We will be staying in Ortisei at the end of our European trip and have to calculate how much driving time we will need to get from Ortisei to the Munich airport in order to have enough time to return our rental car before our flight departure. I would appreciate hearing from anyone who has done this trip. How are the roads (highway all the way)? Are there any mountain passes on the route? What is your estimation of the driving time required?

We are planning to stay in Ortisei 6 days but may decide to change that to 5 days with a last day in Innsbruck or Munich to ensure that we don't miss our flight.

Any help from fellow fodorites would be greatly appreciated.

The first 20 kms are a mountain road (the same you may have used in order to go to Ortisei), then it's all motorway up to Munich airport (280 kms). Be aware that this motorway is used by tons of heavy trucks (most important highway between italy and Northern Europe), therefore your average speed may be slower than usual.

The motorway goes over the Brenner Pass 1350m. There may be some snow and ice in winter (rather seldom). Traffic jams at he beginning and end of holiday periods may be more disturbing, however.
There are tons of sights along the highway, not only Innsbruck, but also the mountain valleys around Kitzbuehel or the royal castles around Chiemsee (a bit east of Rosenheim).

Will you be renting the car in Italy to begin with? If so, you might consider dropping it off inside Italy and taking the train to Munich. It's 4 hours or less depending on where you catch the train. I believe there are car rental offices near train stations in Bolzano and Bressanone (Brixen).

I would extimate the driving time to 4.30-5 hours in normal driving conditions; a couple of hours to get to Innsbruck, a couple of hours to get to Munich, 30 to 60 minutes around Munich. Remember that you need an Austrian highway sticker, and on the top of it the motorway till Innsbruck is paid separately.

Neckervd is right: in July and August the highway is used by a lot of persons and on Saturdays and sometimes Sundays the traffic comes to a standstill. I make a point of never driving on a summer Saturday on the Brenner highway - I found a Saturday where the traffic was so jammed that the only option was heading to a side valley and hiring an hotel room for an extra night waiting for queues to dissolve. I would say that queues are frequent in summer also on the German section past Rosenheim, so allow some extra time.

Thank you all for your comments. Based on what you have said, we will play it safe and do half the journey the day prior to our flight.

FYI, our trip will start mid-May with Vienna (my husband was born in Vienna and, although he no longer has any living relatives there, we still go back quite regularly). At the end of our week in Vienna we will rent a car and head to the Austrian alpine town of Bad Hofgastein for 6 days, followed by Ortisei for another 6 days (now changed to 5). We plan to drop off the car in Munich.

Asps, your comments about the possibility of gridlock on the highway is what we feared so, taking into consideration all of your comments, we are opting for "better safe than sorry".

Thanks again.

Hi Aljo-
Adding to Sandralists's ideas, since you are renting your car in Austria, you can avoid the inter-country drop fee by returning it in Austria. Innsbruck or Kufstein are 2 logical cities. There are non-stop trains from both cities to the Munich Hauptbahnhof for under 100 € total and less than 2 hours (50 € and 1 hour from Kufstein). It takes about an hour to get from The Munich Hauptbahnhof to the Munich airport via S-Bahn 1 or 8, including wait times, times to locate the tracks, etc. (Check the www.Bahn.de website for train and S-Bahn details.) If your flight is before noon you should spend the night in Munich and visit some sights there (Marienplatz?). If your flight is in the afternoon you could still stay in Munich the night before or you could stay in the city you dropped your car.

Have a great trip!!!