Are you getting a great fare or convenient flight into Dusseldorf? I am the first person to tell people they should take the trip they want, but Cologne (except for the Dom), Bonn , and Dusseldorf are not high on most travelers lists as prime places to visit in Germany. There are, of course, many other options available even if you are locked into Dusseldorf as your airport, especially if you want to drive at least part of the trip.

If, however, those are your chosen places, then moving on to Belgium is a much shorter trip than going on to Prague and Berlin. It is about 4:30, by train from Berlin to Prague, and about 5 hours to drive to Berlin from Dusseldorf (if you stay on the major highways). Antwerp is about 2 hours driving from Dusseldorf.

Given that you have two weeks, the relative distances should not be a limiting factor. Where you go really depends on what you want to see. Each option gives you a second country - you could add in some of the Netherlands with the 1st option, but Berlin is unique and has the 20th century history that might be of interest.

What do the boys want to do, and see? If you are flexible it might make the trip more enjoyable if they felt like they were involved in the selection of routes and plans.

Hi,


I just had a new idea, based on your response. What about 9 days in Berlin and 5 days in Prague?

I have heard the surrounding area in both cities are very nice as well.


Andrea

You mention only cities (Düsseldorf and Köln), so why drive? Which ever way, the train sounds like a better option. I would consider landing in Amsterdam, visiting that city and perhaps others by train in the Netherlands and end the trip in Germany, or vice versa.

Hi....

We are now considering flying into Berlin and spending time there and the surrounding areas and then spend 4 days in Prague (via train). Our total vacation will be about 14 days. We have heard that Berlin is a wonderful city and that the surrounding area is beautiful.

Do you think this would be a more interesting?

Thanks

Andrea

Call me crazy, but when you said " Germany" and teens I just assumed you would want to see the Alps and castle coutry of Bavaria. I would skip the big cities for Garmisch, Salzburg, the Salzkammergut and Rothenburg.

Good plan. Go back to 5 days in Prague as there are very nice day trips. With nine days in Berlin, consider renting an apartment. To start vrbo.com/vacation-rentals/europe/germany/berlin

www.inyourpocket.com/germany/berlin and www.inyourpocket.com/czech_republic/prague

Good plan. Go back to 5 days in Prague as there are very nice day trips. With nine days in Berlin, consider renting an apartment. To start vrbo.com/vacation-rentals/europe/germany/berlin

www.inyourpocket.com/germany/berlin and www.inyourpocket.com/czech_republic/prague

I echo Arramis - Cologne and Dusseldorf and to a lesser extent Bonn are some of the most ho-hum cities in Germany in many ways - not the Europe of your dreams as you will find in cities like Wurzburg, Heidelberg, Rothenburg - Berlin is also a modern town rebuilt from war rubble like Cologne and Dusseldorf (which are not really ugly places - but just very modern - both are very pleasant cities) but Berlin has so so much of interest, from Third Reich relics to remains of the Berlin Wall to the newly rebuilt Reichstag and all the stunning modern architecture befitting a major world capital - plus Potsdam's Sans Soucci palace and park to me are tops in that genre in Europe.

Luterlstadt-Wittemberg south of Berlin is also a neat old city and Dresden, though also severaly damaged in WW2 has nicely rebuilt its ancient riverfront that once made it be called Florence on the Elbe.

Saxon Switereland south of Dresden along the Elbe is IMO one of the prettiest river valleys in Europe - right on road and rail routes to Prague, certainly one of Europe's dreamiest and most interesting cities. Fly home from Prague or head to Vienna or Munich from there.

Berlin and Prague is a great combo. If you want castles (and a convenient stop in between) you could consider Dresden as a stopover.
Not sure why Bob thinks that two teen boys, and one of them already 16, equals Bavaria and quaint towns. In my teens, such an itinerary would have caused major disruption of the peace in the family lol

What Cowboy said.

Hi,

Your replies are really appreciated.

We have travelled with our two kids to Europe four of the last five summers for our summer vacations and we have stayed in large and small cities as well as gorgeous countrysides and coastal areas in many countries and our kids have loved it all. It's all about diversifying every vacation.

We were in Germany two summers ago (we drove into Germany from Lake Come and then to Trieste (including parts of Slovenia) and, finally, Venice, and we fell in love with Munich and noted that we would be back to see more of Germany.

We were supposed to have driven to Prague instead of Munich on that trip but found out a day before our drive from Lake Como to Prague late that we were not allowed to cross into the Czech Republic with our rental car, so we quickly changed plans and visited Munich and the surrounding area instead.

We have heard from other family members that Berlin is so interesting and exciting and we were able to get a fairly low fare for this coming summer. And now, we will be able to finally see Prague.....

Dresden and Saxon were on our list as well as places to visit. However, is seven days enough in Berlin?

Thanks again so much.


Andrea


Your suggestions to see Dresden and Saxon are great ideas and

7 days is a good amount of time to explore the city and surroundings also a bit beyond the beaten tourist paths.
You should find a huge number of apartments to rent for a week.

However, is seven days enough in Berlin?>

More than enough for the average person IMO. I am an aficionado of Berlin and have spend several weeks there on and off during the past decade - it is an amazingly interesting city yet seven days is a long time - I'd rather spend some of those days elsewhere - like in Dresden - using it a as a base for Saxon Switzerland - can take boats there in season along the Elbe.

But if you want to do some day trips from Berlin then 7 days may be fine - I have day-tripped to both Schwerin and Luterstadt-Wittemberg from Berlin - two really really nice cities - Schwerin has a castle of your dreams on a lake. I also day tripped to Poland one - just about an hour from Berlin just to get a taste of Poland and yes it is so so different than wealthier spiffier Germany.

For Berlin, from an a trip report:
For my tours of Berlin I again used Peter Fritzsche and Karen Hewitt's Berlinwalks, 1994. I did one new walk, which was the one of the Historic City Centre, and an old one entitled 'Experiments in Diversity', which is a tour of the Kreuzberg district. It is perhaps the best walking tour book I have ever read. It excels in combining the present with the history of a neighborhood, so that its current liveliness is a constant. It is still quite accurate 13 years after publication, although the Potsdamer Platz development did not exist when the book was written. There are a few errors here and there. The book describes the Markthalle as having 'several places for a stand-up lunch, plus a wide assortment of produce, cheeses, prepared foods, Turkish specialties, fish, meats, and wursts.' I saw no evidence of that, and it seems to contain mainly discount places. But what the book does not mention is that it has a very good restaurant in the same building but accessed from the street. So if doing the tour of Kreuzberg in the morning, this place would be perfect as a lunch stop.

We lived in Berlin for several years with our kids and loved it. You'll find plenty to see and do in Berlin and the environs to keep you busy for 7 days.

One suggestion for a fun family day trip is canoeing/kayaking in the Spreewald. Take the train to Luebbenau and arrange for a boat rental with Bootsverleih Richter. We enjoyed doing this as a family when we lived in Berlin and our young adult children did it when they went back there last year on their own.

http://www.bootsverleih-richter.de/

At Lubbenau I also took a punting boat - flat boat propelled by a husky German bloke with a punt, a la Cambridge - these are extremely popular with Germans, who imbibe prodigious amounts of booze en route - the boat even stops at canal-side pubs - a great thing to do and something very popular with locals.

With four of you, perhaps this free tour would work.

The guide we used in Munich was very good and they earn their keep with tips.

For a three hour tour, I think we gave him 15euro.

www.newberlintours.com

Hi...

You guys are great !

I woke up with another idea.....Should we replace Prague with Vienna as the flights from Berlin to Vienna are quite inexpensive.

Or would it be possible to do Berlin, Prague and Vienna, with a stop in Dresden and Saxon in the 15 full days we have?

Thanks

Andrea

Andrea; We all have our own thoughts and opinions on that question on replacing Prague with Vienna. Both cities are entirely different. You decide.

But Berlin, Prague and then Vienna are entirely possible.

Thinking about Dresden and Sazon too, is now streaching your 15 days. dayshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/prague http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/vienna

Berlin 4 days, Berlin to Dresden 1 day, Dresden 1 day (2 nights), Dresden to Prague 1 day, Prague 3 days, Prague to Vienna 1 day, Vienna 4 days. Fly home from Vienna.

Obviously, the train rides to not take the entire day and give the opportunity to visit the destination point in what remains of the day. Dresden can be seen in one afternoon and a long morning the next day, at least for its major sights (the Green Vault, the Zwinger complex).

Ok...we have decided to leave Vienna for another trip. Our preliminary itinerary is as follows:

Arrive Berlin...........drive to Dresden for 3 nights
Saxon....................2 nights
Drive to Prague......4 nights
Drive to Berlin........6 nights

The only thing we are unsure of at this point is if we are dividing the nights between Dresden and Saxon properly.

What do you think?

Andrea

I am not sure where you mean when you say "Saxon" - Bad Schandau? Just for clarity, the general region is called "Sachsische Schweiz, which translates to Saxon Switzerland. The German federal state it is located in is called Saxony.

Bad Schandau is less than 1 hour from Dresden, so spending three in Dresden after arriving late from Berlin makes sense. You can arrive in the Saxon Switzerland area as early or late as you like on the day you leave Dresden so you have maximum flexibility.

Have you compared the cost of taking the train from Berlin to Dresden and both picking up and dropping off your car there? You won't really need the car those 3 days in Dresden so if the cost of the rental and parking for those 3 days is less than the cost of rail fare from Berlin, it might make sense to train to Dresden. It is likely that you can rent the car in Dresden and return it in Berlin for a nominal, if any, charge.

Keep in mind that you will have to pay for parking. A car in Dresden proper and Prague is useless. If cost is an issue, you need to compare the cost of train tickets with the total cost of the car (rental + fuel + parking). viamichelin will include fuel cost and tolls with its itinerary (www.viamichelin.com ).

Arrive Berlin...........drive to Dresden for 3 nights
Saxon....................2 nights
Drive to Prague......4 nights
Drive to Berlin........6 nights

Seems like a nice relaxed pace to me - Aramis makes a great point about taking the train to Dresden and saving a few days car rental and parking fees - return car when getting back to Berlin too as the public transport system there is so so great - hard to tour cities by car as Americans can often do at home.

But seems like a good plan overall.

Thanks so much for all of your responses. So appreciated.

After discussing it with my family, I think that as soon as we land in Berlin, we will rent a car and drive from Berlin to Prague (about 3 hour drive), spend 4 nights, then drive to back towards Berlin, stopping in Dresden/Saxony (about 2 hour drive) for 5 nights and then drive to Berlin (about 2 hour drive) for 6 nights.

This way there is some relaxation and nature between the two larger cities. As well, we will have a car to explore the Saxony area and save quite a bit on train tickets for the four of us between the three areas. We will not need the car in Berlin, so we can drop it off as soon as we arrive from Dresden. The car rental fees are not as expensive as we thought they would be so it seems more cost effective and we will have a little more freedom.

Do you think this is better?

Andrea

You could easily slice thru a bit of Poland en route to Prague.

You could easily slice thru a bit of Poland en route to Prague.

The point being?

Hi.....

As we would be getting off a cross atlantic flight to arrive in Berlin, we do not think it would be wise to stretch the drive time out more than the 3.5 hour drive to Prague.

Andrea

3 or 3.5 hrs drive time from Berlin (Tegel airport, I suppose) to Prague is a massively theoretical estimate.
While it is very easy to find your way, you will have a leg in Northern Czech where the motorway is not built yet plus the hassle to get into Prague. And if you arrive in the morning hours from the States, you will probably still hit the morning rush hour on the Berlin freeways. If you start after 10, it should be less of an issue.
A more realistic " door to door" estimate to get from Tegel airport to a hotel in the historic city center of Prague would be more in the vicinity of 5 hours (incl. a short stop en route of 30 min to grab a coffee).

While the car certainly is a good tool to explore anything outside Dresden in Saxony, you may want to discuss with your folks if driving the longest leg upon arrival in Berlin is really what you want.
A compromise could be to drive from Berlin airport to Dresden and start your trip with Dresden/Saxony first, then move on to Prague. And do the longest drive at the end to go direct to Berlin again.

If you need ideas for day trips from Dresden, google Görlitz. That town has not been hit by the war, neglected during the GDR decades, but is now restored to picture perfect beauty.

You could easily slice thru a bit of Poland en route to Prague.

The point being?>

Uh how about experiencing another country and culture? In case you have not been to Poland it is far different than either Germany or Czech Republic - a Slavish country not Germanic.

Uh how about experiencing another country and culture?

Yes and no. That area of Poland was German for 450 years. Although there was a transfer of population from eastern Poland to this area, from what I saw in Wroclaw there is little other culture evident for the tourist. But more to the point, does the OP have the time? A two day (?) drive-by of western Poland seems pointless.

Whether they have time or not is a question of course but to say that Poland is no different than Germany is IME just silly - I day tripped from Berlin recently to the nearest Polish town and it was a world of difference from Germany - and by all means not positively better but grimy and old eastern Europeanish.

And it need not be a major detour as Prague it about due south of where Poland and Germany meet - just to slice thru a tad bit of Poland and not go back the exact same way they came.

Yes that area was often German dominated and Poles once were a minority in places like Wroclaw but my understanding that once it became part of Poland many of those Germans, like in the Seudentenland of today's Czech Republic moved to Germany - I think this may have actually been a provision of the Potsdam Conference - I wonder how many Germans today live in this part of Poland? Maybe more than I think. Many I read also moved to Germany fearing reprisals after the war from Poles who justly felt an animus to all things German after the horrors inflicted by the Huns of them.

Perhaps I am wrong and that this part of Poland is just the same as Germany.

I enjoyed Wroclaw. Perhaps just under four hours from Berlin.

Then Prague just another four hours from Wroclaw.

They do have two teens and perhaps they are staying in two German cities longer than teens want to be stationed.

Anyways, we have done these types of trips. It's doable.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wroclaw

I also enjoyed Wroclaw (see my trip report) but I would consider Dresden above Wroclaw, it has more interesting museums (the Green Room, the Armory, the Folk Museum). Wroclaw was reconstructed as it was before the war, i.e. under German rule, and from what I saw of Poland, only one town qualified as absolutely ugly and shabby--but I did not see any industrial part of Poland.

'Only one town qualified as absolutely ugly and shabby'.

Not sure which town you are talking about, but that can be said about any town or city that the Rusians sequested and developed that is outside 'The Old Town.'

It certainly was not 'The Old Town' of Wroclaw.

Could be Budapest, Prague, Tallin, Riga, Vilinus, Warsaw or many others.

I was talking of the towns we saw in Poland, and by that I meant that most of them were up to par to the western tourist standard: Krakow, Zakopane, Sandomierz, Wroclaw, Zamosc, Sanok and others, with one striking exception.

Having traveled in that part of the world years ago before the disintegration of the Soviet Empire, I have strong memories of eastern European shabby; and Poland has gone beyond that where it wants to attract tourists.

As for Nowa Huta, the grounds are not well kept, which might also reflect the interior of the apartments. But in its design and basic structure, it is not that different from housing developed in West Berlin in the 50s, particularly in the Britz area, or that different from the cités that were built in the ceinture rouge around Paris in the 30s--specifically le Plessis-Robinson (the buildings have since been replaced) and Chatenay-Malabry.

Given the time that you have, I'd also suggest skipping Poland this trip.

I also don't see the point of driving what with the fantastic German train system. If you must have a car, then rent a car in the Czech Republic and drive around Prague out to the Czech countryside where there are plenty of castles to satisfy any teenagers. Return the car in Prague and train back to Germany.

Hi everyone....

Thanks for your replies. They are so helpful and informative for our family and for everyone else, I am sure.


OK.....We have now thought about this idea:


Spending 7 days in Berlin then taking a 7 day trip from Berlin to either Croatia or Sardinia, as we would love to mix in a warmer, "Mediterranean" type beach vacation into our summer plans that also have interesting sites to visit.

We are not sure which to choose. We have always wanted to see Dubrovnik and have heard that there are some very nice beaches in Croatia, not far from Dubrovnik, either on the mainland or on some of the islands that are not to far by boat from Dubrovnik. However, we have also wanted to see Sardinia, with its gorgeous beaches, great natural beauty and interesting old villages. Please help us choose....

As well, any recommendations on 4 or 5 star beach resorts and hotels in both locations would be appreciated.

Thanks again so much.

Andrea

there are some very nice beaches in Croatia, not far from Dubrovnik,

My recollection of the Dalmatian coast is that the first sandy beach we encountered going from Kotor to Postojna was north of Split, some distance from Dubrovnik. Otherwise we looked for a spot where we could jump into water deep enough to avoid stepping on sharp rocks.

Michael is correct in that most of Croatia's beaches are rocky. Here's a possible list of sandy beaches to start from, if you want to go to Croatia.

http://www.croatia-expert.com/sandy-beaches-in-croatia/

Are you or your boys "Game of Thrones" aficionados? Part of season 3 is set in Dubrovnik. They might enjoy Dubrovnik for that and other reasons.

Also look into going to one or more of the islands.