We started our 2nd tour day off having breakfast at the restaurant downstairs. Wonderful little buffet, with a LARGE bread selection. I discovered that the medium sized pretzels on the little wooden tree were an absolute delight if you spread peanut butter and jelly on them! The staff also offered fresh made omelets and coffee, what's not to love?
After breakfast, we met outside to get our tour listening devices, check that our buddy was present, then started walking . This is a google earth rendering of our hotel location and the center of the Marenplatz where we met our local guide, Michael.
Michael, was hands down one of the most entertaining, knowledgeable, and very informative tour guides we have ever had. He mentioned that his other job is as a high school history teacher, and I believe he must be the most popular teacher in the subject at that school. He was phenomenal.
He gave us some broad history of the area, with visual aids, audience participation and role play! Highly entertaining information about the monarchy, flags, and the church. We then headed into a church to see first hand what he had been describing.
St. Michaels Church is massive! This is a stitched together panorama to try and capture some of the scale!
We continued our walking tour to the statue in front of the Bayerischer Hof Hotel. Apparently, Michael Jackson used to stay there all the time. When he tragically passed, the residents of Munich decided to make the statue of Roland de Lattre, an impromptu shrine to him.
We kept walking and were shown the memorial of Bavarian Prime Minister Kurt Eisner, who was assassinated in 1919.
One thing that I appreciated more than anything else with Michael's tour, was his grasp of the historical significance of the locations he showed us.
His grace at acknowledging the darker parts of Germany's history rather than glossing over things was eloquent and poignant.
He carried a binder with him that had historical photos from WWII to help illustrate the significance of buildings, and locations as we walked along. He would describe the place we were standing, it's history, and then open up to a page in his binder showing photos from the 40's to drive home the relevance of what we were looking at.
We saw the Feldherrnhalle monument on our pre tour walk-about, but did not know it's history or significance. Michael expertly gave insight into the dark history of this spot, and the role it played in the rise and reign of the Nazis. With sobering but tactfullly explained facts, photos, and compelling narrative we gained understanding for a landmark steeped in world history.
Steps from the Feldherrnhalle monument was this plaque describing the significance of this street.
We next toured parts of the grounds of the Munich Residence. We had seen parts of it before on our own walking tour, but here again, Michael showed his storytellers spirit, by filling in the details and giving us the context of our surroundings.
We stopped at the Brunnenhof courtyard at the Munich Residence, which is home to the Wittelsbach Fountain. Each figure represents one of the four main rivers of Bavaria; the Danube, Isar, Inn, and Lech
The last stop on our guided tour by Michael was the Marienplatz, where the Rathaus-Glockenspiel dominates the square. Rick covers its significance in his "Munich, Capital of Bavaria " video.
Here's my video of a portion of the performance. It goes on for a LONG time!
After the tour, we decided we really needed to try a true Bavarian Beer Hall. Part of the tour with Michael included Hofbräuhaus. We thought this would be the place to try some German beer and Bavarian pretzels!
The band kept us entertained as we decided what we wanted to eat!
The food was good, the beers, while decidedly not our favorite, were not terrible! After our meal we decided to finish out our day with a tour of the Residence.
To say this was opulent, and over-the-top with floor to ceiling filagree and gold leaf just about everywhere would be a major understatement. Each room got increasingly more and more absurd with the amount of decor, and finery in every possible nook and cranny! While we appreciated the historical significance of the Residence, we both felt in the end that it was entirely too much!
