Discover the itinerary of our family road-trip

We set off by car from our home in the Paris region, and after a one-night stopover in eastern France, we headed for Salzburg, which was the 1st stage of our road trip. Having a car gave us greater flexibility in planning our route, and the aim was to make a loop so as not to pass the same place twice.

We designed our itinerary and its division into several stages, taking 2 factors into account:

• travel time by car between 2 homes (=stages).
• travel time by car for the day (between our accommodation and the activity site, and the same for the return journey).

The objective was simple:

• To achieve a car journey time that is reasonable and pleasant for everyone, driver and passengers alike, and that takes into account the needs and schedules of children (meals, naps...). We're lucky that our children can take their naps in the car or stroller without any problem.

• Reduce as much as possible the number of accommodations, and therefore stages, while keeping daily travel times acceptable (we set it at 1 hour maximum between accommodation and the activity site). Indeed, each time we changed accommodation, we had to prepare and put away all our belongings, pack our bags again, etc., and all this can quickly take up a lot of time and mental energy. So we had to find the right balance between all these elements. So we made sure to spend at least 3 nights in each accommodation.

In terms of the program, we wanted to alternate between city visits, outdoor activities (in the mountains, around lakes), cultural visits and activities dedicated to children. We were aware that some days could be long for our boys, so we took everyone's wishes and needs into account.

And so we came to this:

Itinerary FR version

Itinerary EN version

Each color corresponds to a stage within the same accommodation. So we stayed in 5 different accommodations over the course of our trip, which seemed to me to strike the right balance between mileage and comfort.

Find out more about each of the 5 steps here!