I'm curious as to what would be the earliest time that the Christmas markets begin in Germany and Austria. Do they all officially open December 1? Or earlier?
I'm trying to plan a trip to include the Christmas markets but don't want to go too far into December.
check the tourist web site of what ever towns you will be visiting, they will post the dates of the markets but they don't start Christmas as early as we do, I was there around Thanksgiving and they were just starting the markets then.
Christmas markets in most big cities start with the beginning of Advent, so, 4 weeks before Christmas. Usually on a Friday, so the date will change every year, but sometime around the 24th or 25th of Nov. Smaller towns may just have a weekend market. Some cities, like Berlin, may have up to 8 markets going on. Here is a website I found this year with all the markets all over Germany, which I am sure you can use to find towns for this year.
http://www.weihnachtsmarkt-deutschland.de/burgweihnacht.html
You can do searches on Yahoo or Google - just type in the city name Christmas market and the year. Ex. Salzburg Christmas Market 2009. By the way- the Salzburg market is wonderful! Vienna has several, too.
We visited Austria and Germany from late (25th) Nov to Dec 5 2007.Vienna,Innsbruck,Salzburg were all absolutely magic,open every day from approx 9am-9pm.The Rathaus in Vienna is spectacular.Also wellworth visiting is Rothenburg in Germany - but not on a weekend,so crowded, but much nicer on weekdays !!! The Kathe Wolfahrt Christmas Shop and museum is enchanting.We are going back again this year to do it all again !
