München ist Ausgezeichnet! (Munich is excellent!)

Ferris: Cameron, what have you seen today?
Cameron: Nothing good.
Ferris: Nothing - wha - what do you mean nothing good? We've seen everything good. We've seen the whole city! We went to a museum, we saw priceless works of art! We ate pancreas!

My brother, Jonathan, Phil and I went to Munich, Germany last week, and while we didn't eat pancreas, we did see everything good in the whole city, just like Ferris, Cameron, and Sloan in Ferris Bueller's Day Off. Well, maybe it wasn't everything in Munich, but we tried pretty hard and it certainly felt like we did an awful lot. Here are a few of our favorite things about Munich:

Outdoor space – There is an incredible amount of beautiful green park space in Munich. Though it was in the high 20’s to low 40’s, we braved the cold and spent much of our days outside. We walked all around the Schloss Nymphenburg, an incredible summer estate built by the Wittelsbachs (the dukes of Bavaria) from 1600 to about 1850. Though the palace was only a summer home, it was pretty amazing: think Versailles in Bavaria. The grounds were equally impressive with miles and miles of trails, woods, lakes, and gardens. Beautiful in the winter, I can only imagine how pretty it is in the spring or summer. Munich’s English Garden (Englischer Garten) is another incredible green space in the city. Just from walking around, you could tell that lots of people use this park for running, biking, dog walking, etc. I loved that it was so used by the people who live in the city. A river flows through the park, and dams give it waves. Despite the freezing weather, there was even a guy surfing on the man-made rapids. Munich really does have an amazing amount of usable outdoor space. It made it feel like a city that people really want to live in.

Beer Gardens and Beer – Could we write about Munich and not mention it?

1. Hofbrau Haus - famous and crowded, but incredibly good beer. We drank liters of HB Hellas (the light lager) where the steins are so large, Phil needed two hands to drink it! This place is known as the city’s most famous tourist destination and can seat thousands of people. One lesser known fact about the Hofbrau Haus is that on the second floor of the building, Adolf Hitler organized a failed coup attempt known as “the Beer Hall Putsch” in 1923. That fun fact is not posted on the walls next to the oompah band…

2. Chinese Pagoda (Chinesischer Turm) in the English Garden – could we go to Munich without a stop at the Chinese Pagoda? Too bad it was bitterly cold by the time we got there, or we would have sat outside. It was a much prettier structure than I was expecting, and my brother and I had to have a photo standing in front!

3. Ayinger – A fantastic and much less touristy beer hall across the street from the raucous Hofbrau Haus. It was recently renovated and had a much more modern feel to it. It wasn’t crowded at all. The basic Hellas beer was a favorite, while the hefeweissen was unfiltered and refreshing.

4. Lowenbrau – we finally got to drink outside in Munich! Some unknown genius planned Munich so there are two beer gardens within a five minute walk of the train station (Franziskaner and Lowenbrau). We hit up Lowenbrau before we left town, and got to bask in the winter sun and toast to Munich before hitting the road for home. It was a great cap to a couple of days together!

Modern Art – Phil and I love to get lost in museums. I particularly love modern art museums, while my brother informed me that he hasn’t been to a museum in years. He decided that it might be fun to see some priceless works of art (call him Cameron), so we spent a few hours at Pinakothek der Moderne. The space of the building was exquisite and created what is now one of my favorite museums. My vote for best installation was by a Slovak artist named Roman Ondek. It is interactive because everyone who enters a large white room is measured against the wall. Then your name is written with the date and you become part of the installation with thousands of other people…and the visual effect is freaking cool.

We were also lucky (or, if you are my brother, “lucky”) to run across a sign for a Mark Rothko retrospective while in Munich. It was a fabulous chance to see the body of his work, instead of just the abstract block color paintings for which he is most famous. It was a very memorable because not only did I learned a lot, but I almost caused an international incident when I was looking for the WC and inadvertently blew past a security guard into a “restricted” area. Let me just say that it is not cool to cause rising blood pressure in a large German guard.

Roasted meats and wurst – One of the goals of Jonathan’s trip to Europe was to sample local cuisine in all its glory. We certainly attempted to eat our way through our three days in Bavaria with an impressive sampling of restaurants. We had multiple kinds of wurst, lots of pretzels and spicy mustard, multiple kinds of sauerkraut and cabbage, delicious goulash soup, roasted chicken…and that was just at dinner the first night. We even had a discussion about how difficult it would be to live as a vegetarian in Munich while eating liver meat balls! (Phil’s note: if you’re offered the Bavarian meatloaf, give it a shot. It’s like a giant loaf of hot dog, but good. Trust me.)

Marienplatz – This is the tourist center of the city, and it is centered on the famed Glockenspiel (carillon) on the Rathaus (new town hall). Tourists gather daily at 11 am and noon to watch a series of clock-work figures dance, sing, and joust(!) while the carillon plays a series of songs. Seriously, it’s much more elaborate than the Prague astrological clock, but a little tiresome. The whole song and dance lasts fifteen minutes, and your neck gets pretty sore. Much better, and just around the corner, is the Viktualenmarkt – an outdoor food market with food, flowers, and (of course) sausage merchants and three beer halls around it. The fruit was fresh and amazing (Phil’s note: even if Danielle’s apricot cost 4 euros), and the atmosphere was incredible. Most beer gardens let you bring in your own food, too, so buying picnic supplies and hitting up a beer hall is a major attraction.

Munich is a wonderful city for so many reasons. We were thrilled to see it with my brother and enjoyed every minute of it!

Ferris: Ladies and gentlemen, you are such a wonderful crowd, we'd like to play a little tune for you. It's one of my personal favorites and I'd like to dedicate it to a young man who doesn't think he's seen anything good today - Cameron Frye, this one's for you. “Danke schön, darling, Danke schön…”