Germany to Italy

Martha, As this is your first trip to Europe, I'd highly recommend reading Europe Through The Back Door prior to your trip. It provides a LOT of good information on "how" to travel in Europe. Use the country-specific Guidebooks to plan sightseeing, hotels and other details in each location. There are MANY possibilities on how to best use those two days. One thing to consider is that travelling by train from Bacharach to Rome will use up a considerable part of those two days. BTW, where are you staying in Bacharach? One option you might consider would be to: > Travel by train from Bacharach to Colmar (FR). Travel time will depend on which train you use, but there's a departure at 08:30, arriving 14:21 that would work (time 5H:51M, 3 changes). It would be a good idea to familiarize yourself with the aspect of "changes". > Stay two nights in Colmar, visit the wonderful Unterlinden Museum and enjoy some fine hot meals. > Travel from Colmar to the Basel-Mulhouse EuroAirport (time about 1H:20M, train to Basel and then Bus to the airport). > Travel via EasyJet from Basel to Rome (flight time 1H:30M). They have one flight per day, with fares currently as low as €54.95 PP. If you decide on this option, BE SURE to read their "Terms & Conditions" carefully, especially related to luggage limits. If your checked items will be over the "free" limit, it's cheaper to pay for that at the time of booking rather than at the gate. Also note that they only allow ONE carry-on item of the approved size (and they WILL check). The flight arrives in Rome at 18:30. If you use the Leonardo Express (train) from the airport into Rome, BE SURE to validate your ticket or face a hefty fine, which will be collected ON THE SPOT! Happy travels!

It depends on what you are interested in. I would suggest taking the train from Bacharach to Munich (takes about 4 1/2 hours, changing trains once in Bingen). You could stay two days in Munich and then take the night train directly to Rome (12 hour train ride departing at 9pm arriving at 10am). I would also look into flights from Munich to Rome. You could also go through Switzerland, or spend some time in northern Italy, or even take the train to Amsterdam or Paris and fly directly to Rome. Ticket prices may be lower than you think.

It is probably going to be at least 15 hours (probably more) to travel by train from Bacharach to Rome, so first determine if that is how you want to spend your extra time. If you do want to take the train, a good tool to use is the Deutsche Bahn website. Put in your journey from Bacharach to Rome. When you get the options back, you can expand a particular trip and click on the "show intermediate stops". This will show you some of the various towns that are "on the way" so to speak.

After arriving in Rome, where are you going on your tour? You could stop in Florence, Siena or Orvieto on your way to Rome, however, maybe those towns are going to be on your tour. Salzburg would also be a nice stop over. Like previous posters suggested, you could get a flight from Salzburg to Rome. Check with Ryan Air and Easy Jet. Which city you stop over just depends on what your interests are and what you want to see/do. Check the Rick Steves' tour books to determine what you might want to do.

Since you said you want to make your way to Rome by train, I will offer suggestions on that. What I would do is look at the bahn.de website for the direct route from Bacharach to Milan, which is the gateway into Italy if you go through Switzerland. You will see that it is a 9-hour journey with at least two changes, and there are two possible routes: One goes Bacharach-Mainz-Zurich and then takes the Brenner pass route to Milan. Tho other goes Bacharach-MannheimBasel (Bern) and to Milan via Brig. Use the "intermediate stops" button to see all the places these trains stop along the way. If you take Route 1, you could with only a slight deviation spend a night in Lucerne. The train station is right in the nice area by the lake and there are good hotels right there. This would be good for a night or two (in which case you would have a long day getting to Rome). If you do one night, you could go the next day to Milan (about 3 hours) and then if you didn't want to stay the night there maybe transfer to Varenna (1 hour) which is gorgeous. Or maybe Verona which is more on the way to Rome. If you take route 2, you could spend a night in Bern or in a nearby town on the train line (Spiez for a lake or Kandersteg if you want a Swiss mountain village). The you could spend the second night in Stresa on lago Maggiore before you get to Milan. Next day hop into Milan and catch the fast train to Rome. Either of these would break op the trip well and give you very nice scenery and places to stay without going out of your way (or not much in the case of Varenna).

Thankyou all! I have much to consider. I am surrounded by Rick Steves Guidebooks that I have purchased. I had considered the route to Switzerland to Milan. I will do more research and come back with a better idea. Thankyou again.

Martha, you do not need a better idea. Mthe route through Switzerland is the most direct and is just fine. There are good choices for overnight stops and great scenery frommthe train.