We left the room fairly late, around 9:00am and headed a few blocks down to have breakfast at a little cafe. We both got a nice bun with cheese and egg on it, mine had lettuce and tomato too. We also ordered a coffee each. We then slowly walked to the old town, seeing some lovely street art along the way. 

In Marienplatz we arrived just as the glockenspiel  was doing its hourly thing, so we stopped and observed this with the crowds of people. First the bells ring and a little knight hammers on a tiny bell. Eventually the top level of the mechanism moves and jesters and knights move around in circles jousting. We watched for quite awhile, but left as the second layer of the clock started moving (a maypole and dancers). I figured that as people were busy watching the clock display, it might be a good time to climb the tower of St.Peter nearby. I think this proved to be a good idea. Apparently St.Peter is Munich’s oldest church. We marvelled at the lovely golden interior of the church before exiting and purchasing tickets for 5 euro each to climb the tower. The ticket sales man ignored us for quite awhile and finished reading a news article on his phone before reluctantly selling us tickets. We then began the fourteen storey climb to the top of the tower. 

The first portion of the tower is very narrow with low ceilings but eventually the climb shifts to another adjacent tower with wider steps. It was still tricky to pass people as we made our ascent. 

When we reached the top there were two doors out to the viewing balcony. The balcony is very narrow and only wire keeps you from falling to the courtyard below. You are awarded for your long climb up the tower with spectacular views of Marienplatz and all the surrounding buildings. Honestly this was a “must see” for me in Munich with such a lower price tag to climb, only 5 euro for adults! 

We walked around the tower and marvelled at the views before making our descent . We then visited the market nearby and found a stall to buy a flat white coffee, which we enjoyed at a little stand up table. We then bought our mom’s some Christmas ornaments at a booth, a dancing girl and boy puppet in a German style. We also bought ourselves a Christmas Krampus ornament to adorn our own tree. 

We then slowly made our way to the Chinese Garden via the English Garden in a huge park in central Munich. The Chinese garden has a large layered pagoda which is surrounded by a beer garden. The walk to the beer garden was lovely, through the forest fields of the giant park! 

At the beer garden we got two .5 litre beers, a bratwurst, potato salad and a giant pretzel, the biggest pretzel yet! You pay at one cash and get tokens for your beer stein deposit (2 euro). We then grabbed a fork (gabel in German which is hilariously my last name), and grabbed a spot amongst the tables on a green bench with a lovely view of the Chinese tower. It was a lovely little picnic. 

After our fest we walked back out of the garden, stopping to watch the surfers…yes SURFERS in the park. One of the rivers in the park creates the perfect perpetual wave. People surf all year here, even in the snow. We watched quite a few surfers ride the wave, then fall and get carried down stream with their boards attached to their feet (one actually came detached and the surfer had to dive in and swim quickly after it). 

From the park we walked to the museum and gallery district via a beautiful garden (Hofgarden) stopping into Theatinerkirche, a Baroque church that was decorated in white marble inside and yellow outside. 

We then journeyed to Alte Pinakothek, a classic art museum housing a lot of masters paintings from Van Gogh to Klimt, but with a very specific focus on classical religious (catholic) art. Some of the canvas’ were huge! I loved seeing the Klimt paintings in person as well as Van Gogh’s sunflowers and a few Manet paintings (one of my favourites) and LeTrec! The ticket cost 9 euro each. It wasn’t a huge collection, but it was a comfortable amount to see in one hour. The main guard at the entrance was a prick and didn’t stop us and an elderly couple from going the wrong way, causing us a lot of confusion and the older lady a lot of unnecessary stair climbing with her cane. 

We then decided to visit a new (to us) beer hall called “Augustiner Stammhaus” but it felt a lot like a restaurant so we opted to just go back to Hofbrauhaus. Along the way to Hofbrauhaus a German lady approached me in a panic, she started speaking in frantic German, asking for directions…. I had no idea how to help. I understood that her phone had died and she was asking for directions, so I opened my maps app and she typed in a place, found it and ran away with a panicked “Danka”. 

At Hofbrauhaus we oddly enough ended up at the exact same table as the day before in the exact same seats. We asked two men at the end if we could sit with them and they stood up to let us get in. We each ordered a 1 litre beer and timed how long it took to comfortably drink the huge beer. Jives took 17 minutes and I took 24 minutes (his stomach is bigger!). Hofbrauhaus was so much busier than the day before. We paid and left the beerhall via the outdoor beer garden space. 

We then visited the market nearby again where we found a spot to order some dinner, a plate of salmon and potatoes with dill sauce. We shared the plate as the lady did not understand I was trying to order two plates, she thought I was trying to talk her into giving us extra food and she nervously told us that her boss was very strict about portion size… I hadn’t meant to give her such anxiety, I only wanted to order two meals. Clearly my German skills are very poor. After we ate I handed her a 2 euro tip for the confusion.

We then walked back to our hotel. I stopped along the way to get snacks for us for our 8 hour train trip the following day to VENICE!!