Southern Germany Itinerary Advice - Car Travel Week of 9/27/26

I'd skip Munich altogether as it's Oktoberfest, and you are looking at limited room availability at unlimited prices.

I'd also suggest using some alternative planning resources. Rick's rec's for southern Germany tend toward hyper-touristy. A few ideas below to get somewhat off the beaten track:

Regensburg: https://tallgirlbigworld.com/things-to-do-regensburg-germany/

Bamberg: https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/624/

Nuremberg: https://img.fotocommunity.com/altstadt-nuernberg-efa800b3-84be-4b9a-b839-87ca97e73790.jpg?height=1080

Nördlingen: https://www.noerdlingen.de/fileadmin/noerdlingen/prospekte/pdf/Ortsprospekt_Englisch-Franzoesisch_2019.pdf

Besigheim, wine town on the Neckar River N. of Stuttgart: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M1xqGvinerc

Tübingen: https://img.fotocommunity.com/rathaus-tuebingen-0510713e-273d-43ae-b91e-32c909ee8ab4.jpg?height=1080

Gengenbach: https://www.orte-bw.de/grafik/uploads/10557_2010_1040.JPG

Ludwigsburg: https://www.schloss-ludwigsburg.de/en/

Sigmaringen (Danube River town... our view from Karl's Hotel there looked much like this.)
https://img.fotocommunity.com/sigmaringen-schloss-706f396f-55f2-4ed0-ae8f-fbf0b447e4db.jpg?height=1080

Also, https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/switzerland/interesting-town-near-swiss-german-border

I consider Munich over-rated, but that is not the view of this news board. You don’t mention a mountain cable-car like in Garmisch, which I’d prefer to a beer party. They have beer up on the mountain.

Thursday - 10/1 - Leave early drive from Rothenberg to Stuttgart
- Tour the Porsche Museum as well as factory tour
- Dinner and overnight in Stuttgart

Please go online and book your factory tour as well as your hotel as soon as possible. You are visiting Stuttgart during the annual Volksfest. Similar to Oktoberfest with around 4 million visitors. Porche is in the northern suburbs. I've stayed at the Mecure Zuffenhause (business focused bare bones 3-star hotel) right down the street. Short walk to the metro if you want to leave the car to head into central Stuttgart.

Dinner at the Volksfest is very doable on a Thursday evening without any advance planning or reservation if you want that experience. Tents with beer, food, singing and dancing. I can also recommend https://www.carls-brauhaus.de/ on the Schlossplatz in Stuttgart.

I'd skip Munich altogether as it's Oktoberfest

Agree with Russ' perspective about Munich during Oktoberfest. And I urge you not to take Dachau off your planned itinerary. A hotel in or near Dachau should still be reasonably priced as its a bit far for most who are traveling to Munich for Oktoberfest.

As for Marienplatz, Residenz, etc. in Munich, I suggest your replace them with similar sites in other cities (e.g. Wurzburg). No disrespect to Munich as I will be there twice this year, including Oktoberfest.

Have you considered reversing that route?
Zurich-Konstanz-(Hohenzollern Castle)-Triberg-Baden-Baden-Stuttgart-(Ludwigsburg)-Rothenberg ob de Tauber-Dachau-Fussen-Lindau-Zurich?

If you're just finishing a Porsche Schweiss driving tour this way you'd be seeing different scenery for most of your trip then returning to mountains at the end. Might seem more "refreshing" that way.

Tuesday - 9/29 - Arrive Munich, have dinner and walking tour... Marienplatz, Residenz, etc.

Have you booked your hotel in Munich already? If not, it's almost too late. And as others have already mentioned, prices are much higher than usual. So if you're not in Munich for Oktoberfest, I would skip it.

And the advice to book a hotel directly in Dachau is not bad, but Dachau is very close to Munich and therefore the hotels there will be fully booked quickly as well during Oktoberfest.

We considered something similar last year and then I looked at the price of rental cars that crossed the border from Switzerland into Germany and about fainted. It may be cheaper for you to take a train from Switzerland to Germany, and then pick up the rental car inside of Germany. It is very easy to drive around Germany.

Also, regarding the Auto museums in Stuttgart. We went to the Mercedes museum and while it was cool, the rest of the city was completely underwhelming. There’s a reason that Rick does not include it in his “Best of Germany” guidebook. It’s a very crowded industrial type city full of traffic and construction. My point is, I would not make a special drive to that city at the expense of the beautiful southern region of Germany unless you were already there due to the train. I don’t know if you are from the US, but there is a fantastic Porsche museum in Atlanta that may give you a similar experience.

Finally, I would consider flying into Zürich and out of Munich instead of making a full circle. Or honestly, I’m not sure why you are flying to Switzerland at all. Why not fly to Germany if that’s where you are spending the bulk of your time? (Edit: never mind, I just saw the part about the Porsche tour.)

if you rent a car in Switzerland it will have the Vignette (toll sticker to allow driving on roads designated as highways even if single lane roads, or e-vignette of the same) for Switzerland but it probably won't have either the French Crit'Air or German Umweltplakette, both of which are environmental permissions allowing entry into cities such as Munich.

A German rented car will have the German sticker, but probably neither of the others.