Rhine river tour

Take the train to Bingen Stadt Bahnhof and cruise down (NE) the Rhine from there. There are two train stations in Bingen, Bingen Hbf and Bingen Stadt. Make sure you get off at the correct one. Only RBs (MRB) stop at Bingen Stadt Bahnhof.

There are day cruise lines other than KD, but KD is the biggest one. They have only two cruises a day starting from Mainz and none from Frankfurt. There are more that start from Rüdesheim/Bingen (Rüdesheim and Bingen are across the Rhein from each other).

The schedule for the KD boats is on the next to last page of this brochure.

I like to take the train that runs once an hour from Frankfurt to Rüdesheim at 07:53, 08:53, 09:53, etc. Walk around Rüdesheim for 45 min. or so and then get on the KD ship and ride this to St. Goar. Explore Burg Rheinfels, train back to Frankfurt with stops in Ober-Wesel or Bacharach if desired.

Find the times for the ship leaving Rüdesheim on the KD website. When buying your ticket, show your train ticket to get a 20% discount.

To get to the Bingen Stadt Bahnhof, which is on the left bank of the Rhein, you will almost certainly have to change trains somewhere on the way (Mainz Hbf, Ingelheim) or backtrack on an RB from the Bingen Hbf. If you go to Rüdesheim, there will be direct regional trains (VIA). all the way from Frankfurt Hbf to Rüdesheim. They go through the Wiesbaden Hbf, not the Mainz Hbf.

"Walk around Rüdesheim for 45 min. or so..."

Either Rüdesheim or Bingen will work, but because of the train and boat schedules, you'll have nearly an hour to fill in Rüdesheim. Then the first 15 minutes of your cruise is spent crossing the river to pick up passengers in Bingen.

If you board in Bingen, you can find trains that provide a shorter wait for the cruise - and from there the cruise heads straight north.

There's nothing too difficult about the change of trains in Mainz - you normally just move across the platform to an adjacent track.