3 Days in the Rhine Area?

Bingen is convenient for your boat trip to St. Goar, but too far from the Mosel or Hahn.

If you made Boppard your base, you could go by train to Bingen, then come back by boat to St. Goar with a stop in Bacharach, then St. Goar to Boppard by train (or continue on the boat to Boppard). If you show up at the boat dock in Bingen with a train ticket from Boppard, you'll get a 20% discount on the boat ticket.

Second day, it's a lot closer from Boppard to Burg Eltz than from Bingen. Take time to see Koblenz (Deutsches Eck) on the way back. You can use a VRM group day ticket (Minigruppenkarte) for the entire trip.

Third day, go to the Cochem area (Cochem, Beilstein, Zell), then from there to Hahn. Again use a Minigruppenkarte. There's a bus leaving Bullay (one train stop from Cochem) at 19:35 daily, getting to Hahn at 20:11.

Thanks, Lee, for the suggestion, but we've already booked and paid for both our lodging in Bingen and our train from Paris to Bingen. So, staying elsewhere isn't an option at this point. I'll check into your suggestions, though, from where we'll be, and see if we can make them work! :)

OK, let this be a lesson to you. In the future, before making plans such as this, check with Russ or me.

But seriously, Bingen is well situated for your boat trip DOWN the Rhein. From Bingen take the 9:30 boat; it's only 45 minutes to Bacharach. Spend an hour there, then take the next boat 40 minutes to St. Goar. If you have time, go across the river on the ferry to St. Goarshausen and take the train to Braubach and see the castle, the Marksburg, there.

But Bingen is a long way to the Mosel and you are going there on day 3, anyway. On day 2, take advantage of what there it to see east of Bingen. Go across the river to Rüdesheim, then to Mainz, or even Worms, or go up the Nahe river to Kreuzlingen.

On day 3, check out and go to Koblenz. Leave your luggage at a locker in the Koblenz Hbf and go to Burg Eltz. There are no lockers at Moselkern on any other train station near Burg Eltz. After Burg Eltz, go back to Koblenz and get your luggage and go on to Cochem. See what you can around Cochem, then go to Bullay (next stop up the river from Cochem) and catch the 19:35 bus to Hahn, arriving at 20:11.

Thanks again, Lee! Your information is extremely helpful. So, here's a question for you - do you know much about the Rhineland-Pflatz regional ticket, and could we use that for all of our Day 3 travel (Bingen to Koblenz, Moselkern, Cochem, then on to Frankfurt Hahn)? The only map I can find for the routes is in German and from 2010, so I'm not sure if I'm reading it correctly. If so, it looks like that would save us tons of money!

Yes, you can use the Rheinland-Pfalz-Ticket for regional trains from Bingen to Koblenz to Cochem, with a stopover in Moselkern. You haven't said what days of the week these days are, but if your trip to Burg Eltz is on a Saturday or a Sunday, there is a bus from some of the stations on the Mosel to Burg Eltz. I think that bus will also be covered by the RL-P-Ticket. I'm not sure if there are public buses from the Cochem area to Hahn, but I'll check. I'm pretty sure the bus I mentioned (from Bullay to Hahn) is a private bus and wouldn't be covered.

Update: There are public buses from Bullay to Hahn, arriving at Hahn at 18:11 and 20:21. I don't know if you want to get to Hahn as early as 6:11 PM (almost 4 hours early) or as late as 8:21 PM (1h39m before flight time), but those look like your choices with transportation covered by the RL-P-Ticket.

The bus getting to the airport at 8:21 pm is the same one (VRM 750) I told you about earlier. It's a public bus run by the VRM (Verkehrverbund-Rhein-Mosel, the metro district for the Mosel and most of the middle Rhein). The times I first told you about were from the Hahn website and were probably out-of-date information. The 8:21 pm arrival time is from the current schedule on the VRM website.

In case you are going to Burg Eltz on a weekend, the bus that stops just up the hill from the castle leaves from several train stations on the Mosel. The last one is Hatzenport; it a 17 minute ride from there.

Another thought: There are regional Bahn buses, which are probably covered by the RL-P-Ticket, hourly from various points in Bingen, including the Stadtbahnhof and the Hauptbahnhof, to Hahn shown on the Bahn website. They take just under 2 hours, with a change in Simmern and get to Hahn Flughafen at 2 minutes past the hour.

So either leave your luggage at your hotel in Bingen after checkout and go to Mainz (or take you luggage with you to Mainz and leave it in a locker there), explore Mainz, and come back to Bingen for the 6:10 pm bus to Hahn (at 8:02 pm). Do the Mosel on day 2.

OK, I think I have a plan! I never said, it will be me (44), DH(45), and two teens (16&18). We arrive Saturday night, so...

Sunday - use the Rhineland-Pflaz ticket to visit the Mosel area, so we can take advantage of the weekend bus at Burg Eltz.

Monday - do the Rhine boat tour between Bingen and St. Goar.

Tuesday - use a Rhineland-Pflaz ticket again to pop down to visit Mainz (can we get as far as Worms on the Rhine-Pflatz?) then head back up to Bingen to grab our bags and head to the airport.

Lee, you have been a HUGE help! Thanks so much!