Just Received Tour Confirmation Email and Have A Question

Since you are going at a festive time I’d probably email the hotel to see how far out they book. You’ll be able to write in English. I would do it during the week as that is possibly more likely to have English speakers answering email.

I always try to book directly with the hotel instead of a 3rd party especially when I’m on a tour. I also ask if it’s possible to stay in the same room although you can always do that at check in.

You can contact them and see if they can help you now or suggest a time when reservations will be open. Also look to see what hotels may be located within a few blocks of the hotel as an alternative. I’ve saved over $100/night before by simply staying across the street pre tour. Whatever type of reservation you make, be sure it can be cancelled with full refund since this is so far out.

The other thing to consider is if you buy trip by trip travel insurance, there is often a 14 day deadline after putting down trip deposit to have coverage for pre-existing conditions. This will be something you will want to act on soon.

I don’t think that most hotels will book more than a year in advance. But you could go to the hotel’s website and try a “dummy” booking to see if they show availability yet for the dates you are interested in.

When I go on an RS tour (12 tours and counting!), I always arrive a day or two early, and sometimes add time at the end. I like to stay at the RS hotel for simplicity’s sake. I generally email them, explaining that I am part of a particular tour, that I want to stay in the same room throughout my stay, and ask for price and availability. In most cases, the reservation can be cancelled or changed until very close to the date of the reservation. So I do this quite a bit in advance since RS hotels are often small and fill up quickly.

Pam and Carol already gave you most of the advice I would. I too often don't choose the RS tour hotel for my pre- and post-tour needs, often because of cost but usually because I want to go elsewhere just before or after my tour. Since you have the property names, you can also look at a booking site like Booking. com to see if the hotel is accepting reservations out that far on that platform. I would book directly with the property if you choose the RS hotel though, as it makes it easier for the hotel to keep track.

Hi, I'm taking that tour in fall 2026. If Adina is your Hamburg hotel, you can save some money by joining their free e-club and/or watching their sales. I was able to book a year out. But, yes, Google map rates first. We decided to go with the tour hotel for the night before the tour after comparing options.

You might also take a look at rates for the equivalent period this year, to see whether the 2027 quote you ultimately receive from the hotel seems reasonable to you.

Good info shared already. As another option, my husband & I always flew in a few days early and stayed at a different city 1-2 hours away by train from our tour beginning city. It’s a way to feel like the trip was expanded. For instance, for my upcoming tour that begins in Prague, I am staying two nights at lovely Cesky Krumlov.

If that interests you, there’s a wealth of information from our German forum participants for ideas.

If it were me, I'd contact the hotels directly by email as soon as being confirmed. The hotels that work with RS will hold some rooms for tour participants who want to extend their stay, but not that many, and first-come first served. They may or may not direct you to their booking site, or just give you an email confirmation. They may also block those rooms to hold them, so a third party booking site may show them as unavailable. So you have to make sure they know you're on an RS tour, and which one. At one hotel we stayed at, they had two RS groups overlapping so only had a few rooms available.

I would go ahead and reach out to the tour hotels, but keep your options open. We tend to prefer other hotels to the tour hotels, although, of course, that varies. It won't hurt to have your name down on the list.

You've gotten lots of great advice, and there's not a likelihood that a hotel would take a reservation 17 months out. But the hotel is the only one who can tell you that. Of our 4 RS tours, I've always contacted the first hotel, and I always ask what type of room I should book that would allow me to stay in the same room once we are officially on the tour. I've gotten response such as "we don't know what type of rooms as they are not in the system" to "yes, we'd love to have you stay, but it's too early to book", to "thank you for your reservation."

Hint: Don't book an upgraded room if you want to stay in the room on the tour. Also, out of 4 RS tours, only one hotel (for our 2026 tour) has offered us a discounted room rate but we've decided to visit another city a couple of hours away instead, and arrive at the tour hotel day of, which we've never done.

What a great response from all of you with a plethora of sound advice and experiences, thank you!. I will do as suggested by contacting the hotels to see what their advance booking policies are like so that I can calendar the relevant timelines appropriately.

The one in Berlin, the Melia, should be relatively straightforward since prices seem pretty decent (just over $110 per night for a 4-star) and I like the location next to the Spree River and Friedrichstrasse Station a block away with many sights within easy walking distance. The RSE tour only touches the surface in Berlin (about 1.5 days) so we are thinking of adding about 4-5 days so that we can see some of the following bucket list items: the Reichstag, the Brandenburg Gate, the STASI Museum, the Wall Museum, German Spy Museum, DDR Museum, Deutschland Museum, Museum Island, the infamous Glienicke Bridge where Cold War prisoner exchanges took place, the iconic Berlin TV Tower built as a showcase by the GDR for breakfast/lunch in what is apparently the highest revolving restaurant in the EU, Topography of Terror Documentation Centre (housed on the former site of the Gestapo HQ at Prince Albrecht Strasse 8), Berlin Cathedral, Potsdam/Sanssouci Palace, Wannsee Conference House etc.

The hotel in Hamburg, the Adina, presents a different challenge where it is in a good central location, perhaps 5 miles from the airport and looks really nice. The wrinkle is that after staying at the Adina for an initial night (or other hotel as suggested by some) we then want to break away and take the DB train west to Bremen/Delmenhorst to stay for 4-5 nights to reconnect with some long lost relatives who I recently found through Ancestry.com. We would then pop back via DB train to the Adina for the start of our tour. I'll need to do some research on how to use the DB train system which will be a first for us but hopefully we can muddle through at the train station with English and some German thrown in. I have downloaded a DB app on my phone which looks like it will be helpful but I need to become familiar with it. Thanks again to all of you for sharing your experiences and thoughtful suggestions, it will help get us started in the right direction. David : )

Your plans to go early and stay late are wise, especially Berlin which definitely needs a few more days. Don't stress about the DB trains, once you get your plans sorted, come back and post specific questions about that. There are definitely experts in this forum on that topic. Have fun planning!

"Your plans to go early and stay late are wise, especially Berlin which definitely needs a few more days. Don't stress about the DB trains, once you get your plans sorted, come back and post specific questions about that. There are definitely experts in this forum on that topic. Have fun planning!"

Thank you CL. Yeah Berlin is a somewhat of a hidden gem, when you start researching it there ends up being quite a lot of territory to cover, worthy of several visits. I have an interesting side story. I have been to Berlin once before in 1979 when I was on a Globus tour with my parents. We stayed in a hotel in West Berlin in the Potsdamer Platz area about 100 yards from the Wall (we heard gun shots at night!). Back then it was a bit of a drab depressed area. From what I can see now, it has changed dramatically with the Wall removed and has become quite a lively area. The hotel that we will be staying in for this trip, the Melia, is located in what was East Berlin about 1/2 mile away. They used to be part of two different worlds and now, since the events of 1989, it has completely changed. I'm really looking forward to seeing everything there. During that 1979 tour we crossed over into East Berlin at Checkpoint Charlie and at all times we were escorted by a GDR government minder as we visited sights in that part of the city. Now there is free movement which I have to say is going to be weird at first but I will get used to it quickly! I'm particularly fascinated by the prospect of visiting the former Ministry for State Security, home of the dreaded STASI, which is now a museum.

I will definitely take you up on your suggestion to return here with my DB questions so that the resident experts here can help shed light on how things work and which stations are good candidates for use. I'm a bit of a future planner with an eye for details so this part should be fun. David

I'll need to do some research on how to use the DB train system which will be a first for us but hopefully we can muddle through at the train station with English and some German thrown in. I have downloaded a DB app on my phone which looks like it will be helpful but I need to become familiar with it.

Deutsche Bahn is very easy to use once you get the hang of it, and it doesn't take that long to figure it out, believe me. That's good that you've downloaded the app because it is handy to have. You want to make sure your trip shows up there because if you get notification of a track change or a delay in the train, they will do a push notification to the app and you will need to have that.

And yes, once you have your full itinerary outside of the tour, come back here. We can show you not only how to look for tickets but also tips on buying them and which are the best tickets to buy for the price. There are regional tickets you can buy, or there is the D-ticket, which is a monthly ticket, and other options. A lot depends on how much you'll be using the trains and what is the most cost-effective.

This is a good link to use because it will automatically take you to the English page. https://int.bahn.de/en/

“We stayed in a hotel in West Berlin in the Potsdamer Platz area about 100 yards from the Wall (we heard gun shots at night!)”

David! That is so cool (well, not the gunshots!). A revisit will be so very interesting. IF you have old photos of Berlin from your trip you might consider taking photos of the photos to compare while you are there! Your guide might also be interested in seeing them too.

I know it’s a long way off but I hope you consider doing a Trip Report. I’d love to know if anything is recognizable for you!

And I agree with CL…definitely do extra days in Berlin.

Hamburg is also a hidden gem of a city, so don't sell it short! Bremen is fabulous--one of my favourite places--but it is fairly small, and obviously Delmenhorst, while cute (yes, I've been), is even smaller. 4-5 days is a long time there, depending on what your relatives want to do with you; I could easily see them suggesting a day in Hamburg!

You've gotten good advice so far, and my thought is always: It doesn't hurt to ask!

Also, the DB is pretty easy to navigate. You'll be fine.

"And yes, once you have your full itinerary outside of the tour, come back here. We can show you not only how to look for tickets but also tips on buying them and which are the best tickets to buy for the price. There are regional tickets you can buy, or there is the D-ticket, which is a monthly ticket, and other options. A lot depends on how much you'll be using the trains and what is the most cost-effective."

Thanks a bunch Mardee. Interesting that you mentioned regional tickets because I will be precisely facing that issue as part of our travels in the north. Although DB runs from Hamburg to both Bremen and Delmenhorst, it doesn't go to the port cities of Wilhelmshaven and Bremerhaven which are served by a regional line. Wilhelmshaven has the German Marine Museum which features German naval ships from 1848 to the present, including warships and a submarine. Bremerhaven has U-Boat Wilhelm Bauer which is the only known type 21 submarine that remains intact from WWII. This was the most technologically advanced submarine by any navy during the war and formed the basis of post-war designs by the US, UK and others. I'm a bit of a WWII history buff and these places are off the beaten path for most Americans so it will be a bit of an adventure perhaps but I'm sure it will be worth it. : )

"David! That is so cool (well, not the gunshots!). A revisit will be so very interesting. IF you have old photos of Berlin from your trip you might consider taking photos of the photos to compare while you are there! Your guide might also be interested in seeing them too.

I know it’s a long way off but I hope you consider doing a Trip Report. I’d love to know if anything is recognizable for you!"

Hi Pam, yeah the night time gunshots experience was a bit disturbing but was illustrative of the way the Wall was set up at that time. Not only were there guard towers every 200 meters or so staffed with armed border guards but also had the infamous "death strip" which featured land mines, automatic firing devices linked to ground sensors and a strip of sand/light soil that was regularly raked so that any recent footprint disturbances would be revealed. At night, the death strip was brightly illuminated with cold whitish-blue spotlights lending a starkly grim appearance to the area. In short, the advancement of Wall technology was state of the art going from the late 1970s into the 1980s with deadly consequences for those encountering it while trying to leave.

I do have some old photos of that Berlin trip packed away in stuff that was kept at my parents home so I'll have to hunt for them but it would be interesting to have them on hand for this new trip as you suggest. Part of our trip took us over on a day-trip into East Berlin with a official government tour guide boarding our bus to narrate the sights we saw there, such as the Soviet Red Army war dead cemetery. There was one interesting sequence of photos that I had taken from one of the high wooden viewing platforms near our hotel on the Potsdamer Platz that overlooked the Wall so that you could see into East Berlin and the death strip. I used a Minolta SLR with a 6 " telephoto lens to photograph the closest guard tower which was located about 100m away. I attracted attention early on when one of the border guards began to focus on me with his binoculars who was then followed a few minutes later by a second border guard using his binoculars as well. So I had these two guys standing next to each other in the tower looking at me with their binoculars at the same time. I was able to capture an incredible sequence of frames of the guard tower with at first no guard, then one and then the second guard showing up with binoculars. All of this because I was an 18-year old armed with my sinister-looking 6" telephoto lens. : )

I definitely would consider doing a Trip Report to compare the two Berlin trip experiences separated by the 48 years. I think its going to be an amazing experience. I'll be particularly tickled to walk in through the front door of the former State Ministry of Security (STASI) HQ building and enter the museum-preserved office of Erich Mielke, the Minister of State Security, exactly as it was when he departed in November 1989. This is something I would never have been able to do in 1979.

Oh my! What an experience with the photos and the guard towers. They may have only been 18 or 20 as well.

My parents went thru Checkpoint Charlie in the mid-70s and recounted the creepiness of it.

Yes, do pull out that box of photos!

Regarding travel to Bremerhaven and Wilhelmshaven, a note from a local: the regional trains from Bremen and/or Hamburg might not be operated by DB (Metronom between Bremen and Hamburg, though that route does have regular express DB trains too; and NordWestBahn between Bremen and both Bremerhaven and Wilhelmshaven [different routes]), but they're fully integrated into the timetable, have standard RE/RS numbering, and are listed in the DB app. Regular tickets are all valid too (e.g. Deutschland-Ticket or Niedersachsen-Ticket) - the latter is good for groups and despite the name valid in Bremen and Hamburg too.

So the travel is straightforward, though admittedly the line to Wilhelmshaven gets more than the average share of rail replacement buses and cancellations. There's also a regular bus from Oldenburg (near Delmenhorst) to Bremerhaven, which is handy to avoid crowds on days when Werder Bremen has a clashing home game or to get directly to the two big museums (Climate /Emigration).

That would be my travel tip for the region actually - if travelling in football season, check the schedule. Some of the most miserable German train experiences of my life are football-related. The impact will depend on which teams are in which division, but this year with two Hamburg teams + Bremen in the top flight, there are some very busy trains. (I would be mildly surprised if all three survive the season, but if Hannover wins promotion that's another set of nearby travelling fans.)

"Hamburg is also a hidden gem of a city, so don't sell it short! Bremen is fabulous--one of my favourite places--but it is fairly small, and obviously Delmenhorst, while cute (yes, I've been), is even smaller. 4-5 days is a long time there, depending on what your relatives want to do with you; I could easily see them suggesting a day in Hamburg!
You've gotten good advice so far, and my thought is always: It doesn't hurt to ask!
Also, the DB is pretty easy to navigate. You'll be fine."

Hi HowlinMad, I figured that Hamburg likely has a ton of things to see and do given its historic background as a Hanseatic League city, being the 2nd largest city and largest port in Germany. I'm just not as familiar with it but I suspect the RSE guidebook that I will be receiving will have some helpful treatment and details on Hamburg so I will have some homework to do.

My initial focus on Bremen/ Delmenhorst is because of the family history ties to the area. My grandmother and her extended family grew up there. She would share some great stories about living there, including about kindnesses shown by individual soldiers towards the then-starving civilian population (due to the lingering effects of the wartime Royal Navy blockade of German ports) during the British occupation that started in 1919 after WWI and the unstable living conditions in the Weimar Republic. My grandmother was the last of her sisters to immigrate to the U.S., departing in 1927, before Hitler and the NS government came to power in 1933 and the start of WWII in 1939.

Of the siblings that remained in Germany (two brothers and a sister), the sister died during a mid-day Allied bombing raid of Bremen in November 1943 while at home having lunch with her husband. Their 18-year old daughter (mother to my 2nd cousin that I have recently connected with) was spared because she was away working at a factory at the time. So there's a lot of family history attached to the area. It is with a personal attachment that I will be spending time walking the streets and seeing the places where my grandmother and her family grew up, a surreal experience with echoes of ghosts from the past. It is just something that I need to do and my grandmother would be very pleased that I made such a journey.

" Regarding travel to Bremerhaven and Wilhelmshaven, a note from a local: the regional trains from Bremen and/or Hamburg might not be operated by DB (Metronom between Bremen and Hamburg, though that route does have regular express DB trains too; and NordWestBahn between Bremen and both Bremerhaven and Wilhelmshaven [different routes]), but they're fully integrated into the timetable, have standard RE/RS numbering, and are listed in the DB app. Regular tickets are all valid too (e.g. Deutschland-Ticket or Niedersachsen-Ticket) - the latter is good for groups and despite the name valid in Bremen and Hamburg too.
So the travel is straightforward, though admittedly the line to Wilhelmshaven gets more than the average share of rail replacement buses and cancellations. There's also a regular bus from Oldenburg (near Delmenhorst) to Bremerhaven, which is handy to avoid crowds on days when Werder Bremen has a clashing home game or to get directly to the two big museums (Climate /Emigration).
That would be my travel tip for the region actually - if travelling in football season, check the schedule. Some of the most miserable German train experiences of my life are football-related. The impact will depend on which teams are in which division, but this year with two Hamburg teams + Bremen in the top flight, there are some very busy trains. (I would be mildly surprised if all three survive the season, but if Hannover wins promotion that's another set of nearby travelling fans.) "

Thank you Snoozy for your local insights as to train travel in the North. I would never have thought about the impact of footballers on train usage but it makes sense. Looks like Werder Bremen and Hamburg have both made it to Bundesliga 1 for the 2026-2027 season and St. Pauli faces a playoff since it finished 3rd from the bottom, Hannover missed out on promotion to 1 by coming in 4th in Bundesliga 2. I'll have to keep any eye out for the final standings at the end of 2026-27 season since our trip will be in September/October of 2027 which will make it part of the 2027-28 season then but at least I know what to be on alert for now.

I've done some exploring on the DB app and I'm seeing the RE/RS numbering you mentioned as well as IC and ICE references. I also see pricing listed for trips so it seems that you can buy electronic tickets through the app if that is a good option unless there's some type of pass that makes better sense. However, since our RSE trip is 18 months away it will be a good idea for me to return to this forum at a later time in order to gather the most current information from the experts here.