Rhine River cruise downstream and train rail trip back to car.

"Castle Tour" is generic. You will cruise to Boppard... but what time does your planned cruise boat arrive there? Please advise.

Why do you have to cross the river at Boppard? Why not take the train from Boppard to Bingen?

I suspect she means Marksburg

Rhine River cruise on K-D beginning in Bingen, where we will park the car

In my experience, parking in Bingen is not easy. most car parks are small and limited to 2-3 hours. The best option I found last summer was the City center car park, Badergasse 5, about 300m from the dock. Please note: you need cash to pay (€8 per day)!

Returning to Bingen: 2 one-way tickets for the direct regional train between Boppard and Bingen will run you about €30. Buy trackside from a machine or using the DB app.

Alternative strategy:

• Drive to Ingelheim, park there.
• Catch a direct train into Bingen (regular service, trip takes 7-8 minutes.) Walk to K-D dock, cruise to Boppard.
• Catch a direct train from Boppard back to Ingelheim.

The two train trips can be accomplished on a day pass (Rheinland-Pfalz ticket, €35/2.)

So your train ticket now costs €5 more. But at the K-D cruise kiosk, you will receive a 20% cruise discount just for showing the train ticket you used to reach Bingen - the €76/2 cruise from Bingen to Boppard is now €15 cheaper. That should cover your parking in Ingelheim, I would think.

Also worth noting... if you just want to leave the car, the gas, the driving, the parking, etc. out of the picture... the Rheinland-Pfalz ticket at €35/ 2 will cover the entire round-trip train journey from Deidesheim - and get you the 20% cruise discount.

Thank you so much for your quick reply!
I like the idea of leaving the car at Deidesheim and just taking the train to Bingen.
That would be more relaxing and could save us time in trying to locate a parking spot.
Another question pops up:
How difficult would it be to add Marksburg castle to the day trip?

To use a Rheinland-Pfalz ticket, you must go after 9 am weekdays, but anytime on weekends. Nonetheless, it takes 2 hours to get from Deidesheim to Bingen Stadt by train, too late to get the 9:15 am boat from Bingen. So parking in Bingen or Ingelheim as previously described may be the way to go.

For Marksburg and a Rhine cruise: The train alone would be impractical from a place so distant as Deidesheim. You would not be able to count on a firm schedule with the changes of train that are involved. I would do this for efficiency:

• Drive to Braubach (1 hr 40 min. according to Via Michelin) for the 1 pm Marksburg tour (an English-language tour should be possible at this time.) You may have time for a traditional German lunch at the Goldenen Schlüssel (opens 11:30, closed W and Th) or elsewhere before the tour.

https://image.jimcdn.com/app/cms/image/transf/dimension=1070x10000:format=jpg/path/sc484ea64eed53c8f/image/i82e0948970fa8d90/version/1550765364/image.jpg

https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4143/4751924826_98980aa49f_o.jpg

• After the tour, drive to St. Goarshausen, park, and board the 4 pm Goethe Paddlewheel ship for Rüdesheim (where you arrive at 7 pm.) The 7:36 train from R'heim gets you back to St. Goarshausen at 8:01 pm. The fare is €6.30 ea. for an RMV train ticket bought with the RMV app or DB app. It can also be bought from a ticket machine in St. Goarshause. (This ticket is for immediate use after purchase.) You will still have daylight for the drive back to Deidesheim.

This is a shorter cruise than the one to Boppard but it hits the very best Rhine scenery.

board the 4 pm Goethe Paddlewheel ship for Rüdesheim

I think that's a different ship. At this time, the "Goethe" departs from Rüdesheim for its north-bound journey.

Not only do you think it's a different ship - it is!

The Goethe will be pulling out of the dock at Bacharach and heading north just before the southbound boat pulls in.

Thanks for all of your advice. I think we will just drive to Bingen and take the tour, then eat there before driving back. We will probably just skip the Marksburg tour because we have tickets to tour the Hohenschwangau and Neuschwanstein castles earlier in the week. And we plan to drive part of the Romantic Road the next day. So we will see plenty of castles.
Here is our itinerary (below). Any advice concerning it would be appreciated. Thanks again for all your help.

June 22 Saturday: Drive to hotel/residence in Deideisheim; Then drive to Katzenbach to visit museum, bell tower & cemetery; drive to Rockenhausen to tour town & museum
Sunday: Drive 4 hrs to Neuschwanstein & Hohenschwangau Castles; Drive 1.5 hrs. to Munich; Munich sites: Feldherrnhalle & Munich Residenz, Karlplatz - Stachus square, and Hofbräuhaus Beer Hall restaurant; stay overnight in Munich;
Monday: Visit Old Town Munich Square; Marienplatz; Glockenspiel giant cuckoo clock; visit BMW Welt; Drive to visit Dachau Concentration Camp; Drive to Nuernberg to visit: Zeppelinfeld; Documentation Center; Nuernberg Trials Memorial; Marriage Ups & Downs sculpture; Imperial Castle of Nuremberg; drive back to Deidesheim
Tuesday: Drive to Bingen for Rhine River day cruise; local river train for return trip back to Rudesheim am Rhein or Bingen
Wednesday: Drive the Romantic Road: Baroque Palace in Mannheim; Schwetzingen Palace and Gardens; Heidelberg Palace; Dilsberg Castle in Neckargemünd; Swallow Nest Castle, Hinterburg Castle, Mittelburg Castle, & Vorderburg Castle in Neckarsteinach; Hirschhorn Castle; and Eberbach Castle; then back to Deidesheim
Thursday: Drive to Rothenburg ob der Tauber; Sterngasse Defensive Wall; Medieval Crime Museum; and Night Watchman tour; then back to Deideshem
Friday; Drive to Triberg, Germany and Strasbourg, France: La Petite France; Cathedral & Astronomical Clock; Rohan Palace, & Imperial Palace in Strasbourg, France; then Trifels Castle in Annweiler, Germany on the way back to Deidesheim
Saturday drop off the car at the airport in Frankfurt; Board the train to Lucerne, Switzerland using Eurail Global Passes

I have not been to Newuschwanstein, but it's often pointed out on this board that it is not even close to "as old" as you think it is! I find Munich over-rated, so I would not drive 4 hours just to add two castle/residenz to my list. However, the Romantic Road is certainly worth driving, if you don't get tired of looking for a parking space. I'd note that garage ramps and stalls are much smaller than at home, so get the smallest car you can bear, with a place to hide your luggage on move-days.

I note that you're skipping this newsboard's favorite castle Burg Eltz. However, I found it's current occupancy by a family to create a strange anachrony of interior decoration! I agree that you have plenty of authentic castles on your list. It's pretty clear that your TOP PRIORITY for entire vacation is ... castles. So I won't urge you to see other things. (But note, for example, that near the palace in Aschaffenberg is the fascinating Pompejanum.

I am not trying to scare you, but when we did the Rhine boat ride, we found that almost all the train stations were completely unstaffed. That created some apprehension about the ticket-machine being "working" and our Chip-and-PIN card "working in that machine." But we did okay. Nice wine cafe across the street from the Boppard station when we were there.

The train is very important because it is so much faster (no matter how local the stops) than the boat, and thus saves you valuable touristing time. It is important not to regard the boat as a hop-on-hop-off bus, because there are simply not enough boat-runs. A separate train issue: Very few people on this newsboard need or benefit from one or multi-country railpasses. But it's a complex subject, including types of trains, required or non-required seat reservations, and a lot of work to buy bar-coded tickets at home well in advance, avoiding predatory ticket resellers, and more. But with a group of four, if you are certain the pass saves you EFFORT, and you don't care about budget, ignore me.

You said this is your first European trip. I urge you to buy/library Rick Steves Germany, even if only a few of "your" towns are in it. He specializes in first trips to Europe. Also, https://www.ricksteves.com/travel-tips

You may wish to refine your ambitious driving plans. I see at least six hours on the road for Friday, and that doesn't count delays of various kinds, including driving through cities to find a parking lot or a garage, and probably 15 minutes to get off the highway and into town. No, I have not made that drive, I'm just taking an (imprecise) estimate from Google Maps. I don't see any space in your schedule for on-the-way discoveries. Do you plan to hit any Fachwerkstraße towns?

I honestly don't know how you are going to see all these things on Wednesday, unless it is to drive by, take a selfie, and move on.

We will probably just skip the Marksburg tour because we have tickets
to tour the Hohenschwangau and Neuschwanstein castles earlier in the
week. And we plan to drive part of the Romantic Road the next day. So
we will see plenty of castles.

Marksburg is a real castle which has survived from medieval times. Neuschwanstein is a late 19th century palace with a fake castle exterior, an extravagant modern building made with concrete, modern plumbing and the like. In historical terms, its unimportance cannot be overstated. Nothing ever happened there.

Hohenschwangau is a palace as well. If seeing a genuine castle with 800+ years of history behind it matters, you should take this opportunity while you are on the Rhine.

I am exhausted just reading your plans for some of these days. The Monday, the Wednesday, etc. I think you really have no idea how long it takes to get from one town to the next, find a parking spot, walk to each castle, tour, walk back to the car, drive to the next town and castle. When will you eat? Your days are kinda unrealistic and they don't sound very enjoyable.

If you arriving in Frankfurt after a flight from North America, you really should not get in a car and drive. It is dangerous. Driving with jet lag is as bad as driving drunk.

This trip report is only about 20% related to your travel targets, but because this is your first trip to Europe, it might be helpful to skim it, and read the sections (like the Fachwerkstraße subhead) that most apply to you.

https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/trip-reports/baltic-germany-fachwerke-landesgartenschau

Thank you for all of your advice. It genuinely helps me plan better. I was also worried that too much was being packed into the week. I guess need to take some things off our list. Much appreciation!!

Monday: Visit Old Town Munich Square; Marienplatz; Glockenspiel giant cuckoo clock; visit BMW Welt; Drive to visit Dachau Concentration Camp; Drive to Nuernberg to visit: Zeppelinfeld; Documentation Center; Nuernberg Trials Memorial; Marriage Ups & Downs sculpture; Imperial Castle of Nuremberg; drive back to Deidesheim

I'm afraid the plan for this day is unworkable.
The carillon at the town hall (I assume that's what you call the "giant cuckoo clock"?) plays for the first time at 11am. If you then want to visit BMW World, you'll hardly get to Dachau before 2-3pm, and even if you don't stay there longer than 90min (which is actually too short) you won't get to Nuremberg before 5-6pm, and for your programme there it will be much too late, as the Doku-Center and Trial Memorial both close at 6pm (and are 6km apart). And don't forget that you'll still have at least three hours to drive to Deidesheim afterwards (not including the possible traffic jams that are almost inevitable with half a dozen roadworks en route).

Maybe it would be best to just cut out Nuremberg completely. I think that might be best.
I have reworked the itinerary and cut out Nuremberg. We drive from Dachau (after leaving Munich) and go directly back to Deidesheim, which is a 4-hour drive. We can stop in Stuttgart and get dinner.

We plan to take the "Castle Tour" which ends in Boppard, I believe. We
want to take the train back to our car but do not know how to do that.
Will we need to cross the river at Boppard into Filsen to catch a
train going back upriver to Rudesheim and cross over by ferry?

There are train lines going along both sides of the Rhein, from Koblenz to Boppard to St Goar to Bingen and from Koblenz to (crossing the Rhein on a bridge) Braubach to St Goarshausen to Rüdesheim. If you end your boat trip in Boppard, you simply take the train back to Bingen (Stadt). No need to cross the river.

Ms. Jo is being generous. There is no way to do half of what you have listed. Your Wednesday talks about the Romantic Road, but it is not on the RR, but looks like a trip along the Neckar River. Have you looked at one of the driving websites to get at least an idea of driving times ?

@Stephen & @Jo, agreed. I was still focused on the Rhein cruise. People just don't understand the time involved in their planned travel. And the Romantic Road is a prime example.

For example, just driving the southern part of the Road, between Füssen and Rothenburg odT (ignoring the northern part, between Rothenburg and Würzburg (Weikersheim and Bad Mergentheim), on the actual Romantic Road, Rte 25, would take at least 4 hours, and that doesn't even include the time getting to/from the Road. There is no point in spending 4 hours driving a two-lane rural road, choked with lorries and tour buses, without stopping. It's the towns along the road, spending time in Landsberg, Augsburg, Donauwörth, Harburg, Nördlingen, Dinkelsbühl, and Rothenburg, and some others, that are the real reasons for driving the Road. If you are not going to spend time in these towns, just driving the road is a waste of time.

If you can't devote 2-3 days to the Romantic Road, don't bother.

Thank you for your replies.
Yes, I have been on those RR websites and purchased several booklets outlining the Romantic Road from Die Romanitische Strasse. I chose only one section of the several sections for the road trip on Wednesday.
Since I have no set times during most of our time in Germany, we are being flexible on our road trips.
The only set dates/times are for the 2 castles, Neuschwanstein and Hohenschwangau on Sunday, June 23rd, and overnight the hotel booking for Munich on Sunday evening.
My itinerary, though very full, is not set in stone. Therefore, I can change the Romantic Road trip, or throw it out altogether.
So, again, thank you for your candid advice.

I had, at one time, Eltz Castle and Marksburg Castle on my list of places to see.
After contemplating your advice, I think I might take the Romantic Road off my list, and add them back in on the list for Wednesday.
What do you think?
It appears that it would be about 2-3 hours to Marksburg castle, then over to Eltz castle, then back to Deidesheim. Total road time would be about 5 hours, according to Google.
Another possibility would be to find a place to stay near Marksburg the night before, since we are doing the Rhine River cruise on Tuesday (the day before).

Another possibility would be to find a place to stay near Marksburg (English) then to St. Goarshausen for 16:00 - 19:00 river float to Rüdesheim. Train back to St. Goarshausen (19:36 - 20:01 or 20:06 - 20:31) for car and one hotel night thereabouts.

Wed: drive to Eltz for a tour, stop over in Cochem before driving back to Deidesheim.

I see room availability in the St. Goarshausen area including the desirable Hotel Rheinfels in St Goar (cross the river to St. Goar using the ferry from St. Goarshausen, last crossing at 21:00) but also including hotels on the St. Goarshausen side as well.

Your idea of staying in Braubach could also work... head back there after your cruise in maybe 20 minutes' time. It's a very handsome town as the many pictures on the following pages makes clear:

https://www.stadtbild-deutschland.org/forum/index.php?thread/7322-braubach-am-rhein-und-marksburg-galerie/