Germany by the seat of our pants

as someone mentioned if you want to rent only one room (family or quad) i would definitely reserve ahead as those rooms are limited. if you explore booking sites you will probably be able to tell what availability looks like. for popular tourist areas i would think booking ahead would be safer. i would personally hate to spend valuable time looking for a room each nite.

Are you asking if traveling by train is OK w/o reservations and by the seat of your pants? Or are you asking about hotels and such w/o reservations and by the seat of your pants.

Purchasing train tix on the fly wouldn't worry me at all. Trying to locate rooms at the last minute when I arrive somewhere might be a bit more challenging. Sure, there will be rooms available, but is it at a place where you will want to stay? If might be a nasty hotel w/ dirty rooms, it might be a posh 5-star with prices out the roof. Finding quad rooms will also be a challenge. How much time do you want to spend at each of your destinations looking for a room?

I think flying by the seat of your pants could be a fun thing. My wife and I did just that in Germany about 20 years ago with a rental car and no children. We spent a good deal of time looking for accomodation each day. Sometimes it was good, somtimes it was bad.

Just be prepared and lower your expectations.

We did this a few years back in the early spring. We had a rough itinerary, which we changed along the route. As we knew many towns that we wanted to visit we researched hotels and took a list with us. We would call ahead one day in advance or use the internet to reserve a room. Prices forced us to skip a town that we expected to visit. I am not into "must sees" so I was willing to adjust the schedule.

It was not bad in the spring; I am not sure about the summer.

We used hrs.com to do most of our researches and Rick's book in one case. I re-checked just before I left home so I knew that rooms were generally available.

If you arrive in a town without a reservation, you can go to the local tourist office for help.

Regards, Gary

Yes, I was asking about both.. The train and the hotel. These are some good points about hotels being full. I did not think about that. I do not want to pay to much and I do not want to end up with bedbugs or have my kids think Germany is dirty by staying at bad places. This is supposed to be a happy time. So I will do a little more planning has anyone stayed with VRBO or vacation rentals.com they look nice and for a family of 3 it's less expensive to book it with them than for each of us to pay hostel prices. Some require a weeks stay and that's ok. If we find a place that has lots to see such as Berlin or Munich then a week seems good. But then I would most likely end up renting a car. Oh so many choices.. Thanks for the ideas and thoughts. :)

In the last ten years I have traveled all over Germany by train. On only two occasions (3 trains) did I have reservations (they came with advance purchase, Dauer-Spezial tickets for half price, €2, so I said, "Why not?" I didn't need any of them; there were plenty of seats on the train.

One time, on the 26th of December (2nd Christmas, a holiday), I was on an ICE that was SRO. Although every seat was occupied, very few were actually reserved. I could have purchased a reservation when I bought the ticket, half an hour before train time, and had a seat. A half hour later we came to the next station and a lot of people got up to get off. We took seats before other people got on.

The only times I buy tickets in advance, is when I can take advantage of a substantially discounted fare. In 2008 I bought tickets, worth about €200 at the counter, for €58 online at the German Rail website.

Accommodations is another issue. First, my trips are carefully "orchestrated" as to itinerary. I'm not going to spend all the money for airfare and then get over there and say, "What should I see".

Someone wrote, "Failing to plan is planning to fail".

So I know in advance where I will be each day. I get accommodations far in advance. Others are reserving their rooms in advance, and when they see a good deal, they don't say, "I won't take that room. It's too good for me. I'll leave it for someone who comes in at the last minute." Early reservers get what they want; you get what they didn't want.

On one of my early trips to Germany I came into a town a day earlier than expected. I could have gone to the place I had reserved online for the following night. However, I wanted to test the system, so I went to the TI office. The place they sent me to was fine, and I would have thought I got the best deal, except the following night I went to the place I had reserved. It was closer to the station, just as nice, and less expensive.

For apartments, you don't have to go through VRBO or stay somewhere for a week. If you know the town or area where you're going, just go to the local tourism website, which will be www.(name of town).de. If there's a British flag on the page, click on that and you'll get the page in English. You may have to negotiate it in German, get a dictionary and do the best you can. For apartments, you'll look for Ferienwohnung or FeWo for short. Check all the prices, including if you have to pay for cleaning.

As others have said, it's usually no problem buying a ticket at the station and getting on a train right away, and most will have plenty of seats.

You should, however, be aware that buying tickets in advance on railroads' websites can save you a lot of money. The trade-off, of course, is that the cheapest tickets are non-refundable and non-exchangeable -- if you miss the train, the ticket has no value.

So basically, it comes down to, how important is it to you to have flexibility in your schedule, as opposed to saving money.

Hotels in the summer are another matter. Europe has lots of tourists in the summer, so if you don't reserve your hotels in advance, especially in major tourist spots, you might get stuck with either having to pay more than you wanted, or staying at a not so desirable hotel.

Except for major cities, such as Paris, Rome and London, where driving can be a nightmare, renting a car for part of the trip might be a good idea, too. It certainly gives you more flexibility with hotels, because if you can't find lodging in one town, you can always drive on to the next.

German trains are terrific and big money savers, especially for groups who take advantage of the "Länder Ticket" daypasses, "Happy weekend Ticket" daypasss, and the mini-group daypasses offered by local transit authorities. These require travel on local and regional trains and include other ground transport options as well.

However, trains limit your choice of accommodations; you don't want to be waiting for a bus all the time just to get to your B&B out in the sticks. I always plan my accommodations carefully so that they're within walking distance of the station, meet my needs, and lie within my price range; just showing up in town may require too much of your time hunting down what you need or searching in vain.

I usually book several days in one town with a good rail location for the region/towns my family wants to see and build our flexibility into our daytrips by train rather than trying to be flexible about where we lay our heads.

We arrived in Amsterdam a day earlier than we planned and we ended up staying at an Ibis there. They aren't the cheapest hotels (well for us, about 80-150 euros it seems) but if you can't find anywhere else they will probably have something, they are a chain over most of Europe. We ended up staying in 2 and they were fine, but I would always recommend a B&B over a chain if you can find one.

We booked every train at the station and always got on the next one.

Danke
That is a good idea I do not want to be running around looking for a place to sleep when I am very tired. I guess it looks easy on PBS LOL
I think Rick calls ahead a couple days to confirm his stays. I do remember one show that he had where he did worn of coming into an area without reservations and you would end up walking right back out of town until you found something. That would not make my kids appreciate Germany.. They just would never travel with me again.. LOL :(

I would go with what Lee says for trains. I've traveled first class with reservations many times, but only for business when someone else is paying and making the reservation. When traveling on my own, second class without reservations always works. I've missed a few trains, but it was always my fault for showing up late.

For lodging. My favorite is traveling outside summer sans reservations. I'm not picky and I always find a place to stay, most often very cheap and usually (with some memorable exceptions) clean, quiet and comfortable. While I'm confident you can always find a room - If you insist on certain types of accomodations, it's probably better to book ahead.