We had a little fun with a bit of comedy at the start of this video. 🤣 What are some funny differences that you've noticed between German and American tourists (or tourists from your own home country)? Let us know below!

I think regarding passports it's also important that EU – citizens don't need a passport to travel within the EU.

Especially since you mentioned that you can travel from state to state within the US without passport.

In the EU it's the same with countries 😉

I dearly hope that the Americans get more holidays leave from their work.!

Gott behüte uns von Flut und Wind und Deutsche die im Ausland sind

Wenn germans go to the netherlands on holydays they did a hole on the beach and say meins 🤣🤣🤣 and older germans take bread coffee from breackfast from the hotel so they dont have to buy lunch and about the sheet in the morning you are right 😂😂😂

It actually is forbidden by law to work during your vacation time.

I love the fact that Jonathan wore socks on his way to the pool in the beginning 😂
Like a real German👍

My American wife and I (German) are actually on vacation right now, it is our second week on Tenerife.
The work culture is definitely true. My boss (German) just told me: "you're on vacation, just take the time of and relax", which was very nice because I was not able to get a lot of work done before the vacation and was afraid that being behind schedule would be more stressful. Her boss on the other hand (Spanish) is still trying to give her new tasks and set up meetings even though she has a tremendous amount of overtime.
This resulted in me being relaxed and motivated to get things done when I get back and her being here with the work laptop and closing in on the burnout.
I also agree to most of the statements in the video btw. I always just make a short list of things to do on my vacation which typically lasts 1-6 weeks and then just decide on a daily basis what I want to do. My wife just started getting to know this lifestyle and she likes it so far 😀
I also feel like the German language is sometimes even more useful than the English language because there's just so many German tourists everywhere. Even though I'm in Spain I don't feel like I left Germany because I here the language everywhere. Sometimes I start talking to people in other languages just so that I get the feeling of having left home. As a German tourist I can't blame others for being where I am but I would still like to be able to feel like I'm far away a little more often 😀

Wie immer: Tolles Video! Allerdings gibt es einen Kritikpunkt zur Anfangsszene: Als Deutscher würdest du niemals (niemals!) schwarze Socken in Birkenstock tragen, sondern nur ausschließlich weiße Tennissocken!
(Of course, this comment fulfills the cliché of the German know-it-all which is true in most cases)

If you don't divide personal time from work time and connect your private phone to your work e-mail you are either stupid, especially so if you want to stay a work drone, or smart, if you want to start your own company in the same field in the future and give customers your private phone number. The email can be diverted easily the phone number is not in control of your employer and he can't force you to switch phone numbers, or you can make your ex employer pay. This also means that there are a LOT of companies that are stupid and try to use their employees phone plans for work…

I love loong Weekends

10 days include sick days 😂

If I look at my older colleagues that work in the company for 30 years, the have about 40 days paid of a year. That means by 5 days workweek, 8 weeks paid vacation + holidays ( Easter Monday/ Good Friday, Whitsun Monday…. And more ) plus sick days are paid and not negative count on vacation days…. And those colleagues are not doctors or academics. They are mechanics left school for a three year vocational training of three years at an age of 14/15 those days….

Zeit. Das ist so eine Sache die mir aufgefallen ist. Ich folge einem Haufen Kanäle mit Expats und immer wenn es ein Video gibt „my Mom visited me…“ dann sieht man mit wieviel Druck und Stress alles betrachtet werden muss.
Dann wird mit 5 mph durch die Stadt oder zu Schloß Schwanstein gehiked oder „gerannt“. Da denke ich mir immer, was ein Stress, ich dachte es geht um Urlaub.

We love southern tyrolia, this old winery that has apartments for at least a week, the north sea and Italy for at least few days and we always used to do day or weekend trips close by from where we were, I think Münster is the go to in a way (my parents met there and a lot of others in the family) or towns with roman historical museums when we were little and Holland. We lived close to Holland and Münster and my parents loved history, so we usually ended up in a museum or play growing up and had fun.
Augsburg, Leer, Münster, Bochum, Rügen, Spiekeroog and Papenburg are special to me for shorter trips because it's recurring and you find something new getting lost still.
Bochum is special because it's got this slightly less classical cultural aspect with industrial urban culture including the coal mining museum and it's my dad's godparent's home we've had this special connection to that it's home away from home, also our family football club.
Leer has a tea museum and this slowed down frisian culture, time standing still in a good way, Papenburg is similar to that as far as the casual slowed down culture is concerned, brick buildings and ships in the town canal. Spiekeroog is a car free frisian island.
Rügen is an island with pirate history and a play about Störtebecker and you can find amber there. Augsburg has this culturally historical aspect, one of the oldest urban residential developments for a good cause and the buildings and foundation still exist and the Puppenkiste which is fun for kids and adults.

Check the greek islands Crete, Samos and Korfu. We used to do "island hopping", but now we mostly hang out on Crete. The island has everything. We are leaving Sunday… Yamas!

Jonathan, after the first seconds I could tell how well integrated your are in the German society. Well done 👍 🤣

There is another type of German vaccation: Elternzeit. When our first one was 6 months old, we stayed about 6 weeks in New Zealand. And literally everythere in the country we have met other German couples with their babies. It is kind of once in a lifetime to have the opertunity to stay away from job for 1..3..5..8 months and even longer, so a lot of German couples travel, especially to Asia, Australia and NZ. We often explained the Elternzeit to the NZ people, and usually they where suprised but also thankfully, because they learned why their country was full of young Germy families 🙂
I wish you nice holidays in Thailand, it is a lovely country. And please never say "Yes" if they ask you in a Restaurant to prepare your Papaya salad "spicy" 🔥😁

I think Americans travel more, I recently heard of one flying to college, east to west coast. It's just not international.
Imagine Germany as New York State, some beaches, some skiing resorts; but mainly people leave the 'state' for vacation, visits and business.
Within 5 hours drive by car I could reach 5 different European countries.

Even our employers tell us to take at least 2 weeks of holiday in order to be able to relax. Only one week or a few days don't work. You need to step beside and see a different world. Coming back with new, fresh ideas and power that's valued by companies. Germans like NOT to plan their days according to a schedule, as we have to all other days a year.

My employer encourages us to take three weeks off at a time at least once a year. Especially since the daycare center also has a continuous closing time of three weeks in the summer. I don't consider less than three weeks a real vacation either. You need this time to "come down".

The best sign that you had a good vacation:

You can't remember your work password after the vacation.

We like to make friends all over the globe. Next time we travel to a country, we have friends there. How beautiful😌🙌

First time i keft the country was when i was 6 years old. We went to hungary(Mucsfa) to visit a part of the family. Deutsch-Ungarn, Germans who left the country because of ww2 and afterwards came back. Not all came back so we visited them. Now i normally do day trips or short trips. But i'm never in a hurry. If i missed something, then i have a reason to come back sometimes. So it's always relaxed. I use ICE(train) for long ways & WeShare(service where you can rent VW electric cars) for short ways. As example: I when travel to hamburg with ICE, i use WeShare(or another service) to travel to Lübeck if i do a short trip(2-3 days).

Hi guys, hope you enjoyed your trip! Our favorite trip were 3,5 weeks road trippin through Norway in a small Ford Fiasta and a tent. Last trip just ended two days ago and we made (again) a road trip in our camper van throught Bavaria, Austria and Northern Italy (Südtirol?) with our dog and it was amazing. We toured 13 days. I apologized my English because I´m not a native speaker but I hope I did it quite well. Stay safe and have fun. Kind regards, Michael

Hallo Ihr Drei,

sehr schöner Beitrag, tolle Sichtweisen die wir in euren Videos erfahren.Mir werden sehr oft die Augen geöffnet was wir für Vorteile genießen ohne darüber " ich mir je einen einen Kopf" gemacht habe.Eure Videos sind Top * macht weiter so,ein Fan aus Waldkirch

greetz from Nederland
i am 53 now and missed out on going on vacation about 10 times in my whole life
and i always stayed in 1 place for a minimum of 1 week but 9 out of 10 times i stayed for 3 weeks at 1 place
Nederland België Luxenburg Deutschland France England España Italia Ostenreich Schweiz
Thailand Cambodia Singapore Abu Dhabi Curacao Aruba Venezuela Dominican republic Czech republic east coast usa [ orlando new york washington ]

Nice video with beautiful impressions from your travel destination, i really enjoyed it 😊
It also reminded me of how lucky i am to work in Germany 😅
It's good to reflect on things we're taking for granted and appreciate them more often

Since coming to the USA, I have never once taken vacation. Even though I have 28 days of paid vacation/sick time, I can only ever take 5 working days off in 1 time. With a family, the cost of traveling is massive, and I can’t justify spending so much for such a short period of rest.

American life style/vacation style: I always find it amazing what Americans are willing to put up with and even more so, are even proud of.

my vacation last spring: crossed the Atlantic on a sail boat (Martinique – Azores – Lisbon). away from work from April 1rst to May 23rd. vacation liek this is a different life within my regular life.

As a German, I don't have a passport (anymore). I can travel to more than 30 countries in Europe without a passport – and some more countries outside Europe (which I won't take advantage of, since I don't fly anymore to do my part in saving the climate).
My wife and I we are both on disability pension now, we have vacation the whole year. But when we were still working, our vacation usually lasted three weeks.
Our favorite vacation destination is Italy, particularly Cinque Terre, the Amalfi Coast and the Dolomite Alps. Domestically we love the car free islands of the German North Sea (Juist, Baltrum, Langeoog, Spiekeroog and Wangerooge); especially nice for little kids, since no danger by cars.

10 X holiday days a year? Holy crap that's poor, why do you put up with that?

I get 38 days a year! Yep, I'm spoilt by an excellent employer! The average is 28 days though.

My wonderful wife however gets just 22 paid days holidays, but she on a 25hrs per week contract so that reflects in her leave days! If she worked 37.5hrs, she would get a minimum of 28 days!

Be glad you moved to Europe! More a continent of the free than the US!

It's funny, i will travel to Thailand next monday for two weeks. 😀

My family totally lived the long vacation at one spot life. Since i was one year old we travelled to Kos – Greek every year, sometimes twice for at least two weeks per travel. My parents got in a family owned hotel on accident but were so warm welcomed and happy with the spot, that we always came back. Even now 35 years later, with different branches of the family tree we get there every one or two years in different constellations.

In this time of my life i am normally just one week there, but thats because i like to see something of the rest of the world. The vaccation days are just not enough, even with a 4 day week and 23 days of vaccation a year…

I really like to stay at one spot and start tours to the surrounding. I hate the rushed city trips, where you typically stay in a central hotel with just a room and the big street right outside the window. We did that in Japan (Tokyo, Kyoto, nearby Tokyo) and it was very interesting, but so stressful. It's ok for 2-3 days to see the town, but then i like to have a calm spot, even if it's a big hotel as long as it has some space to relax.

If you ever want to have a (nearly) short flight, i can totally recommend Greek! The people are very understanding and child friendly. I was a tornado as child and my eating manners were visible a meter around my place. All they did after we left the table, was taking the water hose and cleaned it all up.
xD

Seoul is a wunderfull city, i really love South-Korea.
But if u want something closer to Germany i would definitely recommend Sardenia.
Good wine and food. The people are really nice and the beaches are a dream.
This is the first time i have seen a wine filling station. You go there with a 5 or 10 liter canister and fill the wine directly from a dispenser. only italians can come up with something like that… ingenious

hallo .du hast wirklich schon zu viele deutsche sachen angenommen. birkenstock schuhe ,das handtuch auf den stuhl legen es fehlen nur noch die tennissocken.*lach`*

I have 30 days off plus holidays, all full paid. Usually we make one two-week trip, one 3-week-trip and a short trip (or longer, depends on overtime). We always plan a destination, most of the time we don´t reach it 😂, because on our way we always find a nice place to be! And stay! I remember our trip to Spreewald, the plan was to stay for one night in Potsdam. After 3 weeks we left Potsdam 🥳🥳. Never seen the Spreewald, but may be in the future. We love Italy, France, Netherland, Spain, Greece etc., not longer flying to USA because of our dogs. I can´t imagine to work in the States, I love my work, don´t mind overtime, but I need my time off. Hanging around lots of hours in an Italian coffeebar, sitting in a french restaurant and let the time flow, walking through the soft hills of Sauerland, biking at Niederrhein with some sidesteps to Venlo/Roermond (Frikandel special). I don´t need to see everything, but what I see, I want to enjoy.

After working 80 hours a week in 9 countries worldwide, I was lucky to retire with 55 years of age here, back in Germany. Since my wife and i are living in a nature reserve, without any roads passing by, we still enjoy the silence and quietness after all the stressful years. We travel when we feel like it, mostly to Scandinavia or Spain. But our highlight is just the silence in our garden, watching the skies and the birds (mostly barn swallows). I started kitesurfing a few years ago and that´s it… We are pretty sure that these abroad living experiences caused some deep-inside tranquility knowing, that there is no other paradise that the one inside you:-) And I worked in change of watersport-centers in Dominican Republic with my office 15 meters away from the Atlantic Ocean… But beeing satisfied comes with the peace inside of each one… (With or without any meditation and/or other supports you may need).

I totally get what you're saying about traveling (and having the vacation days to so so) being a privilege. For many Germans, going to the USA is a once-in-life-time kinda deal and we too tend to travel around and try and see as much as we can.

EDIT: And we, as you say, HAVE the time to travel around. So I can't imagine what traveling to Europe must be like for us citizens.

Denmark is wonderfull with kids!
More general for travelling around Europe: Get yourself a tent(trailer) and enjoy the wonderful campsites because that's definitely the best way to travel with kids. Also as soon as he's in to Lego you can't miss out on Legoland.

Alles basiert auf der "work – live balance" und das bedeutet eben nicht immer dem Geld nachlaufen – nicht immer ist Geld ALLES. Amerika ist mehr konsumorientiert. Genießt das Leben, entspannt und kommt an im Urlaubsland. Nehmt Euch Zeit.

European out of office:
I’m away for the summer. Please email back in September.

American out of office:
I have left the office for two hours to undergo kidney surgery but you can reach me on my cell any time.

In general I do love Italy for vacationing – all over lots of gorgeous architecture and culture, terrific food, wonderful nature and very friendly people -my 3 favourites are Cinque Terre, Sicilia and Amalfitana, not to forget Roma and Venice – and we like to stay in places called Agriturismo, gorgeous! these are (often used to be) farms that offer rooms or apartments for vacation – enjoy Thailand for the rest of your trip and come home safely