I can understand why someone would want to spend a week in Munich. It is a great city with tons of stuff to see. When you consider the day trips outside the city as well, I can definitely see spending a week there. We spent several days there in July and will definitely be going back again.

I could spend a week at the Deutsches Museum alone.

I would recommend a car for your Munich to Garmisch leg of your trip. Public transportation in Southern Germany is available, but not always convenient.

DAX, I have pretty much a negative interest in traveling in Italy. Süd Tirol (and possibly Lake Como) would be the only exceptions. Since the Süd Tirol was formerly a part of the Austrian Empire, German is a common language there. In fact it is one of the two official languages and many of the town websites are in German and Italian.

As for Trenitalia, I understand that it is quite unreliable. I have heard, in fact, that the arrival boards in stations do not list the track number in advance because they never know when the train will arrive, and, therefore, what track will be available for it. What a contrast to Germany. Only once in almost 20 years have I ever seen a German train arrive on a different track than the one scheduled.

I have only made about 100 or so train connections in Southern Germany in the last six years, but in my limited experience the trains there have been comfortable, convenient, reliable, and very economical.

Between 6 AM and 11 PM, there is at least one train per hour leaving Munich Hbf for Garmisch-Partenkirchen. The trip takes about an hour and 25 minutes. Via Michelin estimates the driving time at 1 hr 8 min, but if you have to spend time renting a car, it is definitely faster to Garmisch by train. If you buy a €25 Bayern Ticket (probably less than the cost of car rental plus fuel), it not only covers the Munich to Garmisch trip, but any travel in Munich getting to the main station and any bus travel around the Garmisch area that day. It even includes a 10% discount for the Zugspitz Bergbahn. It might not (?) include the city bus in Garmisch, but it includes all of the bus lines of the RVO (Regional Verkehr Oberbayern). The map of the Werdenfels area (http://www.bahn.de/-S:-ptVOR9:eiwQKt...ls_karte.shtml), shows some of the bus and rail lines in the Garmisch-Partenkirchen area.

I meant to say southern Bavaria not Germany - sorry.

You indicated that you were planning on hiking in the GaP area during the last weekof your trip. If so, you probably won't need a car there either. The Garmisch-Partenkirchen website lists several dozen hikes that start from town. Additionally, RVO has a bus connection to Kochel am See, which looks like a good area to hike and explore. Lastly I might suggest that a Werdenfels day ticket for €9 per person, €18 for both of you, is less expensive than Bayern Ticket. With it you could travel round trip via the Ausserfernbahn to Reutte (www.reutte.at) or Pfronten-Ried (www.pfronten.de). In Reutte, you could hike to the Ehrenberg castle; from Pfronten there is a trail up to the Falkenstein ruins, where Ludwig wanted to build his last castle.

If you want to mix a little sightseeing with your hiking, RVO runs buses from Garmisch to Oberammergau, Schloss Linderhof, and Ettal Monastery. You can find these bus schedules by going to http://www.rvo-bus.de/site/rvo__bus/...ahrplaene.html. When you select Garmisch-Partenkirchen for "Regionen"; the pulldown by "Buslinien" shows the various bus lines around GaP. Select a line, then click on "PDF
herunterladen" in the popup window. Line 9606 goes to Ettal, Oberammergau, Wieskirche (but doesn't stop long enough to see anything), and Füssen. Line 9622 goes from Oberammergau to Ettal and Linderhof. 9608 goes to Kochel. In general, the bus fares are low, but the most you should pay is for an RVO Tageskarte (day ticket) at €8, which gives one person unlimited travel for a day on all of the RVO buses.

willis, are you sucking all this good stuff up? Try to formulate some sort of itinerary now and bring it back to the board for peaceful critique.