I'm working on plans for summer vacation, which will include about a week in the Dolomites. I've never rented a car in Europe before, but in order to get to all the hikes I hope to do in this week, I really don't see another viable option.
I'm straying beyond Rick's guidebooks, which always makes me a little nervous, so I wanted to reach out for advice.
I plan to stay around Cortina for a couple nights and around Ortisei for a couple nights, but the order isn't super important. I will be starting my trip in Vienna, and after the Dolomites, I'll be heading to Zermatt. My original thought was to take the train to Innsbruck for a couple days, then train to Bolzano and rent a car there at the airport. My thinking is that Bolzano is a good spot to pick up and drop off given where I'm coming from and heading towards... but my initial searching has that costing about $500 for 5 days, which is doable, but seems like there must be a more economical way.
Another thought was to rent the car in Innsbruck and then detour back through Innsbruck to drop it back off ... but that eats time even if it saves a bit of money.
I've also considered just doing a long travel day from Vienna to Cortina via Lienz and Dobbiaco, but that's not super appealing, and I feel like renting a car in one of those places will be even more expensive, AND it's not convenient to drop in that same location on the way out of the Dolomites to Zermatt. After typing this out, I'm not considering this as an option anymore unless there's something big I'm missing.
What other options should I consider? Is one of these options better than another? What would you do?
Thanks in advance for any advice you might be able to provide.