Romantic Road between Wurzburg and Rothenburg

The "Romantic Road" is a marketing strategy created for tourists. I don't think there is anything that special about the road itself - the towns are the real attraction, so I wouldn't worry about missing something. Just concentrate on the places you want to see and calculate your route from there

Oh yes, I am aware the Road itself is not the attraction.
However, my question remains on the space between Wurzburg and Rothenburg.....the towns in that stretch.
We will have a car and there are parts of our 2 week trip that will be well planned with attractions to see but for this part we are hoping to stop where we feel like it so the question on that stretch of "road" was asked.

" Efficient routing." I would tell you to stay off the Autobahns, but that in most cases is not efficient routing. I would meander on secondary roads, thru/stopping at towns of choice along the way. If that does not meet your timeline than maybe plan again. I understand folks have a limited time/budget etc. Germany by Autobahn in my opinion is not the way to see the Country. I can't speak to the Romantic Road, but I can recommend taking the lesser traveled path.

I've visited these very nice places on the Main River route south from Würzburg to Rothenburg... Sommerhausen, Ochsenfurt, and Marktbreit. Unlike the RR towns in this area, they are, geographically, in between W'burg and R'burg. I found them more interesting and attractive altogether than the Romantic Road towns I'd seen previously in this region. If you are driving the RR south for sure, you'll miss these places, but maybe you could visit them on a day trip from W'burg or from R'burg.

You probably have all kinds of Romantic Road information - it's extremely well publicized - so if you skip all or part of the RR route between R'burg and W'burg, you'll likely know what you're missing. Because I respect the work of the videographer who made the above video, here's his take on a couple of those RR towns for your consideration.

A very nice place in the area is Bad Windsheim and its excellent open-air museum with a fine collection of historic buildings from the area. It's very near Rothenburg and not so far from Nuremberg - and it's in between both of these places. I wouldn't hesitate to spend half a day there if you're traveling between Nuremberg and Rothenburg.

I have driven in this part of Germany previously - picked up a car in Würzburg once - but all the places I've mentioned in this post were visited by train, so I can't say what the drive is like, only that I was glad to be riding the train, hopping off and on at these places and enjoying the traffic-free scenery on the way.

Creglingen has a nice carved altar.

If the open air museum is running in Bad Windsheim then stop there. It's a nice little town. Neustadt on der Aisch is halfway between Wurzburg and Nuremberg (but not on the Romantishestrasse) and it's worth stopping to see. Nice tower and central plaza, part of the old walls, nice country.

Würzburg itself is a gem. You could easily spend some days in arround Würzburg and enjoy the wine, the city and the beautiful landscape.

Most of the Romantic Roads medieval walled towns are between Rothenburg and Augsburg.

There are two interesting routes from Würzburg to Rothenburg.

The first goes from Würzburg up the Main river to Ochsenfurt (as described by Russ above), then over into the Tauber Valley via Creglingen to Rothenburg. The most interesting place in the Main valley is Marktbreit, because it was a "mini-capital" of one of the "mini-states" of the "Holy Roman Empire" (consisting of the "capital" plus six villages), with "Residence", "Court church" (with an interesting picture bible on the walls of the gallery) and a renaissance town hall built on an arch over the Breit river (to which the place owes its name; the best photo motif results if you go left twice after the church to the other end of the "town"). Route: From Würzburg on the B13 to Ochsenfurt, then following the Main river to Marktbreit. Back to Ochsenfurt (below the church there's a row of pretty tiny half-timbered houses), continue on the B13 towards Ansbach / Munich. After leaving the valley (after about 2km) turn right to Aub, also a forgotten town with a pretty marketplace, and continue to Creglingen (cf. route 2).

The second route goes from Würzburg directly into the Tauber valley: From Würzburg on the B19 over the (boring) heights down to Bad Mergentheim, beautifully situated in the Tauber valley, former main residence of the Teutonic Order in southern Germany (castle, historic marketplace; in the nearby village Stuppach the famous Madonna by Matthias Grünewald, painter of the Isenheimer Altar in Colmar). Then always follow the river in the direction of Rothenburg: After 10km: Markelsheim, main place of wine growing in that part the Tauber valley; tasting and sale at the cooperative "Weingärtner Markelsheim". The next station is Weikersheim, with beautiful Renaissance castle and castle park. After 20km: Creglingen. 1 km outside in direction Rothenburg the Hergottskirche, with the undisputed masterwork of Tilman Riemenschneider, the Mary altar made of limewood (in Rothenburg St. Jakob there is similar altar of Riemenschneider, which many tourists consider to be his main work, because they do not know the Creglingen one). Continue through the lovely Tauber valley to Dettwang below Rothenburg, where there is another Riemenschneider altar in the romanesque village church, but much simpler than the other two. If you compare the three, you can see that Riemenschneider's workshop delivered quality according to the solvency of the client ;). For my taste, the second route has more to offer.

When I did the Romantic Road in 2007, I identified two places I wanted to see between Rothenburg and Würzburg, Weikersheim, with it's palace and gardens, and Bad Margentheim, for the Deutschordens castle. I feel that seeing them was worthwhile.

I did the entire road with public transportation, train and bus. The second day, between Landsberg and Nördlingen was by train, as was the last run from Bad Mergentheim to Würzburg. The rest was by bus. I started in Wieskirche at noon the first day (I had already been in Füssen 3 times) and was in Weikersheim at noon on the fifth day, in Würzburg by dinner on the fifth day, so just over 4 days. Including my last night in Würzburg, I visited 12 venues and spent the night in 5 of them.

You don't mention how much time you are devoting between the two places.

I second Weikersheim and Bad Margentheim, and also Wertheim if you are doing that route. Sommerhausen and Ochsenfurt a different route, though not on the Romantic Road. Also not on the Romantic Road is Iphofen, the best of all places to visit.

Shouldn't miss is a personal choice. I drove through the area with my family. We stopped at Wurzburg, for a night, Rothenburg, for another night, as well as Nordlingen and Dinkelsbuhl en route to Fussen/Neuschwanstein before heading toward Munich. The thing I'd suggest is map out what you want to see/do before you get there. I had looked at Wurzburg and Rothenburg ahead of time and felt our time was well spent. In Nordlingen and Dinkelsbuhl, we stopped and essentially strolled around the quaint towns but didn't really see any memorable sights. I expected to find a TI we could stop at but didn't find one in either town. I should have at least mapped those out.