Rhine/Mosel

Four days. Is that 3 nights, with two whole days and two partial days.

Day 1: Arrive Frankfurt, go to Bacharach or St. Goar, check in for 1 night. From Bacharach, cruise to St. Goar, see Rheinfels, train back to Bacharach. From St. Goar, train to Bacharach, cruise back to St. Goar, see Rheinfels.

Day 2: Train to Koblenz, leave luggage in locker in Koblenz, train of bus to Braubach (Marksburg), back to Koblenz, go to Cochem for 2 nights.

Day 3: Train to Moselkern, walk to/from Burg Eltz, back to Cochem.

Day 4: Train to Trier. Go on from there or back to Cochem for 3rd night.

Hi Teena,

We did a similar trip in Oct. '07.

We arrived Frankfurt airport from NJ at 6:30am. We picked up our rental car and went to Bacharach, St. Goar and Marksburg Castle (you could probably do a cruise instead) before arriving in Cochem around 3pm. We actually stayed on the opposite side of the Mosel from Cochem at the hotel Rebenhof in Valwig.

www.hotel-rebenhof.com

We based here for 4 nights and visited:

Cochem, Trier, Burg Eltz, Beilstein, Zell, and Bernkastel.

The drive from Cochem to Trier was about an hour or so on the highway. On the way back to Cochem, we followed the road along the Mosel.

Here's a link to some photo's that may be of interest:

www.worldisround.com/home/pja1/index.html

Hope this helps.

Paul

hope you gets LOTS of help teena, because we're in the same boat! ha! only big difference is we train in and out. good luck! milobrew

I don't think I would recommend doing a cruise unless you were using the train. Then you could cruise down the Rhein, say from Bacharach to St. Goar, and then just keep going. If you had a car, you would have to backtrack to where you left it.

I really enjoyed Rheinfels and spent probably 2½ hours there at least, plus some time in St. Goar, itself. Also, in addition to the Marksburg, I spent some time exploring Braubach, so I probably spent half a day there. Bottom line, I don't think I would have had time to see Rheinfels and Braubach, and Bacharach, and still get to Cochem in one day. But I like castles.

I would go straight to your lodging in Bacharach or St. Goar. If you haven't picked lodging yet, Burg Stahleck is one of my favorites. It's a castle converted to a hostel. It's very well run but usually full, be sure to get reservations. After dropping your bags, catch the first cruise from either Bacharach to St. Goar or reverse. Catch a local train back to your starting point and get lunch. Rheinfels ruins were a highlight for us in the area. It will take a full day for the cruise and the ruins.

For the Mosel, you can catch an early train or drive to Trier first thing to see the Roman ruins, eat lunch, then head back up to see Burg Eltz. Be sure to hike to the castle. The walk is really nice through trees along a stream. It's only slightly uphill until you reach the castle. By the time you've done both it will be time for dinner. Staying in Cochem is a good choice.

That's two full days, leaving two for either travel or seeing more in the two areas.

We had 2 full days in Cochem (3 nights). One day we took the early train down to Trier and spent about 1/2-2/3 of the day there. We did the Rick Steves walk as outlined in his book to see the main sites. We were a bit rushed doing it in the time we allocated, so 2/3- a full day would be better.

On our partial day, we took the boat from Cochem to Beilstein for lunch and exploring the town. We had planned to go to Burg Eltz on the other full day, but we were pretty tired since we'd been traveling 3 weeks at that point, so we took a relaxing day wandering around Cochem and went to the Weingut Rademacher for wine tasting. Cochem was a great place and we'd love to return and explore the area more.

In Bacharach we stayed 2 nights, so on our full day we took the train to St. Goar and went to Rheinfels then took the boat back to Bacharach. We stayed at Pension Lettie in the middle of town and she was a very nice and gracious host.

I'm sort of in the same boat as you,but i was going to spend three nights in bacharach and take the train to cochem and trier. But basing myself in bacharach. But now im thiking about maybe staying at least 1 night in cochem.

I would base myself either out of St Goar or Bacharach, and then go to each area for a day trip (if you are taking a train).
1. First, from one of the places above, take a day trip to Trier, have lunch and walk around the city and then return to your base city.
2. On another day, go from the base city and take a train to Cochem and see the city, have lunch and then if you have time go to the Castle.
3. On another day, from the base city, go on a Köln-Düsseldorfer ship and go to Braubach, have lunch then go to the Marksburg Castle, then take cruise back to the base city.
4. On the fourth day just relax in your base city and see the sites, have a leisurely lunch and or just relax. We, my brother and I did this in recently.
Hope this helps

I think you'd be better off having 2 base cities, one in Bacharach or St. Goar and the other in Cochem. It is about 1.5 hours by train from Bacharach to Cochem and another 45-60 minutes from Cochem to Trier. So, staying in Bacharach or St. Goar as your base and going back/forth to Cochem or Trier would be a bit of time on the rail. I like Lee's itinerary he posted at the top of the thread. Wish we were going to be there! Sure missed both places!