Hello all! This is my first post on fodors, as I need some advice. I will be traveling to Germany in September 2006. Our plan was to buy a german railpass for 10 days, and travel from the Frankfurt airport to Oberwesel first. From there, we're going to:
Rudesheim, Wurzburg, Nuremburg, Rothenburg, Augsburg, Munich, and Fussen. We didn't plan to book hotels because we'd like to stay flexible - stay in one town 2 days or 1 day, or as long as we choose. I did, however, want to book my first night's stay in Oberwesel just for the comfort of knowing I had somewhere set to go after being jetlagged. When I wrote to the owner of the hotel, he mentioned that we should rent a car instead because there are many sites we won't be able to reach by train.

So - what are your opinions on this? Is car or train better? Thanks in advance!

Several of the places you mention are on or near the Romantic Road, which is difficult to explore by train. Even when trains reach these places, schedules are often inconvenient, and this would be especially true for a 10-day trip.

If you do rent a car, it would be less expensive to rent in Frankfurt itself, rather than at the airport due to the high surcharge (which is charge for every day of the rental). Of course, if you can afford the higher price, the airport would be more convenient.

Two thoughts: you'll get ultimate travel flexibility with a car even though the rail system in Germany is quite dense.

If you DO decide to rail it, then definitely inout your itinerary at www.railpass.com and compare the cost of point-to-point tickets with that of a pass. The flexibility of a pass is invaluable but it sounds as if your itinerary is fairly well-structured.

Hi G,

I think that you have a good plan for a motor trip.

If you do decide on the train, enter your itinerary at www.railsaver.com and click "only if it saves money" before buying a railpass.

I agree with the others that a car is most likely your best bet for this trip (though I believe there may be buses that go along the Romantic Road, if you really don't want a car). German trains are mostly excellent, but less than great in much of this area.

>German trains are mostly excellent
Only if you're not waiting for a specific train during rush hour. They are NEVER on time. No info, nowhere to ask, nowhere to complain.

That's not unique to the German system; most aren't particularly friendly to people who don't know what's going on, especially at rush hour. If you know what train you're supposed to be on and look at the status boards, you should be fine.

That's right, just that there's something different going on every day. You can't rely on the timetable any more. Connections? Maybe, maybe you have to wait another half hour. Waiting in a traffic jam, you're at least warm and know what's going on . On holiday traveling around, a car can't be replaced.

Gypsy,

I think I can show you where you can save a lot with point to point tickets vs a railpass or rental car.

However, one question. Are you going back to Frankfurt to return home? I would really suggest using an open jaws flight out of Munich. We did that a few years ago, and the ticket was little more than Frankfurt RT. You save the time and expense of going back to Frankfurt.

I would defiitely make this a road trip. If you're just a doing few major cities rail makes sense. but to do the countryside and small towns effectivbely you really will find a car much more convenient.

Also- finding lodging on the fly is much easier with a car than a train - what would you do with your luggage while you look for places to stay? Or will you just hope the tourist office has something good you can get to easily by public transit?

Every place on his list so far is easily accessible by train.

Using his intinerary, I come up with $268 for train tickets, total, for both. Might be as low as $244.

What does a car rental (with insurance) cost for 2 weeks? The difference is a lot to pay just to simplify room hunting.

In the last 5 years I have spent 8 weeks traveling around Bavaria and Baden-Wuerttemberg by train, and Munich was the only big city I visited. I stayed in lots of small towns. Although I did use buses a few times, I never needed a car.

>What does a car rental (with insurance) cost for 2 weeks?
250-300€ plus gas. I would need a car (getting from the station to the B&B can be a pain in the...)
>In the last 5 years
In the last 40 years, I spent too much time waiting for trains... ;-) ;-) in BW as well as in BY.

I agree that a car makes more sense for your itinerary. But I think that it would be wise to make some hotel reservations before you leave - especially for Munich.

Dear Gypsy2,

A train trip is difficult in Germany unless your German is passable - often no one will help you when you ask a question (this is from personal experience and I have reasonable German) - of course you may be lucky, but you cannot bank on it.
Hiring a car from Frankfurt airport could not be easier (they are all located in the airport car park) you simply drive out straight onto the autobahn.

You should however NOT assume that because you are used to driving on right that you will automatically be ok with autobahns. There are very specific rules when driving on them and they can be quite dangerous - especially if you are jet lagged. Saying that, if you do a posting on here asking for help, I am sure you will be given several entries on autobahn driving.

If you are going to Rudesheim to do a cruise along the Rhein, there are other places that you can embark that are closer to Frankfurt (Schierstein / Biebrich area near Wiesbaden). Rudesheim is ok, but very touristy.

>no one will help you
Usually people don't do this on purpose, they are as uninformed as yourself and looking for help. However if you speak passable German, you can have nice chats about how Deutsche Bahn has come down to being a ... company in the recent years and how helpless you as as customer are, and how come that prices are going up by 7% every year. It's a standard situation for somebody who wants to learn German. Just go to the station ;-)

Thanks for all of the information so far - I honestly was hoping the trip could be done by train, but it seems that the consensus here is to do it by car. The are a few reasons I didn't want use a car - one is the additional expense. Second would the stress of having to read maps and road signs with the possibility of getting lost.... the train knows exactly where to take me. I also thought that train travel would be faster, getting me from point a to point b in much less time than driving would. Lastly, is the difficulty in parking. On the other hand - I don't know when I will ever have the opportunity to return to Germany, and want to make this an incredible trip. That being said, it's probably worth the extra expense of the car from what everyone is saying. I did the point to point expense for the train, and the railpass seemed to be better deal - it was only about 50 euros more than point to point, so we thought the flexibility was worth the slight increase. Oh - and we are flying into Frankfurt and out of Munich.

I'm enjoying everyones input....

Even if you don't speak German, if you ask nicely and people know the answer and aren't in a huge hurry (young people are good, because they are less likely to be in a hurry, more likely to speak English, and often happy to practice their English), you'll still find people to help you. Yeah, rush hour may not be a great time to be trying to do that, but besides that, you'll be alright. As for standing around waiting for trains, that's usually because someone didn't check the timetable (delayed trains happen, but aren't very common).

That said, I still don't really recommend train for that specific itinerary, though it is possible.

Go with the car for much of this particular trip. There are a lot of nice places to stop along much of the way that you can't get to easily by train or bus.

Depending on how long you plan to stay around the Rhein River area and what you planned to do in the area, I would actually use the train for the Rhein, Wurzburg, Nurnberg part of the trip (also check out the small city of Bamberg perhaps in place of Nurnberg). Rent a car from Nurnberg (or Bamberg). Drive to Rothenburg then down the Romantic Road (stopping where you want) to Fussen or Schwangau or Hohenschwangau (the castles are located in Hohenschwangau).

Then head to Munich (I'd recommend through northern Austria along the Plansee, back into Germany with a stop at Linderhof Palace, Ettal, and some towns, perhaps Oberammergau).

Save Munich for last as you don't need a car in Munich--drop your car off when you arrive in Munich.

Are you thinking about buying a new (German) car in the near future? If not, ignore the rest of this post.

When you buy a BMW, Mercedes, or Porsche, and pick it up in Germany, the difference between the American and European delivery prices will pay for the trip - plus you'll have a "free" car for the entire vacation. The automobile manufacturers also frequently offer free accommodations and twofer air tickets.