My wife and I are finalizing our trip to Germany in May. We arrive in Munich at 7:30 PM and are picking up our rental car. We are going to do Neuschwanstein the next day and I am trying to decide where to stay that first night we are in Germany. Would it be better to drive all the way to Fussen and get a room or stay around Munich and drive in the morning? I would like to take one of the first couple tours of the day for Neuschwanstein. Any suggestions of places to stay between the two or an approximate time to drive between the two would be appreciated.

Thanks

Are you coming in from Europe, N. America, or somewhere else? If you are not coming from Europe I strongly advise you not to drive at all when you first arrive. Stay in Munich, maybe at an airport hotel. You will be dead tired by 7:30pm and in no condition to drive. I can understand that you want to get there early and beat the crowds at Neuschwanstein, but your safety is far more important.

Good advice above.

If you are able to drive and feel good, Garmisch would be a good location. It is autobahn all the way and probably about 1.5 hour drive. Nice area. It gets you into the Alps area and a pretty drive over to Neuschawanstein the next day.

Re the Neuschwanstein tours: some are in English and many are not. Be prepared to POSSIBLY wait until enough English speakers show up for them to offer a tour in English if that is an absolute requirement for your visit.

This may or may not depend on the time of year. When I last visited (it was in September) we ended up waiting about 45 minutes for an English language tour to begin.

If you wan t to drive just halfway to Fuessen, you would enjoy Landsberg am Lech. This is where you will have to get off the Autobahn anyhow to head south to Fuessen on the B-17 national road (Bundestrasse).

To get there, take the Autobahn from the airport to the Munich by-pass autobahn A-99. Although it is a bit longer, take the A-99 clockwise (heading toward the Garmisch-Partenkirchen Autobahn). Go on the A-99 by-pass PAST the Garmisch autobahn (A-95) and follow the signs to the Autobahn A-96, Landsberg, Lindau.

The A-99 by-pass counter clockwise is not finished and it is easy to get lost between the A-8 and A-96.

If you want to get over your jet lag and stay near the airport, I have found the Hotel Kastanienhof in Erding (15 minutes by car from the airport)to be a good place. If after your nap you feel like taking the S-Bahn (suburban train) into the Munich city center (45 minutes), the train station is right acvross from the hotel.

dhouse;

If you know the area, have traveled by car before in Germany and depending on the time of year this can be done. If you have never driven in Munich, navigating from the airport can be tricky and is probably best saved for early morning after a good nights sleep.

Clea

Additional information:
We will be coming from Ireland so jet lag should not be much of a problem. Thanks for the responses so far.

Thanks for that extra info, it makes all the difference. I'm sure you can handle that one-hour time change, so no jet lag.

A few years ago we were driving from Munich to Fussen. We left Munich in the afternoon and I was too tired to finish the drive, so we stopped in a delightful town called Peiting. I think it was only about 45 minutes to Fussen when we left the next day.

Just want to point out that it is not necessary to stay in Fussen when seeing Neuschwanstein. There are several hotels in Schwangau, in the valley just below Neuschwanstein and Hohenschwangau (another Ludwig castle). We stayed at the Hotel Mueller, which was very pleasant. And were up early the next morning to see the castle the first thing before the crowds. We were driving, not sure how this would work with public transportation. But we left our car at the hotel while we visited Neuschwanstein, so got parking also.

If you stay in the village of Hohenschwangau, you can easily walk to the ticket center. We stayed in a very nice pension with a modern private bath, balcony, free parking, breakfast included for 64 euro double per night.

It used to be called Romantic Pension Neuschwanstein, now it's Romantic Pension Albrecht. It is right below Neuschwanstein castle.

http://www.albrecht-neuschwanstein.de/index2.html

You can purchase advanced tickets online to castles. If you want to guarantee the time you wish to visit will be available but of course there is a reservation fee.
http://www.hohenschwangau.de/546.0.html.
Another hotel is Schwangauer Hof Hotel. It is also on same website. It was quiet hotel and we could se the castle lighted at night from our room. Good breakfast and in town of Horn(Schwangau). It did not take very long to get to castle area 5 min?

I think I may have made an error in judgement by the responces here...we are arriving to Munich in the A.M from Toronto, getting our rental car and I booked a hotel in Salzburg for the first night. Maybe this is unrealistic for my husband to drive to? We really would like to get away from the city the first night.

grebbs, my husband and I flew into Nuremburg about 3 weeks ago and immediately rented a car and drove to Rothenberg without any problems. Some people have a real problem with jetlag when they arrive and others don't. It all depends on how well you or your husband handle it. Once you leave Munich is all Autobahn to Salzburg so it shouldn't be too difficult of a drive. We usually don't get too tired or "feel the jetlag" until afternoon/early evening so driving right away is never a problem for us. We try not to do any real long drives on the day we arrive but a few hours is usually not a problem for us.
Tracy

Hotel Kastanienhof in Erding

Oh my god - I lived in that hotel for 3 months! It is a nice place.

tcreath has it right. Jet lag is very personal. Mrs. Fly and I are so excited when we arrive someplace on vacation that the adrenalin carries us for hours. Of course we collapse that night, but driving for a couple of hours would be no problem for us.

On the other hand, when we traveled with friends to Italy a couple of years ago, they were wiped out riding in the car to our first destination. Mrs. Fly and I went out sightseeing right after checking in, they went to their rooms. We picked them up at around 8 p.m. to go to dinner.

By 11 p.m. Mrs. Fly and I collapsed in our room and slept until mid-morning.