DavidNJ

So, if you did this tour:

1.) What were you glad you saw?

2.) What did you miss that you wanted to see?

3.) What did you see that really wasn't worth seeing?

4.) Where did you encounter driving, traffic, road, or parking issues on the tour?

5.) Did you see hotels on the route that weren't on the tour but nevertheless looked good?

Thanks,

David

Mercedesfan

Check the European Delivery Thread. If its your first time I'd stick to the schedule in the brochure and go for some of the suggested side trips. The suggested side trip between Austria and Munich is well worth it. The city famous for the Passion Play has shops that sell Bavarian Christmas ornaments year round and one of King Ludwig's castles is within a few miles of the town as well. Although we didn't try it, others have suggested that if you get an early morning departure from the Schloss Hotel in Baden Baden you can squeeze in a short visit to France as the border is close by. I forget the name of the city but it is like an hour away from the border at most. OH - when you travel the Clock Road make sure you get to the falls (Trier?) while it is still light. It makes for a nice hike and there is convenient parking right off the road. If you have at least an hour you can walk up to the bridges that cross the falls and read the interesting markers along the way that describe all the famous people who used to walk that route including Hemingway when he was a war correspondent on holiday.

Here is a link to the European Delivery Thread:

https://mbworld.org/forums/showthrea...opean+delivery

These additional websites describe European Delivery Experiences with some reference to the rally route though they are from a number of years ago so not quite current (one describes the visit to France alluded to above.):

daddyo.home.texas.net/EDSummary.html

curtrich.com/europeandelivery.html

DavidNJ

Mr. Mercedesfan (I'm probably a conflicted BMW fan, the E60 is little like finding your wife cheating on you):

On your trip you visited Schloss Neuschwanstein. That isn't on the MB tour.

A lot of people are telling me that the Black Forest is ok, however nothing special. That the real sights are more on the Romantischestrasse from Wurzberg to Fussen (next to Schloss Neuschwanstein). Others have pointed out stuff near Innsbruck (almost on the tour, depending on route), Bergtesgarden, Halstatt, and Melk.

So is spending 2.5 days driving through the Black Forest the best way to see Germany? Is a 250 mile drive (NJ to Vermont) from the middle of the southern Black Forest to Innsbruck fun?

David

Mercedesfan

The fairy tale castle isn't that far from Munich (about 3 hours max) so you could stay an extra day in Munich and get the best of the Romantic Road as well.

DavidNJ

Our current plan (subject to change) is:

Stuttgart (1 night)
Ludwigsburg
Wurzberg (1 night)
Altenburg (where there is a town with the whose name is the same as my surname) (1 night)
Wurzberg
Romantic Route(2 nights)
Fussen (1 night)
Innsbruck
Salzburg (2 nights)
Munich (3 nights)
Vienna (4 nights)

Now that is one day too long for a Saturday departure and 2 days short of a Wednesday departure (Monday or Friday car pickup). Note that we lost the Black Forest and the Bodensee.

northbenz

Nice itinerary. It is close to what Mercedes used to recommend back before they had the Black Forest Rally package. Caution, be careful that it doesn't turn into a castle tour. Two or three castles are nice but there is a lot more to Europe than rushing between sites to see more castles and art museums. Stop to smell the flowers along the way.

DavidNJ

Question 1: My did MB change the trip route?

Question 2: The guidebooks are castle/cathedral/museum centric. How do you 'smell the flowers'?

David

northbenz

The Black Forest Tour actually features the hotels as Mercedes went out of their way to select top hotels at strategic points. The hotels are as much an attraction as the sites.

DavidNJ

However the Mercedes selected hotels are these big, big hotels. I would have thought something like the Schwarzwald, Bodensee, and Alps I thought would be best seen from smaller hotels and B&Bs.

Also, there day 3 is a 6-hour drive, which must be tiring. Day one and two are a more reasonable pace. Day 4 is a run from locations near Innsbruck to Munich, with few interesting sights specified. The drive is short enough to have stopped in Berchtesgarden and Salzberg on the way to Munich.

DavidNJ

Is the Bodensee (Lindau or Bregenz) worth driving out of your way to see?

We could go from Fussen to Salzburg via Innsbruck and Berchtesgarden in one day.

Or we could go from Fussen to Innsbruck via Lindau in one day, and Innsbruck to Salzburg via Berchtesgarden (and maybe a smaller village like Kitzvbuhel on the next day. The extra time would keep us off the Autobahnen. Is that good or bad?

northbenz

I'll have to defer to others on the sites you mention. On our first European Delivery tour back in 1977 we followed a route somewhat like you describe, but the details are distant in my recollection. I recall there were evenings where we stopped at Autobahn motels the way you would on US road trip. Other nights we stayed at small hotels. The only hotel Mercedes arranged for us was the initial night in Frankfurt at Hotel Gravenbruck (sp?) which had a pleasant garden and our first introduction to the continental breakfast.

Generally I would agree the smaller roads off the Autobahn were the most memorable but then we tried to cover several countries which required at least partial travel on the major routes.

My primary suggestion is not to get yourselves locked into such a tight schedule that you can't be flexible once enroute.

DavidNJ

Because of the need to prearrange the hotels, each night needs to have a destination. We are trying to keep driving time (as calculated by Microsoft MapPoint Europe) under 3-3:30 per day.
That should give us 5 hours or so per day sightseeing and rest time.

The total day should be short enough to still arrive at the next stop by 5-6pm, enough time for a shower and change before dinner.

David