Four cities: A retrospective.

Four cities: A retrospective.

Best city:

For food: Budapest

For quaintness: Salzburg

For culture: Vienna

For ease of navigation: Munich

For hotel: Salzburg

For Christmas Markets: Salzburg or Budapest

For general shopping: Munich

For highlight experiences: Salzburg

For weather: Munich or Salzburg

Worst city:

For hotel: Munich

For ease of navigation: Vienna

For weather: Vienna

For safety: Vienna or Budapest

For having smokers everywhere: Munich

I would visit any of these cities again. Munich was the only one I felt I covered well, which is probably attributable to the fact I spent twice as long there as anywhere else. Vienna especially I felt that I didn’t cover well, and the weather didn’t help. I think Salzburg would be really charming in spring or summer. A little more time in Budapest would have allowed me to do some things on the Buda side – I stayed exclusively on Pest apart from the bridge and the cruise which were between.

I really enjoyed the Intrepid group experience, and think that travelling this way might be a preferred manner in the future for countries where I am not conversant with the language. Having orientation walks was of immense value because they made the cities friendlier and less confusing. It also meant that I wasn’t really alone most of the time but could still be an independent traveller if I fancied going places different to the others.