Austria, Flight-only booked but looks very expensive. What to do???

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gearoid

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Hi,
We are a couple in our early forties, active enough.

We are looking at travelling to Austria from mid to late June, and I booked a flight without enquiring about accommodation costs.

Now my partner is saying most nice hotels are 180-200 euros (90-100 pps) a night even in rural areas.

We were looking at staying three nights in Vienna and 7 days out in the countryside or in a small town to do walking, cycling, relaxing, historic visits, and at a very relaxed pace.

Now the cost of the hotels is putting us off and also perceived lack of hotel availability on hotel booking sites.

For the past three years we have gone to Northern Spain and enjoyed relaxed travelling, nice hotels and good scenery for 100 euros per night (50 pps).

I've just spent four hundred euros on flights but now we think that the Austria trip will be hideously expensive.

Has anyone any ideas before we look at cutting our losses and trying to cancel the flights? We booked Aer Lingus and now I guess we won't be able to claim much back in any case.

To summarise...

We like warm weather but we aren't sun worshippers. Both of us burn quickly. We like nice food, and reasonably nice hotels, moderate activity and historic interest, nature and scenery, and we want to base ourselves in 2-3 locations over 10 days but not tire ourselves out with too much travel.

Any ideas re how to rescue a Vienna/Austria trip gratefully received.

Thanks
Gearoid
 
You could try getting a train to Italy - you could maybe enquire with aer lingus on the cost of changing the flights one way so maybe spend a couple of nights in austria and then move on to somewhere cheaper, we got an overnight train from venice to vienna once (not that venice would be cheap at that time of year but you could look to other places you could reach by train), we had a private cabin / room - it was pricey enough but effectively the train tickets that way also covered one night's accommodation. Are you sure you are comparing like with like - a nice hotel in vienna might be more luxurious than a nice hotel in Spain.

Also have you checked the sensitivity of prices to different days of the week. Central hotels may well be more expensive during the week but more affordable at the weekends, unless there is something specific on (see below).

I think Expedia have some deals at the moment eg book 3 nights save a third on your stay.


Vienna Events and Festivals in June - Vienna, Austria, AT

Jazz Fest Wien - mid-June to mid-July, a leading Austrian jazz festival with some big names in the world of jazz and an outdoor concert within Vienna's centrally located Rathausplatz, which is always completely free of charge and quite a crowd pleaser
Nova Rock at Pannonia Fields - mid-June, an established rock festival in nearby Nickelsdorf, first staged in 2005 and known for its famous groups, which have been headlined in the past by Guns 'N' Roses
Donauinselfest (Donau Island Festival) - late June, with plenty of music and dancing to go around, based on the Donauinsel islands, on the River Danube
 
Well I don't have any real experience of Austria, but here in Switzerland you'd pay about CHF110 for a twin room in a nice 3 star hotel in a holiday region. Now many here choose to holiday in Austria because it is cheaper, so I think your partners expectation of having to pay €180-€200 is a bit OTT.

Here in Switzerland I have found that the best way to find good cheap hotels, is to first locate the community website for the village or town that you'd like to stay in and then see what hotels are listed there. Many of the smaller hotels do not have a website and are just listed there, so they will not come up on your average Google search. Perhaps you can do the same for Austria.

For example, I found this one Hotel Park Villa at €108 for a twin room in late June and it is a four star!!!! Don't give up on Austria just yet.

Jim.
 
Austria is lovely and you will enjoy it. We are a similiar couple in age and interests and we went to Zell Am Zee which was a lovely lake town with lots of places to walk and cycle. We stayed in a hotel there called Romantik Hotel and rooms there are €130 per room per night in Mid June. There were a number of other hotels that were around 100 per nights. We also went to Salzberg and another nice town called Kitsbul and that was also lovely. I think if you search around you will get value and it is a lovely country. It is expensive for shopping but food and drinks are a bit less than here. Also if you ring up hotels you get very good price on half board in your hotel and we also got bikes free from the hotel every day and there was lots of cycle paths and lots of places to see.
 
I have used hostelbookers.com to find cheap accommodation. It's not just hostels. I once found a 2 bed apt in Venice on it for reasonable money. I didn't book it in the end but it could be worth a try?
 
Austria is lovely.I lived in Vienna, and it's just gorgeous. Try the Regina hotel at Schottentor. Just outside central district and beside trams/U bahn. Check out dhr.com for hotels, use trip advisor for reviews. Also check out Vienna (Wien) tourism :http://www.wien.info/en

If you're only staying a few days, invest in the Vienna Card for 3 days travel on public transport. Couple of trips I'd recommend would be:

1. Grinzing ( by tram from Schottentor). Beautiful village in the hills. Lots of walks around there, as it's farming territory. Lovely old taverns etc.
2.Schonbrunn Palace.
3. Baden Baden.
4. Monastery at Klosternnuberg.
5. Boat trip to Bratislava on Danube.
6. Albertina Museum.
7. Browse shops & resturants at Neuburg.

Vienna is a very walkable city, and very safe, walk anywhere at any time. As already said, the Donauinsel is a lovely area for swimming & walks etc. You should also check out the public outdoor baths in Vienna. They are superb and very cheap. The one near Grinzing is lovely, and overlooks the city. Have a great time!
 
A quick Hotels.com shows Hotel Mercure Westbanhof Vienna (4*) for 247 euros for 2 people from 20th-23rd June.....do some more searching
 
Would you considr staying on a campsite? In June they would not be too busy, not so many kids either and a mobile home for a week might be an economical choice. They are usually in scenic areas and have pools and spas etc. We stayed at a campsite near Mayrhoffen, near Innsbruck and it was gorgeous. Slim
 
For sure Austria is going to be more expensive than Northern Spain .. but I definitely agree with the other posters here that while you can spend €200+ a night if you want to (especially in Vienna or Salzburg) there's plenty of nice places you can stay that don't cost anything like this.

So I wouldn't let cost put you off it really isn't that bad .. but if you compare the prices in Austria to Northern Spain all the time you won't enjoy your holiday ... the beer doesn't taste so good if you think it's €1 more expensive than it would be in Bilbao etc.

What you could do if you want a cheaper lakes and mountains experience after the City break in Vienna would be to get the train to Slovakia - pretty good Mountains in Eastern Slovakia and it's not that far from Vienna and would be an awful lot cheaper than Austria for food/drink/hotels (Slovenia might be an option too, but would I guess be more expensive?)
 
We spent a fab week in St Gilgen about 10yrs ago...look up the tourist office and enquire about rates...it was the cheapest holiday ever.
 
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