I've identified a few good lodging choices (hotel/vacation rental) in the town or area around Fussen and Garmisch. I plan to stay about 4 nights in the base town to explore the sights nearby including the castles, Zugspitze, etc.
Please let me know your thoughts on the following to help make a decision -
Thanks much!
My first choice would be Oberammergau, between Füssen and Garmisch-Partenkirchen. It has a train station, but the rail line intersects the Munich-GaPa (Garmisch-Partenkirchen) line to the north, in Murnau, so it's a little bit of a roundabout to go by train to GaPa. There is no reason at all to need a car there; public transportation is very good.
There are regular buses from Oberammergau to the GaPa Bahnhof (next to the Zugspitzebahn) in about 40 minute. From GaPa there are trains to Mittenwald or Reutte.
You can also go by bus from GaPa to Kochelsee on a beautiful route going along Walchensee.
You can also go from Oberammergau to Hohenschwangau (castles) by bus in less than an hour and a half.
There are buses to Linderhof in about 15 minutes.
As a place to stay in Oberammergau, I would recommend Gästehaus Richter. It's very close to the train/bus station. Paula Richter speak very good English (a lot of people from the NATO base stay there), and the price is very good for Oberammergau.
When I stayed there in 2007, I had no problem finding restaurants in town; there were lots. Because I was staying in a Gästehaus and eating in restaurants, I had no need to find grocery stores. I'm not interested in shopping, but there are lots of shops in town selling wood carvings.
Oberammergau is the epitome of charm.
Ditto to everything Lee said. We usually travel by car in this area and Oberammergau, specifically Gasthaus Richter, is the perfect place to stay.
We also have stayed and traveled by car in the area. We loved our two stays in Fuessen at the Hotel zum Hechten. www.hotel-hechten.com
We also loved our two stays in Mittenwald, 20 minutes or so from Garmisch.
If I had to decide between all mentioned options, it would be Mittenwald, even if it's not the most convenient of them all for day tripping. Fuessen would be a close second.
Paul
The responses you have received have already shown that you almost can't go wrong in this beautiful region!
I stayed one week in Garmisch-Partenkirchen and loved it. Very easy to get to sites, lots of restaurants, grocery, etc. A nice blend of outdoors and tourist activities. I think that you will be happy which ever town you pick, so consider focusing in on the attributes of the lodging choices as a more important factor in your decision.
If ascending Zugspitze is a priority, I would base myself either in GaP or over the border in Erhwald. The reason is that you can access the mountain quickly before foul weather moves in. Füssen is about an hour away, so conditions could conceivably change by the time you arrive.
Both have ample places to eat and shop.
There are no particularly steep mountain roads you would need to drive for either location. The road through Austria between the two winds a little around Reutte, but this shouldn't pose any driving challenges.
The entire region (except Reutte) has charm and character galore. I wouldn't describe either as more or less touristy than the other, because they each host thousands of visitors a year. But the tourist industry in Füssen is more the type that exists to sell you trinkets, whereas GaP is more of a place to service your outdoor adventure needs. And GaP hosts nightly live concerts in it's beautiful Kurgarten. So I would give preference to GaP.
Appreciate everyone's input! It's great to know that both Fussen, GnP as well as Oberammergau that some of you recommended are all good choices for different reasons. I'll certainly approach the decision based on preferences for lodging. Thanks again and I can't wait to finalize the plans!
We are booked at Toscana in Fussen? Anyone have experiences at this place? Looks very nice with good reviews.
Does anyone know if tickets are needed in advance to visit the two castles (NSchwenstein...)? Thanks again for great participation. You are helping all of us
Does anyone know if tickets are needed in advance to visit the two castles (NSchwenstein...)? It depends on the time of year. When I lived in Germany, a visit to Neuschwanstein was high on the priority list of guests that I hosted. In multiple trips shuttling guests from my house 3 hours away, they always were able to purchase tickets soon after arrival and only once was their entry to the castle delayed longer than 2 hours.
The big caveat.... we never went during the busiest time of year, the summer.
In 2009, I was in Hohenschwangau on August 31. I was on my way from Pfronten to Munich, and I stopped long enough to take some pictures for the Füssen page on my website. At that time, there was a short line for Neuschwanstein (it filled less than half of the serpentine inside the building).
I was there again around noon in 2013, on the last Saturday of Oktoberfest. I thought everyone would be in Munich at Oktoberfest. Surprise, there was a looong line for Neuschwanstein. They had set up barriers to form a serpentine outside the kiosk, and there were more people outside than inside.
I'm not sure if lines have gotten worse in 4 years, or if there were a lot of people in Bavaria at Oktoberfest time. Compared to four years earlier, there were a lot of Asians tourists. Perhaps they couldn't get tickets for the last weekend so they were visiting Füssen.
If you are going to be staying the night before in Füssen, you should be able to get out to Hohenschwangau before the lines get long.
