Luxembourg before GAS Tour?

It's a cute little country. Some people like Luxembourg City. It's build surrounded by rivers and high cliffs, which makes it unique; you can walk around it below, it's a public park system. Honestly, I wasn't especially charmed by the city itself, but it's definitely worth seeing if you are nearby.

There are some charming little towns, though, like Vianden. Diekirch is a nice little town (not as charming as Vianden) with an interesting World War II museum - it has some very dated-looking Diorama models of the famous Battle of the Bulge, which took place nearby. It's easy to get around the whole country by bus and train. When I visited, it was super cheap to buy a day ticket for unlimited public transportation to travel throughout the entire country! (OK, small country.) I read they were talking about making it entirely free - not sure if that has happened.

As a World War II buff, I also visited the American military cemetery in Hamm, outside of Luxembourg City, where General George S. Patton is buried, along with many men who fell at the Battle of the Bulge (where he led but did not die).

The unfortunate thing about the GAS tour is that it avoids most of the Rhine/Mosel region where it starts. The only other town you'll visit is tiny Beilstein. I've been to Luxembourg a few times, but I think if you are looking for charm, you would do well to stop somewhere along either the Rhine or the Mosel River on your way to Trier.

(These river valleys are the best way to reach Luxembourg anyway - surely the most scenic train ride in Germany - so be sure that any train sequence to Luxembourg passes through KOBLENZ to ensure the best route.)

There are many good places, so I'm hard pressed to choose. The most scenic spot on the Rhine is probably St. Goar. It's also the home of Rheinfels Castle (ruins + museum) and right next to some other beautiful old towns (Boppard, Oberwesel, Bacharach.) Suggest you book a river-view room in St. Goar (the Rheinhotel the Hotel Rheinfels are right next to each other and enjoy a view like the one you see below.)

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e6/Sankt_Goarshausen_Burg_Katz_2012.jpg

Here's a map showing the nearby towns (click on for info,) ferry crossings, and walking information.

How to reach St. Goar? You are using FRA airport, right? You can get there by train from FRA airport using the airport's "Regionalbahnhof" station (1 of 2 stations there.) But I will suggest that you take the train only as far as BINGEN (which might take 45-60 minutes) and then catch a RIVER CRUISE boat from there to St. Goar (which takes about 1.5 hours.) This most scenic part is best viewed from the middle of the river. In the summer season there are 5 KD boats per day and 2 operated mid-day by Bingen-Ruedesheimer cruises that leave Bingen for St. Goar.

The next day you can catch a train to Boppard, Oberwesel, and or Bacharach within about 10 minutes for a look around these places.

I thought I remembered someone posting a scrapbook of their GAS trip with a stop in Luxembourg but I checked and they just changed trains there.

Here is a link to the scrapbook archives (which is a little hard to find) in case you want to look thru the entries over the years for the GAS tour.

https://www.ricksteves.com/tours/scrapbooks/tour-alum-scrapbooks

I'd plan for at least one extra day in Trier. I found this a fascinating city - lots to see especially if you like Roman Ruins. There is a pretty good museum there as well.

Have a wonderful time on this tour! It is excellent!

Thank you all. Flying into FRA and taking the train to St. Goar is an alternative we are considering. So much to see with too little time!

"I wasn't especially charmed by the city itself" - I can kind of understand this view. Some of the parks trails and the casements are worth it, and the Grund area is attractive.

Not sure how easy it is to get to Vianden by public transport from Trier (which I'm not overly fussed about), but Vianden is a very pretty little place with a fabulous castle visit.

Cochem is also worth a day trip. If you want a very long day and a rewarding hike thrown in, stop off at Eidiger-Eller on the way to Cochem and try the Calmont Klettersteig (steep).

I flew into Luxembourg 2 days before a GAS tour in May 2018. LUX was a small, easy to navigate airport with frequent fast bus service direct to Luxembourg City. I found Luxembourg City to be a delightful way to shake off jet lag, very walkable to explore the old town and the park areas surrounding the old town and the casemates were especially fun to explore and quite picturesque. To get to the start of the GAS tour, I took the train to Trier which was ~1 hour. That being said, I stayed on the Rhine described above before a different RS tour last year and thoroughly enjoyed that as well. Stayed in St Goar, walked the medieval wall in Oberwesel, toured Rheinfels Castle, paddle steamer cruise down the Rhine ... if I had to choose to visit either area again, I’d want to do both!