The Best way from HERBORN - MUNICH - FUSSEN -MUNICH or RENTAL CAR in Europe?

Q2,3,4. There is a train station at the airport. They can buy a Bayern ticket that goes for 23 EUR for the first person and 5 EUR for each additional person up to 5 people traveling together. Buy out of a vending machine or pay an extra 2 EUR service fee to buy at the ticket window.. There is a connection every hour that gets them to Fuessen in 3 hours. On the even hours, one connection at Munich Hbf, on the odd hours an addtional connection at Kaufbeuren. Schedules are at www.bahn.com.

Q1, You could take a train to Frankfurt Airport and rent a car anytime. Or take train to Fuessen and wait until Monday to get a car.

I assume we are talking about Herborn, on the Dill River, NNW of FFm, in Hesse.

1. The Bayern-Ticket won't cover all of you travel, because some of it is not in Bavaria. Since this is a weekend day, a Schönes-Wochenende-Ticket, 44€, would cover your travel.

2. However, a regional pass would require use of regional trains, and the trip would take over 9 hours and probably require 5 or more changes of trains.

If you can commit now to a specific train, you can get a non-refundable SparPreis ticket using an ICE and/or IC for part of the trip. Right now I can see two connections at 12:40 and 13:22 for 48€ for two people, but these connections have 4 or 5 changes of trains and get to Füssen at 19:55. There is also a connection leaving Herborn at 12:22 with only two changes, getting to Füssen at 18:56, but the fare right now is 58,90€.

For Füssen to Munich airport (I assume you are going directly), the Bahn shows almost 3 hours, with a change in München Pasing to the S8. Depending on the time, there might also be another change of trains before Pasing, in Kaufbeuren or Buchloe.

@ Lee, I was talking about the friends who are landing at Munich airport and going to Fuessen to meet up with the OP, as stated in Questions 2, 3, & 4. Sounds like OP has no trouble getting to Herborn. The OP did not say whether it was 1 or 2 or more people in Herborn.

Both your advice is a great help!! Thank you so much.

Yes. I can commit now.
Q1: Where do I get our tickets? The SparPries for the ICE part, and the Brayern one as well? Online?
This part confuses me tremendously, do I go to the DB site? What is OP? Or should I wait until I get to Herborn on Oct 23 and purchase at the station? I would LOVE to purchase the one that has 2 stops...

Of course, I have more questions. :)

We are the type of traveler that uses a central loc for home base anywhere we travel. we travel anywhere we can within a few hours (4-5hrs) distance, see the scenery, sights and head back for rest, and at it again the next day. We don't mind the travel, we DO mind slugging suitcases around with us every night at a diff location. Hence the "home base". We'll be in business meetings the first week..which will require more clothing, ie more/larger suitcases. We like hikes, mountains, history, fun type excursions (trams, luge, etc), shopping, and great food. WE AVOID tourists areas (if we can) in the food/shopping part

I have been looking into a rental car (most specifically once we reach Fussen), but with all the fees; eco tax, pick up/drop off, VAT, tolls, parking, some kind of permit I'm told I need, crossing borders, etc..I am beginning to wonder if we should take a train to the other places we want to see.
*Bavaria area: castles, zugspitze, etc
*Austria: Salzburg (optional we dont care about Sound of Music tours) Halstatt, Vienna
*Switzerland: Berrgasthaus Aescher
*Italy: northern area, Vennice, Milan, Lake Como
*Anywhere else we can head to

Granted, that's the "wish list". But I have been looking at Euro rail pass vs all the others out there. Confusing, but we are open to mass transit now as a consideration since the rental car seems to piling up on $$.

Q2: Weather and daylight hours, what are we looking at for the last week of OCT/first week of NOV? Are we expecting to see too much in possibly shorter daylight hours?

Q3: Rental Car vs Rail pass? Does a rail pass cover all the trains (local, ICE, IC and all the others in these places)? Overnight trains? Where would I get tickets online?

Q4: Should we exchange our dollars for the Euro once we get there (Frankfurt), and use ATM's for other cash?

Your help is MUCH appreciated!

Sorry, "OP" is forum-speak for original poster. That's you.

Edit - Next, DO NOT LOOK AT EURAIL PASSES! You will be in Bavaria for the most part and can travel through out by buying a daily Bayern ticket I described previously.
How many are in your party in Herborn? How many are in the party arriving at Munich airport? They will likely get to the destination before you as they probably will arrive in the morning, and you can't get going until after lunch from Herborn which is north of Frankfurt.

I'll try to work through your laundry list of questions.

Get Euro from ATM's.

You are the OP, OP means Original Poster, the person who started the discussion.

Bavaria area: castles, zugspitze, etc

Austria: Salzburg (optional we dont care about Sound of Music tours) Halstatt, Vienna

Switzerland: Berrgasthaus Aescher

Italy: northern area, Venice, Milan, Lake Como

You have 9 days and plan to stay in one play the entire time. Visiting all of these places from one base is, I think, completely unrealistic. You should drop Italy and Switzerland and just plan on Bavaria and Austria. If you really want to visit Italy, then I suggest you plan on splitting your trip into at least two bases.

Q2: Weather and daylight hours, what are we looking at for the last week of OCT/first week of NOV? Are we expecting to see too much in possibly shorter daylight hours? About 10 hours of daylight. http://www.timeanddate.com/sun/germany/munich

Quite simply, there is no one location that would allow daytrips from your wishlist. At best, you can see the castles near Füssen and Zuspitze from one location, and perhaps Salzburg as a very long daytrip. But that's it. The others are simply too far, by either car or public transportation. Even Vienna isn't really much of a daytrip from Salzburg, other than a quick stop just to say you were there.

Q2: Weather and daylight hours, what are we looking at for the last week of OCT/first week of NOV? By this time, the weather pattern has usually changed from the bright, dry days of late summer/early autumn to the damp, heavily overcast pattern that persists until late spring. This has a huge effect in the mountains, where you can easily stay at the foot of a mountain for several days and never see the summit due to fog and low clouds. So, a daytrip to Ebenalp from Bavaria? Absolutely not worth the effort, given your effort is likely to be rewarded by seeing nothing but a curtain of grey mist.

Q3: Rental Car vs Rail pass? Does a rail pass cover all the trains (local, ICE, IC and all the others in these places)? Overnight trains? Where would I get tickets online? Third-party rail passes (Rail Europe, etc) are almost always one of the most expensive options for travel. Whether or not you choose to drive or take public transportation should depend on your own priorities. You can get significant discounts if you can commit in advanced to riding certain high speed trains, and there are a host of regional passes available (no need to buy these in advanced). Your best option is to familiarize yourself with the website of Deutsche Bahn. Having lived in Germany, I found using the train and public transportation most convenient for travel between large cities, but considerably less so for moving between peripheral destinations. Just because it can be done doesn't necessarily mean that it's the best fit for your vacation. Also, realize that night trains are fast becoming extinct, if they haven't completely died out already.

This topic continues at https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/transportation/train-tickets-vs-rental-car-europe-2016.

Look at your posts on this thread after the initial one. On the left, under your name, is a gray square with "OP" in it. That's you.

Rail passes (Eurail or German Rail) include all public trains, including some (Meridian [M], Mittelrheinbahn [MRB], VIA, etc) run on German Rail tracks under the privatization policy of the Bahn. Note: Rail passes are not excepted on the privately run Bayerische Oberlandbahn south of Munich (Holzkirchen to Tegernsee and Schliersee). Unlike some countries, where passholder "reservations" are a surcharge for their fastest trains, and are often rationed and could be sold out to pass holders on some trains, the German trains are always available to pass holders. Reservations are about 4,50€/seat and not required.