Road trip in central europe from Venice ?

bucephale 15 hours in a train has to be worth $300 to you. If so, go for it. Not sure what the rental car is for, but if you can find a way to eliminate that then maybe you fly to where you really want to be and the total trip cost isnt much different. But this is all personal preferences and if it works for you, who can be critical.

300$ ? More like 2000$.

7 hours train is relax with nice views, no problem there.
The car ? We would do a 30 days road trip in Austria and Hungary.

My bad. A group. Still surprised at the cost difference. If it works for you go for it. Not important what I would do. You have to maximize your enjoyment and that's a personal thing.

Month and year?

You don't say whether you have visited Venice before. Staying in Mestre indicates that you have a backpacker budget, which is your choice. Venice is a stunning, unique place. Even 24 hours in Venice is "worthwhile", but since it is not going to get any easier to visit Venice (I mean water, climate, and Airbnb destruction of local life ... ) I'd go now if I had not been.

Have you driven in Europe before? Just so you set aside money for gasoline and parking every day. We flew to Innsbruck (no real cost second Austrian Air segment from Vienna), and then did Innsbruck-Salzburg-Munich-Vienna by train. A pleasure of a 2-week vacation. I personally would not take two all-day train trips to save the money if I did NOT want to visit Venice. Have you checked a two-segment (if necessary) Lufthansa flight to Munich? I have saved a lot of money because United and Lufthansa are partners.

There are legitimate reasons for renting a car, but you chose not to list your justifications.

1) july-August 2025
2) we have travel 7 times in Europe. We have rent a car 5 of those 7 Times.
3) we have been in Venice twice
4) we are planning a 32-40 days trip
5) all options in central Europe are between 1500 and 1700$

I recall your earlier posts prior to European road trips, so I assume you're well prepared for the challenges. I have no reason to doubt the airfare savings you cite.

Given your previous two trips to Venice and lack of interest in a significant visit on this occasion, I'd suggest you consider instead spending a couple of nights in one of the interesting towns along the rail route from Venice to Vienna. I enjoyed both Treviso and Udine this summer--though I must report the temperatures were dreadfully hot in mid-August. Both Treviso and Udine are attractive towns, and lodging might well be less expensive than in Mestre (where I found hotels located near the train station to be rather expensive in September). Udine sees fewer foreign tourists than Treviso. I can't say whether either could possibly be noticeably crowded with foreign visitors next summer; it was so hot in August this year I sometimes felt like nearly the only person outdoors. Either Treviso or Udine would certainly be a nice break before you tackle probably-crowded Vienna.

Treviso is as little as 18 minutes from Venice Mestre by regional train, so you could simply buy your tickets upon arrival at the Mestre station. Udine is considerably farther away--over 1.5 hours by regional train. The RailJet you're planning to take to Vienna stops at both cities.

1) july-August 2025

I thend to begin planning way early too. So i get that. And for me, sometimes its hard to resist jumping off and making the reservations as soon as possible. But I know thats not aways a good thing .... but I have still be known to do it.

There is a contingent here that swears by purchasing a ticket a year in advance will save lots of money. The few studies on the subject dont entirely hold that to be true.

The past couple of years on two ocassions I have set up Google Flights to track prices starting about 10 months out on a ticket to Budapest from Texas. I selected the absolutel best priced ticket based on 1 change and 2 to 4 hour layover. I used the Google Flights price matrix to find the cheapest combo of departure an retun date. Over the following months the price went up and down like a yoyo; as much as 20% down from the starting price. Then in both instances something less than 90 days out the prices went up fairly substantilly and stayed up.

But here is the interesting thing. As Google sent me updates they would also send me alternate flights. Flights that on day one were more expensive so I had not chosen them. Now some of them were less expensive than my original selection.

You cant even price late August flights yet? Wait and I suspect you will find a flight to Budapest or Prague (makes more sense if the trip is Prague, Vienna, Budapest .... that is cheaper than you thought.

Also, you say the train for the family is $120? Prices and schedules are not out for August 2025.

It cant be late August. Our trip must be between june 28 and August 15. So we have some flexibility but not that much.

We are planning in advance because we use Airbnb and the better one goes away faster obviously !

The train schedule is not out yet, but the price is the same all year round.

The prices can change on the train when the new schedule comes out, but I wouldnt expect much.

Typically AirBnb's in Budapest only begin renting out 90 days prior. If that helps any. Maybe the rest of the world is different. I know because i use do own two here and that was pretty much my life for about a dozen years. I live in one of them now and the other serves other purposes now.

I still suspect if you wait about 3 months you will find other affordable options. No guarantees of course. The airlines do something similar to dynamic pricing. If demand is down, the prices go down ... or at least dont go up as time gets shorter. Tourism here this past June, July and August was below average and the flights reflected it (I was checking prices thinking I might go back to the states for a few weeks .... but got busy here and ended up staying). September 1st the tourists arrived and have been coming ever since so the prices are reflecting that as well. Sort of nice having tourism spread out a bit more than usual but caught a lot businesses off guard.

A quick look on Airbnb show me that there’s more that 1000 lodging avaible in Budapest for july 2025. So I dont know about the 3 months period you told me about.

I have a friend who been to Vienna last july. She have check the flight to Vienna and Venice 4 months before departure and they never drop below 1500$.
900-1000$ to Europe from Montréal in summer is the lowest price we should expect. And those prices are for places with many flight per week with more than one company (Paris, London, Lisbon, Barcelona, Lyon, Rome, Amsterdam and Venice).

What I meant was the reservations dont start coming in with any great numbers until about 90 days out. Still i would book 4 to 6 months out.

On the subject, I think the best area to stay in District VI within a few blocks of Andrassy ut. (from Andrassy ut 1 to about Andrassy ut 66 is pretty ideal). The worst place if you are over 25 would be almost any place in District VII. Its the party district. District V isnt terribly satisfying south of Vorosmarty ter, but if you go north of there its nice, but the further north you get the less public transportation becomes convenient. District VIII is nice but again, public transportation isnt that great. All the Districts on the Buda side of the river are terribly inconvenient for tourism.

But do make sure its legal. The listing will have a license number in it. No number, move on.

I was just going to add that I think those are very good flight prices you have found. We are in South Florida and have been paying closer to the $1500 you cite, except for London which we can get for less than $1000.

The only downside I see is the time you spend getting back and forth to Venice. It depends, of course, how long your trip is. You are spending two nights in Venice which is not where you want to be. For a two week trip that would be a big portion of your time. The longer your trip the less the impact. That said, my son and his fiance did something similar flying into London and then the next day flying to Porto. They then flew back from Faro the night before. They ended up with two nights in London and 10 in Portugal. His fiance had never been to London so they enjoyed the day walking around after arrival. For them, it was worth it and sounds like that is the same assessment you have made. It is money versus time.

We are planning a 32-38 nights trip.

Hi,

OeBB also offers the night train option Venice to Vienna on Nightjet if you want to consider that option. I take night trains , at least 2 on every trip, as a way of squeezing out another travel day.

There is nothing wrong with your plan - since the savings is significant and since you have time on your side. You appear to have looked at the total cost package of cheap flights plus train plus extra hotel. Many people forget to do that and end up not saving money - or they don’t have time and have to give up a day of vacation. None of this appears to be an issue in your case.

No one knows if flights will go on sale or not, so if you go for flights now, don’t look back - unless you buy fully refundable or changeable. Although last year I saw some sales around Black Friday- but maybe not with your specific dates.

I think your next question becomes how time and cost efficient a car, including parking, petrol and 2nd driver?, is over trains. And that just becomes math. But it sounds like you are looking at car costs, as well.

Depending on where you end up going, apartments could be really cost efficient for a family.