We only have 5 days to tour mosel region on our quick trip from us.
1. Best time of year?
We will rent a car..so what routes best?
Do you advise staying in one area and driving each day?
Best airport for flights in and out from us.
Other suggestions? Thanks.
Maire
You could check on flying into Frankfurt and out of Luxembourg, or vice versa.
We are going to the Mosel in September this year and staying in Beilstein at the Hotel Gute Quelle which is in Ricks book.September is wine festival time,we will stay at Gute Quelle for all five nights and travel by rental car.For your flights I would go in and out of Frankfurt,lots of flights,so better prices.Our trip will start in Paris so we will fly in and out of Paris.
Mike
Now that is the information for which I am looking. We too are thinking of September, but just are in the beginning of the planning stages. We were wondering if it would be better to fly in to Frankf. but fly back from Lux. I understand that we may have to fly from LUX to Frankf., though.
We have only 5 days and want to stay in one place or at the most two. Will look up the hotel you suggested.
Would like other suggestions re a central location. Do not need "big city."
Thanks
You don't want a big city, but you may not want something the size of a postage stamp (Beilstein) either. Pretty, but not a lot there. As you can see in the photo below it's roughly the length of 8 tour buses.
Beilstein
I'd prefer to visit Beilstein on a 1-hour river cruise from Cochem, a larger town of about 5,000 residents.
Riverfront in Cochem
Reichsburg Castle in Cochem can be reached on foot from the town center.
Market square
Narrow alleyways
Falconry show on Castle grounds
View from chairlift
A car is not essential here. Trains run hourly or better in each direction and take you to other river towns - like Trier (city, Roman history) Moselkern (for Burg Eltz castle walk,) Traben-Trarbach (wine town,) Winningen (wine village,) Bullay (good place for hiking and biking,) or to destinations on the Rhine (Boppard, St. Goar (Rheinfels Castle,) Braubach (Marksburg Castle.) Some of these trips are much more efficient by train than by car (like Cochem-Bullay, which is less than 10 minutes by train but nearly 40 minutes by car.)
Two adults can get a 3-day train/bus pass (mini-group ticket) for €43.60 to cover nearly all these destinations.
Which airport? Depends where you're coming from. Frankfurt Hahn (Ryanair base) is closest to Cochem. The shuttle to Bullay is 45 min. plus a 10-min. train ride.
If you are going to rent a car, you can stay in one of the smaller towns for not too much money, maybe 50 euro in a weingut with a couple of guest rooms and breakfast. Check where there is a Strasssenweinfest nearby for a good time. There should be several going on each weekend at various towns along the river in September.
I'd just fly in and out of Frankfurt. You could use Hahn if coming from elsewhere in Europe on Ryanair.
A Weingut experience is a good suggestion. But a car is not a prerequisite. The Weingut Rademacher is a short walk from the train station in Cochem. You can easily walk to Weingut Haxel too.
Just to throw this out...We rented an apartment in Zell right on the Mosel last September. We enjoyed having the kitchen for some meals and sitting on the deck with our wine and pizza for dinner while watching the boats go by and people walking and biking on the wide path. We drove everywhere around the Mosel. It wasn't fancy but it was cheap and adequate.
