5 days anywhere from London in Early Sept. Where would you go

My first choice would be Amsterdam as I much prefer it to the others you listed. It is a small city filled with the old merchant houses many which have been converted to hotels. We stay at Hotel l’Ambassade in the on the Herengracht Canal, in the Canal Ring area. You can take a day trip easily by train to see Delft and The Hague as they near each other.
In your five days two are travel days and Amsterdam is relatively close to London.

Amsterdam works as well as any other in the area. Lots of good options in that area. Unless your schedule is already locked in I would strongly recommend coming home for where you go -- Amsterdam for example. Save lots of time and money. Staying in northern Europe would be a little cooler than southern Europe. I would use the Eurostar and train to get to Amsterdam but those ticket should be bought soon as they get more expensive over time.

dhirshberg85,
I have been to all three places, and the one I wish most to revisit is Munich. There is a lot to see and do in town, the food is wonderful, you are near to Salzburg and Dachau and Rothenburg ob der Tauber and the Romantic Road. Bavaria is a beautiful part of Germany. In the city there is the superb Deutches Museum, the Residenz, Marianplatz (with glockenspiel), the Hofbrauhaus, brewery tours, the English garden and more. I would fly from England, and back, unless you can change your return flight.
Amsterdam is great also, but has become very pricy of late, and doesn't call to me as does Munich (or should I say Bavaria as a whole?) Prague is a bargain, but I would put that further down my list also. We were there in 2004 and were both robbed (different days, different locations). I have a sour taste in my mouth from that trip, although we did enjoy it (aside from the robberies!)

Not on your list, but relatively close to London, is Ireland. Any interest in it? Whatever you decide, I am sure you will have a great trip!

Amsterdam would be a good choice. It won’t be as hot as southern Europe and there are a lot of flights between the two cities so will be easy to schedule a trip that works time wise.

Have you thought of Scotland?

Stay in the UK, lots to see there.

Check out Winchester, Salisbury, Stonehenge, Bath, the Cotswolds, Oxford, Stratford Upon Avon, Canterbury and Cambridge.

Thank you for the incredible amount of responses. Our original plan was Munich, and still may be, but all the responses confirmed that we need to consider Amsterdam, Ireland and Scottland too. All of which were on our short list. After my wife took a deeper dive into Munich, she really like the idea of seeing the nearby Castles and taking day tours to surrounding areas that can be done from the city. I was in Munich about 10 years ago, but only for one day. Thanks to Jet lag and a Bier Garten, I was only able to see a little and always wanted to spend more time there. All good suggestions and thank you!

Scotland for two reasons. You will lose less time in transit by staying in the U.K. And there isn't a language problem; or at least not too much of one. One could easily spend twice that amount of time in Scotland and just scratch the surface. Strongly suggest you consider Edinburgh as a base with a couple of day trips from there.

Unless you go somewhere very close I would suggest that you get back to London or Heathrow by Sept 3. York and Yorkshire come to mind as a possibility. Train is 2 hours from Kings Cross station. Enough time to explore York and take a day tour to explore the Yorkshire dales. Or if you are comfortable driving then rent a car to explore the area. If you don’t have an interest in London then windsor might be a good alternative for your final night. Fairly easy access to Heathrow.

I was going to suggest staying in England as well. We spent 2 weeks in Fall of 2022 touring from Salisbury to Canterbury. Your wife can see some spectacular castles within a 2 hour drive of London.

Realistically, this is a 4.5 day getaway, given travel time. Depending upon your level of willingness to miss the LHR return flight, you would need to be back in England the night before, especially if you're planning on buying a cheap RT to MUC from LHR, for example. Then absolutely as your last leg would be lost if you're delayed. Or you could stay the last night in Windsor, easy commute by taxi to LHR. OR had you considered a multi-leg flight, into LHR and out of MUC? Sorry, should have added - if you book additional ticket on the same carrier alliance, even if it's a separate ticket, the airline will get you onto a new flight for last leg out of LHR, I've done this a few times on Star Alliance & it always worked out... hope that makes sense!

Thank you,
I think this time around we are going to do Munich. I go to the UK on business every couple years, so will try the other suggestions for sure at a later date. Added a day and plan to be back in London a day before our flight back out. Perhaps as I get closer I can figure out a way to fly directly out of Munich, but it will be hard to beat the airfare I got out of Heathrow. RT business class from Miami to LHR around $3500 on BA/AA. Everyone else is significantly higher.

If anyone has a suggestion good hotel locations in Munich to base my stay they would be appreciated as well. Thank you all for the suggestions. Great forum!

Glad to hear you've figured out your priorities! Here are threads about Munich hotels - https://search.ricksteves.com/?utf8=%E2%9C%93&query=Forum+munich+hotel&button=

BUDAPEST

August 30 to 3 September about $150 on Ryan. 2:25 flight time.