Vineyards/wineries near Munich
 

We will have a short visit in Munich mid November and have a rental car from Friday afternoon to Monday morning. Original plan was to pick it up in Munich on Friday, drive up to Stuttgart and stay overnight at the Le Méridien. Saturday morning continue up to Schloss Lieser and stay for two nights as I wanted to stay in a castle and my wife wanted to check out the vineyard. Monday morning, return the car in Frankfurt and catch our flight to Paris. I just found out that my 1-way car rental has to either end in Munich, or begin and end in Munich. Are there any recommendations for vineyards/wineries within a ~2hr drive or Munich? I can forgo the castle but the wife loves dry white wines. I know it's not a long time but I'm open to any and all suggestions. Our main flights are from Boston to Munich and then Paris back to Boston which the prices have gone up a good bit so those are difficult to change.

The region Oberbayern, where Munich is located is not famous for wine. The next wine region is Franken https://www.frankentourismus.com/reg...-wine-country/ which is between a 2 to 3 hours drive north of Munich.

I just returned two days ago from visiting wine regions in Switzerland (Valais) and Germany (Kaiserstuhl). It depends on how serious of a wine connoisseur your wife is. I usually spend a minimum of 1.5-2 hours at a winery asking a lot to questions, making notes and comparing the wines. I evaluate both reds and whites. We brought back 2 cases of Swiss reds and whites this time. I’ll be going back in November to get the German wines while visiting friends.

I think your task would have been easier if you were in Frankfurt rather than Munich, given the limited amount of time. The FT German residents can give you a better idea of wineries within 2 hours of Munich because I’m not aware of any.

My advice would be to do your homework before leaving on your trip. Depending on the winery, you could be tasting Grauburgunder, Weissburgunder, Chardonnay, Riesling, Sylvaner, etc. Choose a locale, research the wineries in the area and pick 2 or 3 to visit. If you leave everything to chance, you’ll probably be disappointed. The Falstaff wine guide can be helpful as a resource.

An alternative is to find a good wine shop in Munich.

Plenty of wineries around Stuttgart - quite off the beaten track in terms of what's well known internationally, but they like to say that the reason for them being relatively unknown is that they sell most of their wine to locals. The terroir is quite special, and the wines are as well - Trollinger red (which is "Schiava" in Italy or "Vernatsch" in Tyrol) might be a bit of an acquired taste, more so if you're accustomed to what Germans call "new world" wines (US, Australia, South Africa, NZ, Chile).

Put "Weiprobe weingut Baden-württemberg" into Google and see what comes up along your route. There are some big estates (the Duke of Wurttemberg's winery is one of the big traditional places - www.weingut-wuerttemberg.de), but most are co-operative or family-run traditional affairs. In fact, the City of Stuttgart itself owns and operates a winery (www.weingutstuttgart.de) which owns some of the most famous vineyards along River Neckar (Cannstatter Zuckerle happens to be entirely within Stuttgart city limits).

Many of the small wineries have currently closed their cellar door outlets because of Covid, but near Stuttgart Dolde (Dolde Wein: Dolde Wein) appear to be open again on Saturday mornings. Better check beforehand if they're actually open, an what type of service they're offering at the moment.

ETA re car rental: catch a train to Stuttgart and pick up the car there. If you go on Friday, make sure you book well in advance and with reserved seats, Friday evening is peak hour for long-dinstance trains leaving Munich.

She is far from a wine connoisseur, mainly just enjoys a good pinot grigio. Or any dry white wine. Had a blast in southern Italy (Sorrento) 2 years ago trying almost anything the restaurants and small shops had to offer. I couldn't name half of what we had.

Thank you for your suggestions. We may just head towards Stuttgart to see what we can explore around there and then head back to Munich.

Check if you can find a better deal for the car rental, one ways are decently priced in Germany if you use a corporate or AAA rate.

If she enjoys Pinot Grigio, she should start with the Grauburgunders which are made from the Pinot Gris/Grigio grapes. Don’t ignore the other whites, however.

We've decided to explore around Bavaria. Still trying to decide on where to stay for the 3 nights. We usually stick to Marriott properties but Schlosshotel Steinburg has caught my attention.

The two properties on Lake Fuschl would be right up your alley ;)