tostaky

Hi !
We are planing a road trip in central Europe next summer (30-40 night between july 1 and august 20) . We are 2 adults and 2 teens and we are from Montréal.
It would be our sith trip in Europe with kids. We have seen : France, Spain, Italy, Germany, Portugal, Slovenia and Croatia. We also have seen Belgium, Netherlands, Poland and Czech Republic in 2004 and 2006 before having kids.

The plan for now (flight arrival can change) Is
- Arrival in Venice (for now it the cheapest we can find from Montreal). We already seen Venice twice so dont feel the need to go back again. And rent a car. From there we would do:
- maybe one -two night stop in the DOlomites which we already seen
- Austria (Mountains, Hallstta, Vienna...we already seen Slazbourg) for around one week.
- Krakow (that we already seen in 2006, but want to go back with the teens) for 3-4 nights
- Southern Poland for mountains (or northern Slovakia) 3-4 nights
- Slovakia (Maybe we would do Bratislava from Vienna) 5-6 nights
- Budapest and Hungary for 6-7 nights
- Travel back to Venice .

Of course we woul need to make our plan more precise and plan daily stop, but what do you think about that plan ?

Michael

Munich would seem to be a better arrival choice given what you want to see.

Take a look at my Poland trip reports which covers Krakow, a car trip through SE Poland, and Krakow.

Trip Report: Car tour of SE Poland, May 2012

Trip Report: Wroclaw, May 2012

Trip Report: Krakow, May 2012

chosebinne

Of course Munich would be better, but it’s 500$ more per ticket

Michael

Keep your options open and search for tickets in January/February for summer 2025. Re-reading your itinerary, Vienna might be a better hub.

Traveler_Nick

You're going all the way to Poland for mountains? The ones in Italy,Switzerland, Austria,Slovenia etc aren't enough?

You haven't really given any idea about interests. Right now you're just driving around looking at mountains. Is that your goal?

kja

I wonder how much basic research you've done this time, tostaky. I know that very generous Fodorites have spent a LOT of time over the years giving you input -- only to find that you didn't realize how expensive a destination would be, or how long the flights, or how otherwise unsuited to your needs. I sincerely hope that you have actually checked into some of those things this time!

tostaky

true that last year my mind changed a couple of time and I’m sorry for that. We have around 15 000 euros for this summer so I guess It will be fine.

tostaky

We would like to make flight reservation as early as possible, that way we would be able to get more options for our airbnb.

tostaky

No, we are going in Poland for Krakow (and Auschwitz and Wieliczka salt mine), but since we love mountains and that we also want to go in Slovakia we would like to take some time in the Tatras.
our goal is always the same in our european trips. Try to make a mix of vibrant cities, quaint villages and naural wonders. We are history fan (well I am !) , foodies and craft beer lovers. Our teens are not into beaches, but they sometimes like to take a small swim, so access to a lake here and there is soemthing we also looking for.

Travel_Nerd

The good thing is, you have time to plan and work out logistics. I would suggest tracking flights on Google flights either an open jaw or roundtrip from cities that are CLOSER to where you want to go and be. Tracking flights will show you fluctuations in price and since you are not going until next summer, you will see that they change often, routes may even change too. Venice may be cheaper "now," but may not be later when you actually book the tickets.

Flying roundtrip into Venice does nothing to help you here. It is farther away from where you are planning, which means you need to spend time and money getting to where you want to go - even though you are planning this to be a road trip, you still should NOT drive upon landing as you will be crossing multiple time zones and should wait at least 24 hours upon landing to begin the road portion. This will mean either lodging in the Venice area or a train trip to your actual planned starting point - those "savings" you just got, just went out the window.

shelemm

I have been to Krakow and Malapolska, including Zakopane and Mala Fatra National Park on the Slovakian side. It's a different culture with different mountains, and it seems a bit bizarre to me to say that traveling there is inferior to Switzerland, etc. The time I spent there is very precious to me.

I also find some of the other places you mention wildly expensive. A family of four would spend a ton more money in those places.

For the OP, I took in a lot of sites with traditional crafts including the unique wooden architecture, the smokehouses producing oszypek and mountain huts and teahouses serving fresh kielbasa and kompot. I like the food better than in Switzerland.

Michael

Zakopane, an easy drive from Krakow is at the base of the Tatra Mountains.