Road trip europe

Hard to understand when you will reach Croatia, but seems like it will be winter and definitely off season for the coast. A cold and wet time in Austria is likely, maybe skiing but no hiking. Make sure you have a vignette for the Austrian highways.

I would only want to visit Scandnavia in the summer, but perhaps you hate cold weather less than I do. Not sure about the driving conditions, though.

I know 4 to 5 months sounds like a long time, but you're planning to cover far miore territory than I would. The major advantage of having a car is the ease of visiting small towns and rural areas. It appears to me that after you see the usually-recommended highlight cities in all those countries, you will have no time for the smaller places.

Hi,
Norway is far, far away and very, very wet and cold until the end of April. Also, driving there is slow and speeding fines are very expensive.
Likewise, Sweden, while less far away, takes a lot of time and driving distance to properly visit.

Conversely, Hungary / Budapest is worth including after Croatia or Austria on the way to Krakow.

Thanks for your comments so far, trully appreciated. We think that it will be in Scandinavia after April, we are at the beginning of our planning and it is also hard for us to estimate how time of year will suit the different areas. We understand about Norway being far, it feels that way, but we live in Australia and we are used to long distance travel. Time is flexible and we can take a little longer. We will take all of your comments on board, road conditions specially. Thanks again, very helpful

We have been to all the places you plan to visit. You plan to soo a lot of Europe, but you do have 4-5 months.

When you mention entire countries like Germany and France, you could easily spend 60 days in each of those countries and still not seen it all there. Paris is good for a week. The Rhone-Saone River area in SE France is wonderful along with the rest of Provence. That area alone is good for two weeks. The Loire Valley, Normandy, Alsace and Bordeaux would easily take another month.

Regarding Scandinavia in the early Spring, you could easily visit Denmark, and Stockholm, but I would not try to do Norway that time of the year, especially driving.

We visited Norway on an 11 night Arctic Circle cruise that went to the North Cape (this was June 9-20). In our first port of Geiranger, we were told that a heavy snow had fallen 5 days prior to our arrival and that the highways had just been cleared.

Further, even in the Summer, driving around in the mountanious terrain there, you will spend many hours just getting from place to place.

The Norwegian guides that we had for our tours told us that driving up to the North Cape at any time of the year pretty much required driving through Sweden to get there.
You probably won't be going to the North Cape anyway, that time of the year.

I noticed that you didn't include Budapest, which you might consider since you plan to visit Austria.

Note that winter tyres are mandatory in several countries along your route. Something to consider if starting in february.

Thanks for your replies, we are going to remove
Sweeden and Norway from the itinerary and add some of the other wonderful suggestions from your posts. Thank you !!!!

You will have to face and solve several issues driving through all that countries:

• Border issues from Schengen to non-Schengen countries
• Different customs regulations
• Valid driving permission (not only driver license), e.g. German regulation
• Various winter tyre regulations
• Emission class stickers to enter environmental zones
• High parking costs in some cities you may want to explore for a few days (a car makes no sense in nearly all German and some other European cities)
• Toll roads and vignettes, e.g. Austria's Pickerl
• Different traffic rules and traffic signs, e.g. the troll warning sign in Norway

All manageable and doable but you shall know all about it when planning that. Fines in some countries are really high.

I would not strike out Scandinavia, especially not on the sentences made here. I recommend to ask some local or even car travel experts about Scandinavia. Especially Norway and the fjords are a great experience. End of April / May is a wonderful time to explore the fjords on some scenic routes - some of the passes will still be closed but on fjord (sea) level you can have a great time - example route Hardanger.

"The Norwegian guides that we had for our tours told us that driving
up to the North Cape at any time of the year pretty much required
driving through Sweden to get there."

That info makes only sense for Norwegians living southeast and east of Oslo. The others and the supply trucks just drive up E6 in Norway and you will have it. Another interesting option in Norway to combine land and sea way by taking a Hurtigruten ship for a few days.

Thank You!! Good points
Will look into all of it
Thanks again to all of you for your great contributions