Hi folks,

I'm hoping to crowdsource some ideas for a family trip (2 adults in mid-30s (self and wife), 2 in early 60s (my parents), and my gregarious and well-traveled 2-year-old). Everyone is highly mobile.

I usually avoid Europe in August: it's hot, there's not always good (by US standards) air conditioning, popular places are crowded, locals go on vacation, and so on.

But my parents had particular dates they were available, and I was able to get the TATL flights booked at great rates for all of us (AF J into CDG on miles, AA J -- with SWUs cleared at booking for all 5 of us on FCO-DFW). We don't actually want to do Paris or Rome this trip, but those were the best TATL options and it's not too hard to connect in and out. So we have 7 nights beginning August 29.

I'm hoping for some advice on fun places and properties (not necessarily Marriott-branded, but I'd like to start here because this is the sort of trip where benefits like upgrades, breakfast, lounge access and so forth would be appreciated, or where a fun Autograph Collection or Luxury Collection property that I might not have heard of would be a nice surprise). I've looked on this map of "all" Marriott properties (https://millionmilesecrets.com/guide...rriott-hotels/) but it's missing obvious things like the Marriott in Tirana Albania, so I don't know that I can trust it to have hidden gems.

Constraints:

1. We can go anywhere in Europe, but don't want to do UK/Ireland, Italy/Greece/Croatia (except maybe Como/Lugano region of Italy or Istria in Croatia), or Paris, Madrid, Prague, Budapest, or Vienna. (Mostly because we've recently done those places!)
2. Slight preference to countries we haven't visited before, which would be Denmark, Belgium, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania on the north side, and Slovenia, Albania, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, Bosnia, or Romania on the south side.
3. Slight preference for north (cooler weather) over south, but strong preference for good air conditioning (at least capable of cooling to 20C/68F)... would rather have 90F temps outside with good A/C inside than 75F temps with poor A/C. Probably not looking for a beach trip. Would definitely be into something in the mountains (Lake Bled looks cool, but where to stay?) or a walkable city.
4. Edited: since posting this, I have decided that we'll spend the first night in Reims at La Caserne Chanzy. I booked a rooftop duplex for us and a king room for the parents, we'll do a Champagne tasting that afternoon. Then we can easily take the TGV back to CDG on Wednesday August 30 to hop to the next destination. I'm open to splitting up the remaining 6 nights any way that seems reasonable: 2-2-2 or 3-2-1 or something else (we may spend the last night near FCO unless we can get a good connecting flight from wherever on September 5 to make the 1:55pm FCO-DFW flight).
5. Ideally I'd book a regular room for my parents and a suite for myself + wife + kid, where the suite has a separate living room where we can put the crib. But we can tolerate a junior suite for some of the nights.
6. We like cities with walkable "old town" areas, we also like beautiful countryside (on the higher end, places like Schloss Fuschl, the Grand Hotel Victoria in Menaggio, or the Villa Spalletti Trivelli in Rome are properties we've loved; ).
7. Budget is flexible, anything in the $150-500 per room per night range is tolerable, could go higher if it were worth it (or if needed to secure a suite w/ a separate living room).
8. Would like to be able to get from Destination A to Destination B without too much difficulty, but a pair of connecting flights (or even an overnight train) is fine.

For context, we typically do 2+ Europe trips a year. We did a trip (with different relatives) last August (1 night at FRA, 2 nights at the Gewandhaus in Dresden, 4 nights at the Andaz Prague, 3 in Menaggio, 2 in Lugano) and thoroughly enjoyed it. Flew into FRA, train to DRS, train to PRG, flew EasyJet to MXP, rented a car, flew out of MXP.

Some thoughts I've had so far:

1. The Marmorosch in Bucharest, the Telegraaf in Tallinn?
2. The Marriott in Tirana actually looks cool for a big-city Marriott, do we want to spend 2-3 days in Tirana though?
3. What other mountain/lake areas are there like Lake Bled that seem off the usual US-tourist's beaten path? Anything similar with a Bonvoy (or Hyatt/SLH) property?
4. Not Marriott, but Pädaste Manor (a SLH property) in Estonia looks cool, but no FT reviews, TA reviews are mixed, but could be covid-era-cutback-related? Are there any Marriott properties that come to mind that are like this, sort of a countryside luxury or semi-luxury property?

Bottom line, I'm not asking anyone to plan my whole itinerary (though, I wouldn't say no...) -- but mostly looking for help brainstorming here! I've traveled a fair bit and I think we mostly want to see new places on this trip. I would probably be perfectly happy picking Riga and Tallinn at semi-random and calling it a day, but I don't want to miss out on an opportunity to stay somewhere unique that I just wouldn't have thought of.

Help!

Thanks in advance.