9 days tailor made from $7,640 pp
From $7,640 pp
At a glance
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Don't forget that all of our itineraries are totally customized and so this is just an idea of what we can build for you.
Germany rewards a first visit like few other countries in Europe, because it contains multitudes. This itinerary is built as a proper introduction to the country, starting in Berlin, one of the most historically significant cities in the world and still one of its most exciting, before working south through Dresden’s baroque grandeur, the fairy-tale density of the Black Forest, and finally Bavaria, home to the castle that shaped how the world pictures a fairy tale in the first place.
Berlin sets the tone. The Brandenburg Gate and the remaining stretches of the Wall carry the weight of a city that has been divided, rebuilt, and reinvented more than once in living memory, and by night, Berlin’s clubs and bars are still considered among the best and most adventurous anywhere on earth.
From there, the trip slows into something gentler, Dresden’s restored old town, the Black Forest’s dark, dense woodland and half-timbered villages, and the still, glacial lakes of Bavaria.
The whole journey builds to Neuschwanstein Castle, built by King Ludwig II and the direct inspiration for Disney’s fairy-tale castles, a fitting final image for a country whose past and present sit as close together as anywhere in Europe.
Throughout, the food carries its own thread, from a Berlin currywurst eaten standing at a street stall to a proper slice of Black Forest gateau in the region that gave it its name.
In detail
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Don't forget that most of our itineraries can be totally customized. Our expert team will be able to talk you through all the options.
Day 1: Berlin
Your driver meets you at the airport and takes you straight to your boutique hotel, after which Berlin is yours for the rest of the day. Few cities pack in this much history, food, and nightlife all at once, and it’s easy to see why so many visitors end up falling for the place within a day of arriving.
Evening at leisure.
Day 2: Berlin
A guided tour fills the morning, since Berlin is large enough that having someone steer you through it saves real time. The route takes in Charlottenburg Palace, Checkpoint Charlie, and the Brandenburg Gate.
Walking along the former Wall traces the now invisible line that once split the city in two, and the Wall Museum fills in the history behind it. The Holocaust Memorial, at the heart of the city, is a quieter stop by comparison, a monument to Germany’s darkest chapter.
By evening, Berlin’s nightlife takes over. Schöneberg is the place to start for the city’s gay scene, and from there it’s genuinely open-ended, this is Berlin, after all, and the night can go anywhere.
Day 3: Berlin
The East Side Gallery is next, the longest surviving stretch of the Wall and now an open-air gallery covered in murals from artists across the world. From there, the DDR Museum offers a hands-on look at daily life in the former East, right down to recreated apartments and a Trabant you can sit in.
Somewhere along the way, make time for currywurst. It’s a Berlin institution, sold from stalls on nearly every street corner, and no first visit to the city is complete without one.
Evening at leisure.
Day 4: Dresden
The train ride into Dresden sets up an afternoon and evening in one of Germany’s most underrated cities, all the more remarkable given most of its historic center was rebuilt from rubble after being almost entirely destroyed in 1945. The baroque old town, centered on the Frauenkirche and the Zwinger Palace, is the payoff, a reconstruction so faithful it’s easy to forget the city spent decades as ruins before the work was finished.
Spend the afternoon wandering the old town on foot, taking in the Semperoper opera house and the Fürstenzug, a hundred-meter mural of Saxon rulers on horseback made entirely from porcelain tiles. As evening sets in, a stroll along the Elbe with the old town lit up behind you is one of the best free views in the country.
Day 5: Black Forest
A short flight takes you to Stuttgart, where your driver is waiting to transfer you into the Black Forest itself. In the evening, settle into rustic German cooking at its best, hearty, unfussy, and built for the region’s cooler mountain air, finishing with a proper slice of Black Forest gateau in the very region that gave the cake its name.
Day 6: Black Forest
Today is a guided tour through the Black Forest itself, a region so thick with dark pine forest and half-timbered villages that it’s easy to see why the Brothers Grimm drew so many of their fairy tales from land like this. It’s also where the cuckoo clock was invented, back in the eighteenth century, and you’ll find them still being handmade in workshops across the region today.
The afternoon takes you into the Black Forest National Park, one of Germany’s newest protected areas, where marked trails wind through dense, undisturbed woodland exactly as dark and green as the name promises.
Day 7: Friedrichshafen
Today’s drive takes you to Lake Constance, home to Friedrichshafen and the birthplace of the Zeppelin itself. From here, you’ll board a Zeppelin flight over the lake and the Alpine forests beyond it, a rare way to see the region and one that Friedrichshafen has been associated with since Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin built his first airship here in 1900. Champagne is served on board as the views unfold beneath you.
Day 8: King Ludwig’s Castle
Today is Neuschwanstein Castle, in the Bavarian Alps, the home of King Ludwig II, remembered as the Swan King. Ludwig never married, and historians have long pointed to his private diaries and close relationships with men as evidence of a hidden interior life, one he had to keep hidden given homosexuality was a criminal offense in Bavaria at the time. He spent much of his adult life in seclusion here, building an increasingly elaborate fantasy world as an escape from a public role that gave him no room to be himself.
The result is a castle so extravagant it directly inspired Walt Disney’s own vision of the fairy-tale castle, and today it stands as one of the most visited sites in Germany.
Day 9: Bavaria
A day at leisure in the Bavarian countryside, with time for spa treatments and some proper downtime before the trip wraps up.
Day 10: Departure
Today, your driver transfers you to Munich Airport for your return flight home.
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