Walking tour of Munich on a Monday

A bit of a slow start to the day which was nice. Caught our favourite tram…Number 19 to Marienplatz in the Altstadt and found our ‘Walkative Free Tour Guide’ outside the toy museum, who took a group around for about 2 and 1/2 hours. He was very well informed and had a good sense of humour too. We started at the Juliet statue, and then went to the Frauenkirche (or Munchner Dom) rebuilt by the women after WW11, very white inside with a huge Advent wreath over the altar. The onion domes became a feature for other churches in Bavaria and no building in Munich can be higher than the church’s domes. We saw a wonderful bronze cast of the city buildings outside the church which the guide used to show us the various important buildings and the amount of damage they suffered with the bombings

of WW11 (85%). At midday we stood with hundreds of others to watch the famous midday dance of the Rathaus Glockenshiel. A wedding celebration on the top and the dance of the coopers at the end of the plague in the 1400’s - or thereabouts!! It was a fantastic sight with all the Christmas markets below and the gothic Rathaus and the brilliant blue sky above.

We then walked to Max Joseph Platz and heard the stories about the man, his wedding and that he is has the only statue with the figure seated. All the other statues in Munich are standing or on horses - a bit of trivia! The old legs were getting a bit tired by this stage but we continued on the Odeonplatz to hear about the statues and lions there. One lion looks to the Redidenz with it’s mouth open reminding the people to speak up about issues and the other lion had a closed mouth to be respectful to the Theatine Church - a white ornate church with a stucco interior. The king had his wife and 6 daughters

immortalised in statues around the churches dome and his only son was above the altar.

Mike and I left the tour then which was continuing on as we need food and a drink. We entered the Residenz Museum Christmas markets and had a brunnerwurst and sauerkraut…very nice and an apple cinnamon donut type thing - apfelkuchle...also delicious! Fortified we then walked back to climb the Pfarrkirche St Peter tower…about 300 steps…we have a thing about climbing lighthouses, towers and in Sue’s case tall trees in W.A. - another story!

Before doing up the tower we may have indulged in a kaffee and a nice piece of cake…shared this time! We slowly climbed the stairs…the ticket office person looked twice when Mike asked for 2 senior discount tickets…we made it up okay and saw Munich spread in all directions before us all the way to the snow covered alps. We walked all around the top and looked down on the people in the Marienplatz Christmas markets…a fantastic view on a sunny calm day. Very lucky! We enjoyed visiting the church afterwards, it was really beautiful and they were finishing decorating 2 enormous Christmas trees while we were there. A very long ladder was needed!

I went into the cute Christmas shops opposite the tower and bought a couple of cute decorations…certainly not cheap but nice. We then went to look at some shops to buy Mike a new pair of trousers but no luck… the prices for clothing is really high and they did not have his size. So window shopping instead - see photos of the amazing Christmas trees. I saw an amazing lederhosen outfit at only 1299 euro. - just for the pants…hand stitched too!

We enjoyed a lovely meal of schnitzel with Michaela and Sean at a restaurant - Preysinggarten - near Max Weber Platz…lots of food, a

nice wine and great conversation. Sean had been filming all day and had shaved off his beard for the film shoot…we all thought he looked younger and a bit like Freddy Mercury…much to my amusement…not! I thought he looked a bit like Ted Lasso! Another great day.