Germany Road Trip 2025 ✈ Part 2: Neuschwanstein Castle • Rothenburg

Continuing with our 'Making Memories with Moms' series since 2022, we are back with another trip with our moms this year. This time, our destination was Europe - Germany, Switzerland, Luxembourg, and Liechtenstein. We kicked off our trip in Germany, and drove around the entire country in 10 days covering a total distance of 2856 kms (1775 miles), and continued our journey in Switzerland by trains. This was a hectic trip but we are so thankful for the opportunity to enjoy all the amazing places and sceneries with our moms, making memories that will last for a long time.

10-Days Road Trip Around Germany, Luxembourg & Liechtenstein

7-8 May 2025: Journey to Munich

9 May 2025: Neuschwanstein Castle, Rothenburg

10 May 2025: Nuremberg, Bamberg, Dresden

11 May 2025: Berlin

12 May 2025: Cologne

13 May 2025: Luxembourg, Trier

14 May 2025: Cochem, Rhine River

15 May 2025: Heidelberg, Gengenbach

16 May 2025: Black Forest

17 May 2025: Liechtenstein, Friedrichshafen

9 May 2025 (Fri): Munich - Neuschwanstein Castle - Rothenburg ob der Tauber

Early start for day 2. Checked out at 6am and packed all our bags into the rental car to begin our road trip. Even though the car didn't look big, the trunk was surprisingly spacious enough to fit all our bags. We were also glad there was a cover over it to hide everything in the trunk.

The drive from Munich to Neuschwanstein Castle took about 1hr 45min, and took us through the quiet countryside. Hubby was the designated driver on this trip while I was in charge of navigation, taking photos/videos, and preparing food.

Quick photo stop at St. Colomon church on our way to Neuschwanstein. Unfortunately, the weather turned cloudy and foggy as we got closer to Neuschwanstein. Spot the castle in the fog.

Made it to Neuschwanstein at 8.20am and parked at the parking lot for €10 ($13.64). We then took the shuttle bus to the castle for €5 roundtrip per person. We were able to pay with credit card on the bus.

After getting off the bus, it was a short 3 min walk to Marienbrucke bridge.

The Marienbrücke is the most popular vantage point at Neuschwanstein Castle. This is also the most famous photo spot around the castle with a fantastic view of the flat hill country behind it.

Had the whole bridge to ourselves, which means more photos and videos. =)

After taking plenty of photos on the bridge, we walked 15 minutes from Marienbrücke to the castle.

Honestly, I wasn't impressed by the front of the castle. Could have skipped walking all the way to the castle since we weren't going into the castle. The view from Marienbrucke was much better.

Wrapped up our visit of Neuschwanstein at 10am and took the shuttle bus back to the parking lot.

Continued our journey along the Romantic Road to our next destination...Rothenburg. The 3hr 45min drive was pretty easy and hubby had fun speeding on the Autobahn. We were caught in a bit of traffic and learnt that in Germany, it's the law for drivers to shift to the sides and create a clear path down the middle when traffic grinds to a halt — it's called the “rescue lane.” 

Arrived our hotel in Rothenburg - Gästehaus Eberlein at 1.45pm. No chain hotels in Rothenburg so we booked 2 double rooms on booking.com for €75 per room.

Walked from our hotel to Rothenburg Old Town at 3.15pm. So glad the weather was clear and sunny!

Climbed up and walked around the old town wall.

Rothenburg ob der Tauber, is one of Europe’s best example of medieval glory, with charming fairy-tale spires, ingenious fountains, and neo-Gothic churches. It is one of Germany's best-preserved historic walled towns.

No it's not Christmas season but Rothenburg is Germany's Christmas capital so you'll find the holiday spirit year-round at Kathe Wohlfahrt's Christmas Museum. The store is free to enter.

Rothenburg Old Town is very walkable. The pleasant weather certainly makes sightseeing more enjoying. 

Early dinner at 5pm at Zur Holl...an old-timey German house with stone walls and wooden beams.

The food was pretty good but we didn't realize that they only acccept cash until we finished our meal so we had to make a quick run to the atm to withdraw cash...fail lol!

Wrapped up our sightseeing of Rothenburg around 6.30pm with a photo stop at this classic photo spot of Rothenburg - Plonlein. This is one of Rothenburg's most iconic streets and appeared on Disney's Pinocchio.

Made a quick stop at LIDL to buy some bread for breakfast and lunch tomorrow before heading back to our hotel and call it a day.

Next stop...Nuremberg, Bamberg, and Dresden!

Germany Road Trip 2025 ✈ Part 1: Munich

Continuing with our 'Making Memories with Moms' series since 2022, we are back with another trip with our moms this year. This time, our destination was Europe - Germany, Switzerland, Luxembourg, and Liechtenstein. We kicked off our trip in Germany, and drove around the entire country in 10 days covering a total distance of 2856 kms (1775 miles), and continued our journey in Switzerland by trains. This was a hectic trip but we are so thankful for the opportunity to enjoy all the amazing places and sceneries with our moms, making memories that will last for a long time. 

10-Days Road Trip Around Germany, Luxembourg & Liechtenstein

7-8 May 2025: Journey to Munich

9 May 2025: Neuschwanstein Castle, Rothenburg

10 May 2025: Nuremberg, Bamberg, Dresden

11 May 2025: Berlin

12 May 2025: Cologne

13 May 2025: Luxembourg, Trier

14 May 2025: Cochem, Rhine River

15 May 2025: Heidelberg, Gengenbach

16 May 2025: Black Forest

17 May 2025: Liechtenstein, Friedrichshafen

Trip Planning

Back in 2010, I had the opportunity to travel around Europe and visited a few countries on that trip. I usually prefer not to revisit countries that I've been to before but this trip was an exception. Hubby had always wanted to do a road trip in Germany, and I've been wanting to revisit Switzerland after watching Crash Landing on You, so we decided to plan a trip that would allow us to visit both countries and invited our moms to come along with us. 

We booked our flights in June 2024 when the flight first opened for booking, but I procrastinated till December 2024 to finalize our itinerary and book our accommodations. Switzerland is an expensive country to visit but fortunately, we were able to use points and miles for to book our flights and pay for some of our accommodations, which made the trip cost slightly more 'reasonable'. 

7 May 2025 (Wed): US/Malaysia - Munich

Even though this was a multi-week trip, we all traveled light with only our backpacks as we would be hopping around a good bit.

Arrived Huntsville airport at 8.15am. Almost had a panic attack at check in when the staff informed that there was problem with our tickets as the system was showing that we 'missed' our first flight. Apparently, our tickets were not issued correctly when we changed our first flight (to a later flight) due to a schedule change by American Airlines. Thankfully, the AA staff was able to fix and issued our tickets after a few phone calls to her supervisor...phew!!

Flight #1: 1.5 hours from Huntsville to Charlotte at 9.30am. Redeemed our flights from Huntsville - Charlotte - Munich for 19,000 AA miles + $5.60 per pax. 

Arrived Charlotte at 11.50am with a 4-hours transit in Charlotte. I was able to secure Oneworld Emerald status for this trip with my Alaska Gold 75K status (from a temporary status match), which gave me access for 2 to the AA Admirals Club lounge in Charlotte. However, all 3 of us were able to get into the lounge thanks to a nice AA lounge staff. The food served were good enough for a free lounge.

Flight #2: 8hr 45min from Charlotte to Munich at 4.25pm on American Airlines. As always, I was 'strategic' with my seat selections and intentionally selected both ends of the middle section of 4 for the both of us. My strategy was successful and we were supposed to have the whole row for just the two of us...until a lady requested to switch to our row because she couldn't fit into her bulkhead seat (because the armrest was fixed and couldn't be lifted for her to sit comfortably in the seat)...ughh!!

While we were traveling from the US, mom was traveling solo from Penang - KL - Abu Dhabi - Munich and enjoyed the lounges in Penang and KL. Redeemed 3,400 Enrich points + RM33.76 for flight from Penang to KL on MAS, and paid $354.90 (RM1,573) for the flight from KL to Munich on Etihad.

8 May 2025 (Thurs): Munich

Arrived Munich at 7.10am. We timed our arrival perfectly and our flights landed 5 minutes apart from each other, but mom got through immigration and baggage claim much faster than us. Even though we arrived at the same terminal, Munich airport had different immigration area for each flight so we had to walk to another area to look for mom.

Bought the group day travel card (for 2-5 pax) for Zone M5 for €30.50 using the ticket machine at the airport train station. A one-way ticket from the airport to the city would have cost €14.30/pax so it was much cheaper to get the group day ticket for the 4 of us. A day travel card can be used on airport trains, regular trains, buses and trams. Took the 8.10am train S1 from Munich airport to Munich Laim station. The journey took about 35 minutes.

Arrived Munich Laim station at 8.50am. Even though we were able to see our hotel from the train station, we still had to walk about 15 minutes to get to our hotel. Fortunately, the weather was nice and cool, which made the walk a pleasant one.

Booked our hotel in Munich for 13,500 Wyndham points per room per night (2 rooms). For some reason, the hotels prices in Munich for that night were very high so I was glad to be able to book this hotel with a pretty reasonable number of points. The hotel was pretty basic but had all we needed for a comfortable stay. There was also free coffee in the lobby. 

While the moms rested in the hotel, hubby and I walked from our hotel to Enterprise - Munich Laim to pick up our rental car at 10am. We had to wait for about 45 minutes because there was only 1 staff working on that day. We opted to pick up our rental car from this location instead of the airport or train station as it was cheaper. It worked out perfect as this location was close tou our hotel.

After waiting for an hour, it was finally our turn to pick up our rental car. It was my first time picking up rental car from a basement garage, which wasn't ideal as it was too dark to properly inspect the car, and to take photos and videos around the car. The staff also didn't have time to clean the exterior of the car before handing it to us but at least the interior was clean.

Our rental car (compact SUV) for 9 days in Germany with different drop-off location costs €330.82 ($371.21). Thought we'd get a German car but got a Ford Focus instead.

Parked our rental car in the hotel and took the train to the city since we had the day travel card. We also didn't want to deal with parking in Munich. It was a short 15 minutes ride to Marienplatz station.

It was already 12.30pm by the time we got to the city so our first stop was lunch at Hofbräuhaus Beer Hall.

Hofbräuhaus Beer Hall is a 3-floor beer hall dating back to the 16th century serving Bavarian cuisine, music and upbeat vibe. There were musicians playing in the beer hall and we sat next to a group of uncles who were enjoying their beer gathering.

Ordered big beers, pork knuckle, sausage platter, potato dumpling, and 1/2 Bavarian roast chicken.

Finished lunch at 1.50pm and it was time for sightseeing. First stop...Marienplatz. 

Second stop...Odeonsplatz. Here we begin the ABC tour of Europe...

ABC = Another Big Church/Cathedral/Castle

ABC #2...Frauenkirche. I remember walking around Munich all by myself and visiting this church on Christmas morning in 2015. Pretty impressed I was adventurous and daring back then!

ABC #3...St. Michael's Church

€1 public toilet in the train station...so fancy that it takes credit card too! Yes, hubby was desperate enough to pay to use this...lol!

Most places in Germany accept credit cards, but we still withdrew some Euros from the ATM machine using our Charles Schwab debit card just in case. Travel tip: When withdrawing cash from ATM or using credit cards in a foreign country, always decline conversion (choose the local currency).

Finished our sightseeing at 3.15pm and it was time to head back to rest. We made a quick stop at Aldi Sud to buy some bread and sandwich for dinner befor returning to our hotel. Hubby also found his favorite wafer biscuit (Manner) here. Wrapped up our day early as everyone needed rest after the long travel, and I had to make it back to the hotel to join a 3-hour work call.

Next stop...Neuschwanstein Castle & Rothenburg!