rest of the country?
MR E - Thanks for the detailed itinerary. It gave me better ideas to structure my route so I can stick to the Balkan area.
Having a rental car would have been a better option but the dropoff charges, crossing border charges by rental company seem very high.
Is there a way to drive in a loop and cover 7 - 10 countries and come back to the place where we rented the car?
It seems some of the local rental car companies do not charge any fees to take the car outside the country. The hard part is to find those rental car companies :)
Mardee - Thanks for your input. I was trying to fly out of Frankfurt as it has better connectivity to India.
You could Albania by bus or private transfer then probably rent a car and loop Podgorica through Montenegro and Bosnia and Croatia and back to Podgorica with a flight from Podgorica to Budapest. Then do shuttles and trains to Vienna and Prague.
I would still hire an expert in the Balkans. She might know the best rental company for the car and certainly the best route and stops.
Albania is difficult by bus, especially when you don't have much time. It's a fabulous country, but I'd hold off until I could give it more time than you'll have next year if you want to go through so many countries on a single trip.
Just a general comment: The Balkans mostly lack the mile-eating express trains you find in western and central Europe. In some areas they have no trains at all. A plan to go a lot of places over such a distance may turn out a lot more challenging than you expect for these reasons:
I am not saying you shouldn't go to the Balkans. It is a fascinating area. However, most of those countries are massively more challenging, logistically, than the places you have traveled in the past. I would recommend building an itinerary one country at a time. Pick the country you're most excited about. Buy or borrow a guidebook and skim through it, making a list of the places you'd like to see. Figure out how much time you should allot to that country after considering how you will move from place to place (it's likely to be more days than you initially guess). Then repeat for the neighboring country you are next most excited about. And so on. Stop when you've filled up your 50 days (or before, because things will probably not go to plan).
Alternatively, you might consider renting a car for one or more individual countries and taking a bus or a taxi across the border. A car in Albania would be very handy because of the aforementioned bus situation. I spent a lot of money there in 2024, taking taxis from town to town when the bus schedule didn't suit me (or there were no buses at all). The drop-off fee within a country is sometimes very reasonable.
Incidentally, mainland Greece is very interesting. I don't know what you plan to do there, but I wouldn't go to Greece intending to see just Athens (not my favorite capital city).
Fifty days seems like a long time, until you divide it between all of the destinations that you've listed.
The suggested itinerary seems very good, though I have to say that I have only been some of the destinations you listed, and none in the Balkans.
What appeals to you about the destinations you've already visited, and those on your list for this upcoming trip? For example, history, the outdoors / nature and hiking or biking, culture, food? That may help you to narrow down your locations, and perhaps to drop some so you can focus in more depth on some areas rather than visiting 6-8 countries for shorter periods of time. Also, you provided a list of cities; would you like to visit the countryside or smaller towns/villages near any of those cities, or do you prefer to visit cities only?
In terms of flying out of Frankfurt, if that's the only reason you would be going there, you could seek flights that would (for example) from Budapest, then connect in Frankfurt for your return to India.
If you want to visit Athens for its history, and more specifically its place in terms of the impact of Athens/Greece on western history, then Athens is worth five days or so, and more if you want to do day trips. Or you could rent a car from Athens and visit many ancient sites and gorgeous towns, such as Nafpflio (close to the ancient site of Mycenae), Olympia, Meteora, Delphi. Some of those could be done as day trips, though we recently spent three lovely nights in Nafplio so we could enjoy that town while visiting ancient sites near there.
