Rothenburg between Frankfurt & Munich - worth the hassle?? We have Bacharach

"That fairy-tale look"... I'm guessing you mean Fachwerk. I'll let you in on a secret... central and southern Germany is filled with it. It's everywhere, and certainly not confined to the limited number of destinations listed in Mr. Steves' book. You don't need to go out of your way to see stuff like this. You can see it along the Rhine, around Frankfurt, and even within Frankfurt proper itself. In fact, if you want to vist a walled historic town chock-full of Fachwerk, you don't need to drive two hours south to Rothenburg odT. Just go 30 minutes north of Frankfurt to Büdingen. Or a little north of Bacharach to Bad Neuenarh-Arhweiler. Or a little to the south to Michelstadt. Or 90 minutes north of Frankfurt to Fritzlar. Or if you don't need a wall, within an hour of Frankfurt, you have Idstein, Bad Homburg, Wetzlar, Braunfels, Dillenberg, Alsfeld, Eltville am Rhein, Butzbach, Bensheim, Seligenstadt, Heppenheim, Weinheim, Lorsch, etc......

You get the idea.

Hi Linds & Dave-
I would suggest the following- Pick up a car Tuesday at the airport or train station in Frankfurt, then drive to Rothenburg . Spend the night in Rothenburg. Wed morning drive to Fussen for "Mad King castles". Spend the night in Fussen. Thursday morning drive to Munich and visit Dachau. Then drop bags at hotel in Munich & turn car in downtown at train station. This gives you Thurs evening & all day Fri and Sat to explore Munich. Return home on Sunday. If you can stay awake on the return flight Sunday you should be able to get a good nights rest at home Sunday night and then be ready to go back to the grind Mon AM...Incidentally, you don't have to restrict yourself to the hotels in the Munich train station area. The Munich public transportation system is great. Just be sure your hotel is within 3-4 blocks of an U-Bahn or S-bahn station and you are good to go.

Have a great trip!!!

What Tom said. I certainly wouldn't bother going out of your way to visit Rothenburg when so many other towns are just as nice, if not nicer cause they aren't filled with tourists. Towns where you don't have to wait until evening when the tour buses leave, to get a pleasant atmosphere.

In Frankfurt itself, head over to the neighborhood of Höchst which now belongs to the Half-Timbered route that runs through Germany. This is a wonderful route with all of the quaint towns that everyone wants to see.
http://www.deutsche-fachwerkstrasse.de/uk/index.php

Büdingen is my favorite walled town. Idstein is gorgeous, Eltville is one of my favorites on the Rhine itself. No roads or train tracks along the river here, just a great promenade.

Rothenberg is definitely worth a day and night's stay. It is one of those fairytale places and no two places are interchangeable. Each town has its own unique charms. When you get home on Sunday afternoon, go home and crash and get plenty of sleep. Taking the trains is part of the delight of travel in Europe. It is restful not to have to drive and you see astonishing scenery.

We are fans of Rothenburg. It is so popular because it is so attractive. I especially like the way that it is perched over the Tauber River Valley, the setting is as attractive as the town. It is substantially larger than Bacharach with its fortifications mainly still intact. That said, we prefer to visit it in low season. It is mad with tourists in June. If that is an annoyance to you, then...

We like train travel in Germany. It is part of the vacation to us. We have also lived and driven in Germany; that is a nice experience as well. The great thing is that there is no wrong answer. Your instincts are probably your best guide.

"I really like the sound of Rothenburg's description - a charming medieval town with half timbered houses."
Keep in mind that R'burg is largely a reconstruction. After WW II it looked like THIS.

"Will we get enough charm in Bacharach that we can skip the logistical hassle of Rothenburg?"

What Tom said (again.)

But let me just toss in very emphatically the fact that in Bacharach you are surrounded by OTHER charming towns and that to find handsome, old-world, half-timbered towns, walls, and towers, you do not have to travel to all the nice places Tom and Jo mention either! A lot of folks unwisely book one night in Bacharach after a day on the Rhine cruise. But they miss all this, right in Bacharach's back yard:

Oberwesel (5 min. from Bacharach)
Old town wall w/ towers
Town wall map (for exploring each of the 18 numbered towers)
Wine Fest in O'wesel

Boppard (20 min. from Bacharach)
Tea House
Severus Stube in half-timbered alley

Braubach (cross over on St. Goar Ferry, then 20 min. north by train; home of Marksburg Castle
Market Square
Old town scene

Linz am Rhein (further north)
Market Square
Street scene
More towers
Castle Square with old town tower/gate
Popular wine house / eatery with walls from ancient Rome

Castles: while in Braubach, make time for Marksburg (Braubach,) Rheinfels (St. Goar,) and Burg Eltz (near Moselkern on the Mosel) castle tours if you can. Rick's book offers tips on these. These all have a history going back 800 years - Marksburg and Eltz were never destroyed - and they are a world apart from the hypertouristy, late 19th-century King Ludwig "castle" Neuschwanstein (not a real castle at all) near Füssen.

RHEINFELS is In St. Goar, a 10-minute train ride from Bacharach.

Since you are spending most of your time in cities, I would stick with trains. If your goal were to explore the countryside, a car might be a better option, but not for just a one-night; if you went on to Munich the next morning, you would have to really rush to avoid paying for an extra day's rental.

If you decide against Rothenburg, some good options are Bamberg and Regensburg. Or you could go straight to Füssen, visit Ludwig's castles the next morning, and make better use of your time in Munich. I would settle on an itinerary quickly as bahn tickets between Frankfurt and Bavaria are much cheaper three months in advance than close to your travel dates.

Hi,

My vote is not worth the hassle. Lots of examples of half timbered houses, see the town center of Butzbach, between Gießen and Frankfurt, or Minden, or Hamelin. As pointed out above, the central and up north are places to find this type of design.

Rothenburg is Rothenburg. It is a tourist mecca. There is a huge parking place just outside the old city walls. It is like a Busport. My last stop there included pictures of a large Japanese tour group all wearing chartreuse baseball caps. Yes it has been rebuilt, but the walls still feel medieval. A 2-4 hour walk around the Altstadt will let you see everything along with a coffee and Bier stop. Take a walk down towards the Tauber river and look back at the city walls. All the shops cater to tourists. Not sure an original thing exists there but the old walls and cobble streets. Actually being there later in the day when most of the buses have left could be a good thing. I do not think you will be disappointed though as the pictures speak for themselves, and you will have checked the block.

I initially missed the part about afternoon departure from Frankfurt. That would rule out Füssen but other options would work. Still, I would be tempted to go straight to Munich to have extra time there.

Time utilization: Day 1, Stay in St.Goar where Rheinfels castle is located.
You want to walk off jet lag anyway, so you could actually explore the castle later in the afternoon. It’s a doable option if you have early afternoon arrival into St. Goar. We’re 30 years older than you and did this.

Day 2, From St.Goar do the first scheduled KD-Rhine cruise tour. You can hop off and visit Bacharach. Another stop of interest with wine would be Rudesheim. There is also a chair lift to the top for viewing and the Germanic War Memorial. There’s a lovely trail walk along the mountianside but knowing you need to get to Cologne I’d pass on that.

After completion of the Rhine tour, pick up your bags from St. Goar Hotel and get the train to Cologne.

St. Goar: We stayed at Hotel am Makt for its covenience to the train and with your schedule you could even have your evening meal there.

If Rothenberg: If you overnight in Rothenberg you can visit Dachau enroute to Munich. We left our bags in the train lockers. The bus schedule from the Dachua train station is well coordinated and convenient. Pack a small water each, like 16 ounce size, and at least a snack for yourselves. Even though it’s somber you need water, and back on the train you’lbe l be hungry as it will late afternoon by this time.

I don’t know the train schedule from Frankfurt to Munich, but I’m sure you can stop at Dachua even if you decide not to visit Rothenberg.

We opted out of the Neuschwanstein Castle in favor of seeing Rothenberg and having 3N/2 full days for Munich.

PS: I'd plan on flying back home on Saturday versus Sunday. Monday will just be grind, but a very blurry grind coming back on a Sunday. Also, you'd have 1 day if your flight has a delay or whatever to get you back to work for Monday.

R'burg is a neat place and deserves at least a one night stay. Having said that, however, I just don't think you will have time to do all you want and still do justice to R'burg. Just take the fast train from F'furt to Munich and assume you will come back and do R'burg on another trip.

Ah, but they do have time to stop by Büdingen, where you can enjoy the medieval atmosphere all day long and don't need to wait for the masses of tourists to go home, and they don't need to stay overnight there either. They want a medieval town and this one fits the bill perfectly. Hopefully, Rick never comes here or the place will be ruined with souvenir stores and mass tourism.
http://www.buedingen.info/en/places-of-interest/old-town.html

If you opt for Rothenburg, don't miss the nightly Night Watchman Tour - worth every penny. If the tour is in German only - ask someone in the group to translate the main points for you. http://www.tourismus.rothenburg.de/index.php?id=516

Having just spent the day at the castles in Fussen and are currently spending the night in Rothenburg, I would skip Fussen totally in favor of any of your other choices. Fussen is like visiting a tired Disneyland -- thousands of tourists, hundreds of cars/buses, too few bathrooms, mediocre food choices, long trek to top, all to see a set-designer's idea of a castle that was never lived in. We arrived at noon with the Bavarian Museum pass and the best tour time was 4:30. Your visit is also weather dependent -- it snowed today so only had brief views of castle from below. As you are also visiting Munich, plan on a visit to The Residenz where you can see real opulence lived in by real people. Rothenburg, by the way, is delightful. We're staying at the Pension Elke with a view over the town roofs and even though it's rebuilt, it has more atmosphere than other walled medieval towns we've visited in England and France.