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Christmas trip with the family.

Posted by on

Hello, I am doing some pre-pre-planning here and was throwing around an idea to take my wife and kids to Germany between Christmas and New Year's. I was thinking about heading southwest and stay south of Munich or go southeast and explore the Black Forest area during the winter.

All that being said I have started to debate the idea of finding a home base and just traveling out from there or splitting it up into two different cities and doing both. First half in the German Alps and second half in the Black Forest area.

We will be 100% train travel so that I know will limit us a tad but not much.

Has ANYONE on here done this before?

My wife and I, 3 daughters 23, 18, and 7

Posted by
1396 posts

Christmas to New Years in the mountains in Alpen ski areas is high season. This is German school vacation time and top ski and family time. If you are thinking this year then you need reservations now for the best places. Black Forest area outside of ski areas not so much. With cold temps, manmade snow in higher elevations will open the ski areas in mid December. Maybe no snow in the valleys/flat lands. Possibly Garmisch or Mittenwald in the Bavarian Alps. I'm not familiar with good train friendly winter spots in the Black Forest. You could consider going further south into Austria, more snow and mountains...

Posted by
5697 posts

Austrian alps are lovely as well -- Innsbruck, Hall. Are you looking for a ski experience, a Christmas markets experience, an architecture/ history trip ? How long do you have -- is it just the week between Christmas and New Year's ??
This will be our third December/ January trip to the Germany and Austria areas, all using trains and carry-on sized bags (with one personal item each.)

As noted above, you are looking at a very popular time

Posted by
40 posts

What a great question...... or Questions.. We would be flying out the day before Christmas eve and flying back New Year's day. So we are looking at 8 solid vacation days. An overnight flight and land Christmas Eve morning and then fly back on new years day. Train travel the whole way.

I'm just not sure yet to be completely honest about how we are going to gear the trip. We are not a skiing family so I would say no to that but the Alps really has piqued my interest. I think it will be important where we stay that we can experience some holiday cheer but I would like to toss in some castle things along with fun winter things...

Just not sure what will be available to do.

Posted by
910 posts

Check out Innsbruck area. There is the Stubaital Valley and the Zillertal Valley just south of Innsbruck with great pensions, skiing of course, but possible sleigh rides etc, as well as great food. Innsbruck toGarmisch Partenkirchen is 90 minutes by train . Salzburg is southeast of Munich and the Black Forest is to the west. Also from Innsbruck you could go over the Brenner Pass into the Sud Tirol in Italy for something quite different. Check out the train times in Bahn.com or Bahn.de/en. Because it will be a holiday week best pick your spot(s) soon.

Have fun.

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