Itinerary check and rental car?

I'm reading this as Oberammergau will be the base for the Bavarian visits, in which case this is one of the better itineries I've seen in this forum! What are these crowds you are expecting?

how many is we ? Bavarian regional transport prices mostly include group tickets for up to 5 people for a lot less than that number of single persons. But they exclude the mountain section of the Zugspitze railway which doesn't have competition from cars. These day tickets cover your intinery up to arrival at Salzburg (some with a 09:00 start on working days). There is a new alpine express bus route between Murnau near Oberammergau and Rosenheim, half way between Munich and Salzburg, which gives you a scenic option avoiding the city. https://www.mvv-muenchen.de/en/vernetzte-mobilitaet/alpenbus/

I'll let other people give their negative opinions about "those castles" - all I'll say is that they are not as close as they look and you could consider Linderhof instead.

Salzburg-Prague should be easy with a change of train at Linz, there was some confusion last week over engineering work on the Linz - Czech border section, but even then the confusion was a bigger problem than the actual change to schedule!

There are 2 of us and I know the Salzburg Festival will be in full swing while we are there. I'll look into the bus! Sounds interesting. Thanks for the help, me.crewe!

I hope you are using the DB website to research all your trips accurately.

Bus schedules for Oberammergau / Füssen / Neuschwanstein Castles stop can also be found there. Note that travel times and the number of changes required are irregular throughout the day. You will have to pin down a schedule to make this work, which should include tour reservations, the walking time between bus stops and the palace in question, etc., and you will have to maintain that schedule meticulously. FAR less time-consuming would be to skip all that and use the bus (20-30 minutes each way on ONE bus) to visit Linderhof Palace from Oberammergau, a route which is well served throughout the day.

The glaring omission in the German Alps is Mittenwald, where you would have river gorges, mountain lifts, great scenery, and perhaps the most gorgeous little village in the area, all in one place.

https://www.alpenwelt-karwendel.de/en/mittenwald-bavaria

Thanks Russ. Looks like the earliest bus will get us to Füssen around noon. We can have lunch and tour the town and then head to the castles later in the afternoon. The last bus to Oberammergau departs around 6. This will give us plenty of time since we do not plan to tour the interior of the castle.

Stephen, I think you will enjoy Oberammergau. I was there about 15-16 years ago and really enjoyed it. It's a charming and very picturesque town, very walkable and in a beautiful area.

Enjoy your trip! And I need to get back there again!