S and I spent our summer holiday in his homeland and in between various family commitments, we took a short trip south to my favorite area. We'd previously been through southern Bavaria on our way elsewhere, but never spent enough time for me to get a proper feeling for Munich. One winter day and a November afternoon in a beer garden do not a city tour make.
I found an serendipitiously inexpensive and well situated hotel via app two days before, so by mid-afternoon we were settled in, car disposed of in the garage, and ready for exploration. S had arranged to meet a friend at the Pagoda so we started off with a wander around the famed English Gardens. The bosky paths intertwining with the swift moving river were exactly as I'd hoped it'd be, and with a panini and drinks we found a shady spot to enjoy the atmosphere and an overview of what seemed to be the prime sunning area for locals. As I looked over the prone bodies I noticed there seemed to be a surprising absence of clothes, which was confirmed when a nattily dressed guy arrived by bicycle and proceeded to remove every last stitch of his business casual outfit before flopping on a towel. Not quite the scenery I had imagined from one of the most famous parks of Germany! We continued the wander past another section of river where bathing-suited people floated under the bridge and then ran dripping back upstream to repeat the process, dodging lederhosen-clad bicycle rickshaw drivers carrying agog tourists through the chaos. A bit further on, we arrived at the pagoda and its immense forest of green-painted tables in the beer garden.
S's friend and her boyfriend were waiting so we ordered our immense one-liter drinks (we chose the half-and-half radler option instead of full beer) and a gigantic pretzel with obatzda and settled in for the evening, watching as the tables filled up and people brought out their beer garden accessories. Unlike anywhere else I've been in Germany, it's apparently quite acceptable to bring your own tablecloth, decorations, and dinner to a beer garden, and then just buy a few mugs of beer to round out the meal. After the place became too crowded for our liking, we moved along, over the Isar to their favorite local café for dinner, and then S and I went back to our cozy hotel by tram.
The next day we enjoyed a leisurely breakfast in the hidden garden of the hotel, marveling at our good fortune in finding the place before we packed up and returned to the center of town for an intense few hours at the German Museum. It's a full experience, that museum, from the impressive kaiserzeit architecture to the vast collection that covers everything from a 1906 u-boat to a fully operational miniature brick factory. We went our separate ways so he could look at spaceships while I checked out textile history and musical instruments. Three hours later, we'd both had enough so we went back to where the car was parked near the viktualienmarkt. The day was sunny, leafy and breezy so we ate lunch there- freshly squeezed grapefruit juice and goat cheese, sundried tomato, and rucola panini.
We'd found a hotel for the evening outside of town, so we decided to make one more stop on our way out, at the Nymphenburg palace. As we pulled up, I was reminded strongly of my visit to Versailles when I was in college, with its similar flanking outbuildings, and the grand canal setting off the gardens behind in a similar fashion. S was feeling a bit walked-out so I left him in the palm café and set off on a promising looking path. In classic grand schlosspark fashion, there were plenty of follies and a romantically winding stream criss-crossed by urn-topped bridges. There were plenty of swans gliding gracefully as well, naturally.
When I'd had enough traipsing, we continued on our way to our overnight, a classically Bavarian guesthouse on the edge of a forest, naturally with its own enormous beer garden. We supped there on creamy garlic soup, goulash and a tomato stuffed with goat cheese, herbs, and rice. A delicious end to a delightful pair of days.
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