Christmas Markets in Europe

Author Message   Thomas Laws New member Username: Thomlaws Post Number: 3 Registered: 05-2008 Posted From: 98.183.134.124 Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 - 02:19 pm:    Hi Jan, I loved reading your trip report. We were in Germany around the same time, and also visiting the Christmas Markets. My husband likes to visit out of the way places, where he can practice the German that he learned as a child when his father was stationed in Germany. We stayed three nights at a Gasthaus in Neuses, a tiny village. When we arrived, our hostess treated us to free drinks and sat down to chat, in German. Friday evening, when we returned from our wanderings, she insisted we go out for walk with her. Since it was already dark, I tried to decline, but she refused to accept a "No." My husband and I finally acquiessed, and to the delight of her dog, we started walking around the village. Before long, we were joined by the entire village and Saint Nicholas. The village was observing an Advent tradition. Each night in Advent, one family unveils a decorated window. Each Friday, the village assembles and goes from window to window, lighting paper lanterns along the way and singing German carols. After the last window is visited, the village assembles in the firehouse for a party, to which we were warmly welcomed. We were plied with gluwein, beer, sandwiches, and homebaked cookies and cakes. Everyone made an effort to carry on a conversation, although my German is nonexistent and most of them spoke little English. My husband and I were deeply touched by the amazing hospitality. It was repeated at other times as well. An elderly shop owner in Rothenberg presented us with an ilustrated map of the town. And the owner of a tiny restaurant presented us with a bag of cookies and candies.   Jan Advanced Member Username: Seychelle Post Number: 304 Registered: 07-2006 Posted From: 70.137.25.218 Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 - 04:27 am:    Joe, the website is www.ricksteves.com and once there you will see some choices to click on along the top. One is "Railpasses" where you can find out all about those, and also purchase them. Another is "Books" where you can see all his guide books and purchase them also. The one we took is "Rick Steves GERMANY 2009" but the 2010 edition is now available. If you want to email him, click on "contact us" at the bottom of the page. We usually just check the guide out of the library. If you have a Kindle it can be downloaded.   Joe E. Brown Member Username: Kb2avb Post Number: 33 Registered: 08-2005 Posted From: 67.242.125.18 Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 - 12:43 am:    Very nice trip report ! What is the exact title of the Rick Steves Guide Book referenced in this blog??? What is the e-mail address for Rick Steves is there more than one??? Thanks Joe E. Brown   Jan Advanced Member Username: Seychelle Post Number: 303 Registered: 07-2006 Posted From: 70.137.24.170 Posted on Sunday, December 13, 2009 - 02:37 pm:    PR, our passes were for 2nd class. The Eurail and Select Passes are only 1st class, but for the Passes for travel within Germany (or other single countries) or Germany and a neighboring country you have a choice. The regular price for the Germany 4-day "twin" pass is $267/pp for 1st class, $195/pp for 2nd class. Be sure you opt for the "twin" pass if you are a couple traveling together because it is much less than buying 2 individual passes. Sounds confusing, but if you read the Pass information at ricksteves.com it will make sense.   Leland Senior Member Username: Leland Post Number: 5441 Registered: 05-2006 Posted From: 98.218.147.237 Posted on Saturday, December 12, 2009 - 08:22 pm:    Jim/Alice, when can we expect your trip report?   PR Senior Member Username: Pretzlaff Post Number: 1471 Registered: 06-2003 Posted From: 67.190.52.82 Posted on Saturday, December 12, 2009 - 08:21 pm:    Jan-- I was going to buy the same 4 day rail pass, but instead went with cheap RyanAir flights. The nice thing about the rail pass was that it was first class. As I sat in second class on one ICE train in Germany, it looked like a waitress was taking food and drink up to the first class section. Was the food and drink included in the pass? ...and how was it all? Were there any other bennies to being first class??   James E. Kale Advanced Member Username: Jimiam Post Number: 152 Registered: 09-2006 Posted From: 71.191.18.193 Posted on Saturday, December 12, 2009 - 04:12 pm:    Great report, Jan. Those train passes sound very interesting for a future trip. We are also just back from a Christmas Market tour and, for the first time, used the trains. The German Rail website was pretty confusing with wildly varying fares, but a fellow SPAT on our flight advised us to go either to the onbase travel office or the USO for help. We used the RTT travel office in the new Ramstein Inn. A very efficient agent was able to book us round trip to Prague at about 160E for us both. It involved a number of changes and an express bus but worked out well. On the return trip, one train was late, causing us to miss a connection. We were panicky, but we went to a German Rail help desk in the station where we were re-routed in seconds - no kidding - putting us on high speed trains, getting us to Landstuhl at our original time. We'd love to go to Salzburg next year.   Jan Advanced Member Username: Seychelle Post Number: 302 Registered: 07-2006 Posted From: 70.137.21.60 Posted on Friday, December 11, 2009 - 02:35 am:    Thanks, Earl. We both hit the send button at the same time.   Jan Advanced Member Username: Seychelle Post Number: 301 Registered: 07-2006 Posted From: 70.137.21.60 Posted on Friday, December 11, 2009 - 02:34 am:    Phyllis, maybe next year we can get a group to go. PR, seems I remember you got some incredible deal for a commercial flight to Frankfurt so you didn't have to worry about sweating out the space-a flights. Yes, the days WERE very short in Germany, but on the other hand that just made the evenings more magical with all the Christmas lights. They were so beautiful, and we saw the tallest Christmas tree we have ever seen in Strasbourg. It was taller than the 8 story building it was next to. Vic, we made no lodging plans ahead of time. We just went to the hotels and none of them were full. We took our GPS to help us find them, even though we had Rick Steves guide and he has maps which are very good. But it was helpful to have the GPS not only initially, but to get back there after walking around the city. When you buy the train passes all the information comes supplied with them, plus a DVD with travel tips and info on how to use the passes. I just checked again and the passes state that only Salzburg, Austria and Basel, Switzerland are considered border towns. If you want to travel more in another country, you can buy similar 2-country passes which are more expensive. You can also add on days if you want more than 4 days, but you have to do that when you buy them and not later. The passes are good for 6 months from the date of purchase and for ours you have 1 month to use up your 4 days once it is activated. Some with more days have 2 months, etc. Total details are on Rick Steves website. Phil, the nice thing about using trains is that the main stations are usually close to the city center. We are walkers anyway and all of the cities we visited are easily walkable with the exception of going to the Nazi Documentation Center in Nurmberg where we took the tram. How to do that is straight out of Rick Steves guide. We had visited all these places before, but seeing them all decked out for Christmas was really special. We will go again next year to other sites.   Earl Senior Member Username: Myramstein Post Number: 528 Registered: 11-2007 Posted From: 99.205.88.112 Posted on Friday, December 11, 2009 - 02:34 am:    Jan, great report. Thanks. In all the years of reading trip reports on here...you trip has to be one of the most interesting and well done. How lucky you were to have such a nice trip.   Phil Doubleman Senior Member Username: Phil Post Number: 1362 Registered: 08-2005 Posted From: 68.35.71.161 Posted on Friday, December 11, 2009 - 01:47 am:    How did you move around in the cities after arrival by train?   Vic and Connie Senior Member Username: Pattons Post Number: 416 Registered: 12-2006 Posted From: 72.218.15.235 Posted on Friday, December 11, 2009 - 01:19 am:    Jan, Thanks for taking time to post your report. Well written and very informative. With respect to the Rick Steves recommended lodging can you tell us how far in advance you made those reservations? As for the "Border Towns" did you have something which told you Strasbourg was not a border town or did you find that out on the train. Along those lines do you know of a listing of German border towns. Thanks, Vic   PR Senior Member Username: Pretzlaff Post Number: 1470 Registered: 06-2003 Posted From: 67.190.52.82 Posted on Thursday, December 10, 2009 - 09:56 pm:    Just got back myself last night. I hit the markets in Cologne and Frankfurt. Frankly, or Frankfurtly, the markets in Frankfurt were better than the ones in Cologne. I passed on Nuremburg and such, and went to Madrid and Porto. Weather was good in Madrid, but quite rainy in Porto. Germany was chilly and the days were really quite short. My 5 star, $67 and $77, priceline Marriot's in Germany were fabulous. Sorry that I missed you guys.   Phyllis DeLancey Senior Member Username: Phyllis Post Number: 2424 Registered: 06-2003 Posted From: 99.68.199.9 Posted on Thursday, December 10, 2009 - 08:28 pm:    Jan, what a great trip, I wish I had been with you and Richard. We have been to the places you mentioned and they are wonderful at Christmas. One of my favorite shops in Salzburg, was the little shop with all the decorated eggs. I loved them, have a dozen on our tree. Merry Christmas.   Jan Advanced Member Username: Seychelle Post Number: 300 Registered: 07-2006 Posted From: 70.137.21.60 Posted on Thursday, December 10, 2009 - 08:11 pm:    We made our first trip to see the Christmas Markets this year. We were prompted to do this after reading about them on this board. Thanksgiving day we drove to Memphis after our family get-together in Tulsa for dinner. Friday morning we flew from there to McGuire in a C-5. We met space-a'ers Bob and Ellie Dart in Memphis. They had driven a one-way rental from the Chicago area and had a commercial flight back from Frankfurt on around Dec. 18 since they knew it would be difficult to fly space-a that close to Christmas. Memphis could manifest us only to McGuire, but the flight was delayed at that point anyway for 28 hours. Luckily for us, there was another C-5 Ramstein flight that night and a total of 13 of us continued on to Germany. That was a relief for us as we thought there might be a crowd at McGuire and our sign-up date was not a good one. We stayed at Ramstein for 2 nights. Unfortunately we did not make it into the new Ramstein Inn, but at least there is a shuttle from there to the other housing area. The new place is incredible. Loved browsing the shops. Ate one night at the Sports Bar and the second night at the Hofbrauhaus in the Mall. We had purchased train passes through Rick Steves. We checked that website about a week before we left and found German rail was offering a special deal for the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. Our 4-day "Twin Pass" for 2 people traveling together was just $156 apiece (regularly $195). This was for any 4 days of train travel within Germany in a 1 month period. The next day we took a taxi to Kaiserslautern, activated our passes at the Deutsch Bahn office, and took the train to Wurzburg. We put our luggage in a locker at the train station, and walked to the beautiful Christmas Market -- tried the gluhwein, some brats, checked out the central city, then continued on the train to Rothenberg. Rothenberg has one of the oldest Christmas Markets around and we chose a hotel right out of our Rick Steves guide book, the Pension Elke, a wonderful place. Our room overlooked the clock tower often shown in pictures of the city. Price was 62 Euro, 10% less if you stay more than 1 night, and that included a great breakfast. Rothenberg is the home base for Kathe Wohlfahrt and has 2 HUGE Christmas stores of her trinkets, in addition to the other countless Christmas kiosks. We went a short distance the following day, just to Nurnberg, and did not use up a day of our train pass for that short trip. Nurnberg not only has the markets, but incredible Christmas windows with animated Steiff stuffed animals. The market was the largest in Germany we were told, and very crowded. We again chose a hotel from Rick Steves, the Accor Hotel Ibis, 75 Euro. In addition to the Christmas Markets we toured the city and visited the Nazi Documentation Center and Rally Grounds. From Nurnberg we went to Munich and again used a luggage locker for a couple hours. Munich also has some incredible animated Christmas windows. The same day we continued on to Salzburg, Austria and had a beautiful train trip through the mountains. After we arrived there we took a side trip to Berchtesgaden, the site of Hitler's Eagle's Nest. Since Salzburg is considered a border town, our Germany train pass was good going there, and we stayed there a couple of nights at the Pension Adlerhof, 62 Euro with a great breakfast. The day we left Salzburg it was snowing in the mountains, but clear and sunny by the time we got to Strasbourg, France. Strasbourg is NOT considered a border town, so we had to buy an extra 2.4 Euro ticket to get from Kehl, Germany, across the river to Strasbourg. But we had heard the oldest Christmas Market in France was located there so we decided to see it. Strasbourg actually has 12 separate Christmas Markets, one specifically for children, and there were brochures at the information centers in English with write-ups and maps of all 12. We went to the main market, the oldest one, by the Cathedral, and visited a couple others just in walking around the city. You cannot find any brats offered at the Christmas Markets in France, but the crepes were wonderful! The 4th and last day of our train pass we returned from Strasbourg to Landstuhl and caught a taxi to the terminal. Although we would have loved to spend a couple more days at Ramstein we figured if we found a flight back we better take it before the holiday crowds appeared. So within a few hours we were manifested on the Patriot Express to BWI which had about 159 open seats and only about half that many people trying for them. Arriving at BWI we went to the USO to use a computer to check for flights that might be returning close to Memphis and our car. There was one the next day from Norfolk to Little Rock, so we rented a one-way car to Norfolk and made it to Little Rock a few hours later. That worked out very well. The train passes were wonderful. Trains are expensive and when we checked the prices we realized we would have paid several times the price of the passes for the traveling we did. The weather was chilly but not bad at all since we were ready for really cold weather. Umbrellas were needed just off and on a couple days.